TGW Progress

Hello,

I’ve spoken about progress in personal messages but I’ve generally kept myself out of the discussion so as not to influence it. That was a good call, as I had tried an abandoned the AGGA last year. I think Ronald Ead has done as good a job as anyone could covering that device ( https://jawhacks.com/), so I did not re-iterate my results. In short, I had 10mm of gaps open up, but CBCT scans showed no bone changes outside of the alveolar ridge and after stopping treatment the gaps have completely closed.

Starting in childhood and increasing in adulthood, I would have back spasms large enough to cripple me for 2-3 days. In the past 2 years they have declined and now stopped, which indicates to me that my spinal health has improved and this may be due to a more balanced skull sitting on top of it.

Facially I believe I am more symmetric with time. My declining vision in my right eye, the side with a completely opacified maxillary sinus, has improved. My inclination is now that width and symmetry come before forward growth. Otherwise the initial gains I spoke about in this first article ( https://the-great-work.org/adult-palate-expansion-progress/) have stayed but not significantly improved. There was a rapid improvement in the first year in the face and multiple areas of health, as outlined in the article, but I hit a plateau.

After the failure of AGGA and coming to the general conclusion that the skull can not be forced into a correction using devices, I’ve explored and made use of all sorts of other therapies. This includes craniosacral therapy, endonasal therapy, as well as all sorts of osteopathic work. While helpful, I am now of the opinion that most cases of improper growth are not strictly mechanical in nature.

To go further: The innervation of the tongue and most areas of the face and cranium come directly from the brain stem. The tongue, maxilla, and lower jaw for example are all innervated by the trigeminal nerve.  The attached GIF shows the various innervations. Using the metaphor of a tree, the trunk of the brainstem and spinal cord branch into the face and cranium (and of course, the neck and shoulders and rest of the body).

Hence I have switched from looking at the branches and leaves of the tree to looking closely at the trunk and roots. If a plant is not grown properly, you would be naturally inclined to look to see if the stem and roots are properly functioning rather than trying to correct individual wilted leaves or flowers. And you would nurture the roots and stem to restart the growth that has halted, rather than trying to force the leaves to grow straight with force. The human body is, sorry to labor the point, a living organism. While there are mechanical forces at play, growth signalling is all happening through energetic signalling and energy fields. This is accepted science, Tufts, observing the formation of a frog’s face :

The Tufts biologists found that, before the face of a tadpole develops, bioelectrical signals (ion flux) cause groups of cells to form patterns marked by different membrane voltage and pH levels. When stained with a reporter dye, hyperpolarized (negatively charged) areas shine brightly, while other areas appear darker, creating an electric face.

https://www.enn.com/articles/42977-electric-frog-face

https://now.tufts.edu/news-releases/face-frog-time-lapse-video-reveals-never-seen (This link contains a video)

This is known across the orthodontic/dental/medical fields, hence the perfectly acceptable theory that lack of growth signals result in improper growth, and why appliances attempt to give the nervous system growth signals. They are attempting to signal to the branches of the nervous system in the hopes that it will restart growth – with mixed results that quickly stall.

I am now tackling the topic from the other end, hypothesizing that issues in the very core of the nervous system – the brainstem and spine – are causing a lack of signalling out or a lack of reception to signals coming in. I believe that various patterns, largely unconscious and with various sources (such as trauma) are held deeply in the nervous system and brainstem (“reptilian brain”). The central nervous system is being inhibited from its fully flowered form of function, and this manifests as a body that has not fully flowered.

I am happy to talk further about my research and practice into restoring the nervous system; I have theorized that these discussions will eventually branch into their own sub-forum as many are reaching similar points of development in their understanding:

On close levels of examination one eventually comes to the understanding that the body and mind are not separate. Now begins the study of yoga

I have approached medical experts about these more esoteric ideas and it seems that there is already a large contingent of the medical community who see the parallels between modern science and ancient understanding from around the world. Sutherland of CranioSacral Therapy and Myers of Anatomy Trains are two examples. I broached this topic with Mike by pointing out how posture and personality correlate so strongly, and how tongue/etc posture can likely never be fixed without a change in personality. Mike was clearly already aware of these topics, and I’ve since started to contact groups who are exploring these ideas in various spheres.

I have been keeping close tabs on device development and general topics during this period as well. I reach out any time someone discusses a new procedure or device that seems promising or of interest to people on this forum.

About the website and YouTube channel: I have been working to better develop both, and that has largely kept me from writing articles. I hope to rebuild the entire website from scratch as a developer so that I can implement ideas I have for features (and drastically cut down our hosting costs). I am also working on my video production and 3D modelling to make videos for the YouTube channel.

If there is an appetite for articles and videos about the topics above, I can try working on them sooner rather than later. At the moment I am waiting to see if the forum naturally proceeds in that direction, rather than trying to influence it in any way. Yet I will also continue with articles and videos frameworked around peer-reviewed research that pertain directly to healing the body and craniofacial form.

If, in the meantime, you would like more information I believe this is an excellent resource: https://www.aypsite.org/

They also have their own public user forum.

@admin Could you share more info regarding the personality – posture theories/ ideas?  Genuinely interested in how these relate. Could I pm you?

@admin Here I thought I was ahead of the game knowing about mewing, seems there is a whole nother group that is even more ahead of the game.

@admin I think it’s far more likely that the improved posture and facial structure inevitably makes people more confident. There’s something to be said as well about the inherent feeling of “comfort” associated with proper facial form, whereas asymmetries and unbalanced growth causes weird muscular imbalances that feel “off” Someone who doesn’t know what a proper facial form feels like would just think they’re shy or awkward, but in reality they’re just physically deformed.

I had fantastic progress in the past but relapsed briefly and am now back to solid progress, so I know how they both states feel pretty directly.

I couldn’t agree more about the posture–personality link. I noticed very distinctly that when I first had some progress with mewing at about age 21/22 or so, and especially when I recently had MSE expansion (which happened over several weeks!), my temperament completely changed to be more relaxed, easy-going, and my cognition sharpened (but that last one might just be diminished sleep-disordered breathing). There is obviously a positive feedback loop between the way others treat you because of your looks and the way you act because of how you’re treated by others, but I’ve been thinking for a few years now that the biggest reason that low-CFD people act the way they do is because that’s how they feel, or stated in another way, CFD causes physiological impairments that partially manifest as emotional handicaps.

I have a pet theory that part of the mechanism for that is that low-CFD people can emote more easily and accurately because the soft tissue (muscles especially) is better able to function when attached to an bone surface that distributes it across the full range of motion it should have, which in turn affects how you feel. Have you ever heard of how making yourself smile mechanically will cause you to feel happier in that instant? Try it! High-CFD people often have doughy or ill-defined face contours and you can easily tell that mewing “stretches” their same soft tissue across their face, and I and others on this forum have noticed that a genuine, happy smile will come more easily to a mewed face, and given what we know about mirror neurons and micro-expressions ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microexpression ), would it not follow that Mew’s maxim that a face that has the wrong shape does not function as well could extend to emoting, interpersonal connection, and your social experience? Why is it that old people with advanced, acquired CFD rarely crack a big smile and seem like they’re just a little emotionally muted? Why are so many good-looking people characterized as charismatic?

I do a week research about spine and lordosis sclorosis … , Some theory come out that spinal cord doesn’t growth fully and so it affect spine and stretch it so cause the spine not to be straight! I think it could also relative to how a not enough tall, stretched spinal cord could affect the jaws and bring face down!? 

@admin Any idea about using nasal insulin, igf1, ngf to get nerve growth and so bone and tissue growth? i dont get why u link yoga website? do you think yoga work on spine could help? 

@admin What a great answer. The deeper I get in the more complex it all seems and quite beyond my ability to explain. I have long suspected that orthodontics and postural change were operating in completely different ways and,whatever the visual similarities of the results, they were achieving different physical results.

I had thought the variety of methods I have employed was a protection, in that I was more likely to do harm if I over repeated one technique. Now I think it is essential to progress to be proceeding on multiple fronts simultaneously. There is even an element of Wilhelm Reich’s body armature going on in the face; added work to proceed on this front too, but rewards way beyond those I set out for.

Your post was also a useful for reminder of what I set out looking for. I had severe back problems that prevented much my of life. I was not setting out to get better looking, breathe better, and so on. Even starting to try mewing improved this without one fraction of a mm of increase in IMW. For some years now I have had no problem at all with my back. Save last summer after a lot of digging in the garden. My back felt sore and I smiled. I had got normal ageing man back pain and it was hard earnt. What progress from ending up bedridden for days because I sneezed while shaving.

As the unimagined benefits of this work unfold I worry that I am stuck on an never ending quest. My wife does too. It is not yet time, but nearly, for me to do the difficult work of withdrawing much of more attention from this work. Tbh I dread it.

My back was my problem, but in the moment I met Mewing I did realise in was in fact about the totally of my health. By your references to alchemy I have the impression you always have too. 

Good luck man thinking that some sort of subconscious meditation will make your face looks more normal is just pseudoscience and worst than that. All you are going to do is waste years of your life while you could go for surgery of the maxilla and mandible at a young age cause believe me I am in several group discussions of jaw surgery and what I saw is that around 26 even Maxillary advancement or rotation doesn’t show that much on the physical of the patient and it gets worst with age as with mewing. It is the same for the recovery process from that surgery. My advice to everyone who read this is that sometimes you’re too old to hope correcting yourself by non proven sciences and if you have still some years to spend before your bone remodelling significantly stops you should hurry yourself out and reach an ortho or surgeon to get yourself healed. Do not waste your time ! 

Posted by: @ope

Good luck man thinking that some sort of subconscious meditation will make your face looks more normal is just pseudoscience and worst than that. All you are going to do is waste years of your life while you could go for surgery of the maxilla and mandible at a young age cause believe me I am in several group discussions of jaw surgery and what I saw is that around 26 even Maxillary advancement or rotation doesn’t show that much on the physical of the patient and it gets worst with age as with mewing. It is the same for the recovery process from that surgery. My advice to everyone who read this is that sometimes you’re too old to hope correcting yourself by non proven sciences and if you have still some years to spend before your bone remodelling significantly stops you should hurry yourself out and reach an ortho or surgeon to get yourself healed. Do not waste your time ! 

Well you’re just completely misinformed. There are tons and tons of people in middle age with proof that mewing or orofacial myofunctional therapy works, and works very obviously, but just to put this to bed without posting a huge number of case studies, see this:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=R5S5AZ50pAE

Tom Colquitt was a 70-year-old dentist in 2016 (not to imply he is deceased) who gave a presentation entitled “I Can’t Breathe!” My Personal Journey from Chronic Inflammatory Disease to Wellness where he discusses his lifelong chronic health problems and how a Homeoblock appliance worn from 2014–2015 fixed virtually all of them and increased the volume of his face, which he measured with a laser scan.

@silver Of course using an appliance will work at some degrees to any patient any ages. Mewing does not have any appliance and this will of course give you some results in your remodelling stages but it will never cure significantly a destroyed face. This old man did not have any significant changes physically. He definitely had some but it is not significant. Even if he had bimax I don’t think it would’ve tones of physical effect cause of his age, don’t waste your time. Get the best you can 

Posted by: @ope

@silver Of course using an appliance will work at some degrees to any patient any ages. Mewing does not have any appliance and this will of course give you some results in your remodelling stages but it will never cure significantly a destroyed face. This old man did not have any significant changes physically. He definitely had some but it is not significant. Even if he had bimax I don’t think it would’ve tones of physical effect cause of his age, don’t waste your time. Get the best you can 

It obviously did have a significant effect, as shown by the fact that his lifelong chronic health problems disappeared with no other changes lmao

@silver I’m talking about aesthetic changes