Girlfriend teeth grinding

[strakekul]

My girlfriend stopped taking sertraline about 4 months ago (it was for panic attacks) but became increasingly anxious and started taking them again almost immediately.

Since then, she's started teeth grinding / bruxism quite severely, which is giving her a bruised jaw and somewhat frustratingly, keeps waking me up at night. We both suspect, but can't guarantee, the tablets are causing this.

She has tried a mouth guard, but she has basically chewed through it in 4 weeks, still has some symptoms of bruised jaw, and still keeps me awake.

Her doctor has upped her sertraline dosage to 100mg which has seemingly changed nothing.

It's at the point where I'm getting increasingly frustrated with lack of sleep but every time I mention anything about her maybe trying to stop / change medication to see if that helps, I get completely shut down.

Can anyone give me any tips on how to approach this situation? I don't want to be the guy who doesn't understand her problems...

[aprilmoon]

Hi
Could you try some other low level noise on in the room to mask the sound a bit?
I've found putting a fan on low speed,you can turn it away from you if its too cold,creates a sort of "white noise" that can mask other sounds quite a bit.
I've done this to drown out the noises from a busy road,and it works quite well.
I know this won't help your poor girlfriends bruised jaw,but it might give you a bit of sleep while you're working on it...

[Emphyrio]

SSRIs are notorious for causing bruxism, though in my case, I did it before I was every on any medication. How long has she been taking the sertraline for (and how long at 100mg) and did she grind her teeth prior to restarting sert?

I really think you should keep telling her to do something before she wears her teeth down to nothing - whether it involves lowering her dosage or getting another mouth guard. Apparently SSRI induced bruxism can be helped through the addition of an anti-anxiety drug called buspirone. Magnesium can also help - particularly well absorbed magnesium such as taurate and glycinate.