What we need to get us through the day is a good night sleep. So we don’t need any distractions while we are resting at night. If something really uncomfortable happens while we sleep, then this can disrrupt our sleeping routine.
We can’t really feel most of the things that happen during sleep, but if they are extremely painful we will notice them for sure.
One of those things is biting tongue during sleep. This painful experience will surely wake you up, and disturb your sleep.
We will be discussing possible reasons of this experience, and the way we can treat them.
Causes of biting your tongue in sleep
This is actually a very common experience for many people. In most cases it is normal and it is not connected to anything severe or dangerous. You body might simply do this because of some twitch you have, and it is not dangerous. However this can also be caused by other conditions.
One of those conditions are seizures. Seizures affect our body in a way that they create movements and reactions that we can’t control. If you ever felt a seizure, or you have seen someone have one, you know that our body starts reacting beyond our control.
So, tongue biting might be a sign of seizure that happens during night, or in our sleep. You will surely notice this happen, and what you should do is visit your doctor immediately.
A head scan is necessary in this case, because you need to examine your brainwaves during sleep. What is possible is that when you are awake, your body doesn’t have any reactions or doesn’t expose them, but at night when your body is relaxed and your brain is still working they can occurr.
Your doctor will prescribe you medications if necessary and also suggest you to change your daily routine and adjust your meal plan, so this doesn’t happen anymore.
Other possible reason for tongue biting at night might be teeth grinding.
Although this doesn’t seem like an answer, when you grind your teeth, you can bite your tongue accidentally during this process. Teeth grinding is a disorder that affects many people.
Causes of this disorder are numerous, and some of them are anxiety, depression, alcoholism and many more.
To stop biting your tongue at night, you might need to dig depper into this disorder and find out what is causing it. When you eliminate those causes, tongue biting will stop.
Rhytmic movement disorder can also be the reason why you are biting your tongue. This disorder makes our body move uncontrollably and we can’t help it.
What causes this disorder is yet unknown. It is connected to our brain functions, and certain people simply have this disorder. To help treat this disorder there are special medications but the correct treatment is not determined.
Sometimes wearing braces can be the cause of your tongue biting. Expecially if you have been wearing them for a short while, and you haven’t gotten used to them yet. They can be very uncomfortable for us, and things like tongue biting can occurr during our sleep, when we don’t control our movements completely.
Maybe you are used to sleeping in a certain way (different jaw positions), and with braces these positions are not possible. Your tongue in this case might not have too much room, and that is when he gets hurt.
Sleep apnea relaxes our tongue. When it is fully relaxed it can fall into our throat or between our teeth, which makes it harder to breath or we can bite our tongue during this time. this can also happen few times during the night, and it is important to know how to treat this condition
. To do so, you need to visit your doctor and ask for advice. During treatment you will need to take medications that will help you control this condition while you are sleeping, and prevent you from hurting yourself.
Stress can cause many different conditions in our body, and one of them is even tongue biting. Your body might be fighting with this awful condition through these night movements, that are not controlled by us. During pregnancy, women can experience this often due to hormones that affect their bodies.
Infections like Lyme disease can be the possible reason for tongue biting. This condition affects our brain and impulses wrong signals to our central nervous system. These signals cause our body to move uncontrollably.
This disease can even cause night seizures, which I mentioned eralier, so it is important to visit your doctor and to all the necessary examinations. Treatment for this disease include probiotics that will restore your normal digestive flora and keep your digestion in balance.
Treatment after tongue biting
When the damage is already done, all you can do is treat the affected area. Depending on the cause, your injury can be more severe or less.
Sometimes these injuries can be really hurtful, and even cause wounds on your tongue. Bleeding can also occurr ir your injury is more severe. In these cases it is always recommended to visit your doctor.
As much as it can look like a simple injury, the cause of it can be more dangerous than you think. Like the examples I mentioned earlier. Some of these conditiones are really dangerous, and if not treated they can be life threatening.
So, if you wake up with a serious injury, then call your doctor and do the necessary examinationes. If the injury is not that serious, then you can apply home treatments that can ease your pain before you visit your doctor and find out the cause.
Try applying something cold on your tongue. You can use ice cubes or something else, and put it on your tongue. This will numb the pain for a while, until the inflammation goes away. This pain can be really severe, and we have probably all felt it at some point in our life.
To clean your mouth from bacteria that can infect your wound, try rinsing your mouth with salty water. This will clean your mouth from possible infectiones. You can rinse your mouth for a few times until your wound heals, or your pain is gone.
It is recommended to avoid eating spicy or hot foods until you are feeling better. Spicy food will make your pain bigger and you certainly won’t enjoy your meal. eat thing that don’t require too much chewing, so more liquid and soft foods.
Healing time depends on the injury. If your injury is greater, it can take some time to fully recover and if it was only a small bite then you will be fine in a short while.
Really severe cases of tongue injuries can be extremely hard to treat, especially if tongue biting continues and we are doing nothing to cure it.
This is why it is important to find out the cause of this condition. If the wound is blleding it is importnat to ask for medical help because you might need a more serious treatment.
In most cases this condition is normal and it is not caused by a life threatening condition. Examine your daily routine and notice if you have changed something that might be causing this condition. If nothing comes to mind then ask for medical help because the cause might be more serious than you think.
Make sure to exclude stress as a possible reason, since this condition is mostly avoided by all of us and sometimes even by our doctors. Try including more fun activities in your daily routine, and if nothing helps then do the necessary examinations to find out the reason.
Although it might not sound like a big deal, when you feel that pain during the night it will make a big difference.
