Continuation of my story

General Eagle Syndrome Stories
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This is what I posted in March below

For the last 3 years I’ve been dealing with what I thought was and have been told was tmd muscle dysfunction and pain due to night time clenching. Over the last 6 months noticed my neck is stiff meaning limited motion turning my head. Especially to the left. I pulled my neck and it’s never been the same. Since December 2024 I’ve noticed that when I swallow usually during sleeping my throat on the right side feels bruised or like strep. I tested swallowing my head turned left and there’s no pain then I turned my head right and swallow and there seems to be a lot more muscle engagement in my whole Adam’s apple and muscles move up and there’s an ache. Kind of triggers what they now call my post traumatic neuropathic pain. I do these my functional exercises and I’ve been doing them because it’s good for TMD chin, tucks and tongue to the roof of the mouth and open the mouth and side side jaw side to side and I thought I might’ve irritated some of the muscles in the neck because of those chin talks, cause I wanna do a chin talk. It hurts my neck inside my neck same area. Also I do the Latore scapula stretch to help with movement left and right and it helps, but that might be irritating so I’m kind of grasping at straws. I also scrape my tongue pretty regularly after I would brush my teeth and I do it aggressively and so I’m not sure if the tongue sticking my tongue out and scraping the tongue could irritate the throat, so I’m kinda like don’t know what to think. I want to see a ENT in December talking about that showing how my right engages more than my left when I swallow when I turn my head, left the right how the Adam’s apple and the neck muscle is just engaged completely differently when I have my head turned right she looked through my nostrils and looked at the throat and said there’s nothing in there blocking it so you’re good there if you have any issues come back but that’s about it. I’ve rescheduled for another appointment. I’m just so frustrated. I’m using voice to text so I hope you understand what I’m saying.

Update:

So it seems I have gotten over the swallowing issue - I’m not sure if I irritated the throat muscles with all the exercises I was doing with the neck. Stopped them.

I have been suffering these symptoms on the left side: aching in the mandible back of jaw under ear and then it moves to the ear. Pain is consistent sometimes burning and dull ache can range from 1 to 6 out of 10. pain may move to the inside of the mouth in upper and lower gums inside and outside gum line. Some days are better than others. Pain can come out of no where - no triggers.

As of now I’m accepting that I have PTNP with some tmd muscle issues from clenching. I have a night guard.

Anyway I emailed a specialist that dealt h with tmd issues - he took a full ct scan a couple years ago and told me my styloids are normal. I emailed him and asked him how many cm my styloids are. He said mine are normal at 1.7 cm. ChatGPT looked at fhe images and said they are elongated / haha.

I’m going to upload the pics he sent me from his scans let me know what you think. Thanks

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I’m sorry to but I meant to say my pain is more on the right side.

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@tyoungin to me, just by looking at them, your styloids look to be within normal limits (i.e., less than 3cm). I’d guess around 2-2.5cm, which is the population average. Unless I had access to the imagine and was able to measure, we won’t know for sure.

However, it’s not always the length but rather the angle and thickness. I don’t see any calcified stylohyoid ligament which is good.

If you can get access to the imaging that would be best. I would want to check your hyoid greater horns and thyroid cartilage to make sure they aren’t digging into anything.

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@tyoungin - You’ve completely lost the lordotic curve in your cervical spine. A straight cervical spine is called military neck. The loss of the curve brings the styloids closer to nerves & vascular tissues in the neck with your head in neutral & other positions. The curve can be restored via PT or doing gentle neck exercises at home.

Here is a discussion that has a lot of information about neck anatomy & exercises to help with military neck:

I second what @TML said about the styloids not needing to be elongated to cause ES symptoms. The shape, thickness, angle of growth, how curved, twisted or pointed they are can all play into them causing symptoms. We’ve had members w/ normal styloids that had unique physical features which caused ES symptoms & thus styloidectomies were mandated. Your left styloid is thick & oddly shaped; your right one has a downward curve at the tip. Both of these features could cause them to be irritating nerves.

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I do have the disc with all the images. Is there a tutorial on how I would be able to view this?

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Thanks for your tips. There is so much info out there on military neck. Is there just one video that you recommend that I try?

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I actually have a video on a straightforward way to interpret the axial view of CT imaging (in my opinion the best view). It should help you find the landmarks.