The feeling of your own body fighting against you is a surreal one. When my jaw is locked shut it's like a betrayal; like in the middle of the might someone has come and wrapped a rubber band tight around the left side of my head. No matter how I try, I cannot fix it. I must wait until it resolves itself. It's usually only a couple of minutes, maybe a few hours. This time it's been seven days.

Chalk it up to stress. When you pour forty-plus hours a week into something that you hate for almost a year, chances are you won't walk out unscathed. Some people get sore necks, bad backs, knee problems, migraine headaches. Not me. When I'm angry or unhappy, ready to punch the next person who tells me the tips slot is full in the face, all the energy wasted, that tension bound up, it goes straight to my temporal mandibular joint. Can't talk, drink, eat, kiss, laugh, scream without some serious and unnecessary pain.

You try what ever you can think of. Heat, cold, popping anti-inflammatorys. Hell, I even chewed on an eraser the other day because some doctor my mom knows said it might reverse the pressure. Nothing works for long. At this point I'd let someone punch me in the head if it helped.

It gets me in my sleep. Like Freddy-fucking-Krueger, it sneaks up while I'm dreaming