u/LurkyMcLurkface123

Really see the title. I’ve been a financial professional for roughly 15 years and have either participated in or been the key holder on around a dozen large scale integrations at small business and large business.

I have never in my entire career had a worse experience than with Avalara. Up until the moment the ink was dry on their sales order it was great: fast answers, lots of promises, US based sales staff, etc.

Since then everything has fallen completely apart. All of their integration and support staff are based overseas. This is beyond the typical difficulty to understand. They basically play issue hot potato for weeks if not months at a time. You can tell the major objective is to get an email out of their queue as fast as possible, not to solve anything.

They frequently no show on calls, their escalation process is non-existent, and they are unable to answer simple questions about either their software or their tax position.

I would take a pay cut to fire them if that’s what it took. I don’t know that I’ve ever regretted a decision more in my professional life.

Avoid at all costs.

I always fantasized about coming to Reddit after years and years of searching for an answer to my issues and sharing the story so someone could maybe find it one day and not have to redo the work.

I was dx with vestibular migraine about 13 years ago after a sudden onset of daily attacks that felt like a mixture of seasickness and intoxication. Had a complete neuro and gastro work up which was negative. Saw an advanced eye doc, completely negative. The illness was constant and affected my family, my work, and just about every other part of my life. It was with me at funerals and weddings. At the birth of both my children. It was like an evil little demon with me all the time.

Eventually trialed elavil and that was a game changer. Instead of 6-7 attacks a week, I was having 5-6. Big improvement when you’re miserable. Vestibular rehab therapy, every legacy and modern migraine medication including the new wave expensive stuff, and no noticeable relief. Finally found a rescue med that worked amazingly well, which was compazine particularly in combination with alprazolam and Benadryl. That was my go to for years but obviously not ideal or sustainable. I’ve trialed injections, pills, neuro stimulation, medical marijuana, becoming a borderline alcoholic from self medicating, everything.

That brings me back to April 1st of this year. I had a tooth go bad due to resorption, which I had never even heard of. Dentist extracted the tooth and in passing asked if I was a grinder. I said that I was and I experienced frequent tension headaches. At this point I did not draw any lines between VM and bruxism/TMJ. Dentist suggested an occlusal guard as a potential preventative for more tooth issues due to grinding. I received and started wearing the guard April 20th.

That was exactly one month ago. In a typical month I would take medication roughly 25-27 times. In the past month I have taken medication four times. An almost instant, almost complete, painless, drug free remission. I needed most of those four doses in the very beginning and now I’m two weeks straight with zero medication.

I was floored. Extremely emotional that something so small, simple, and relatively affordable could fix a devastating, decade long disease progression. I couldn’t at first wrap my head around the idea that something as generally benign as grinding my teeth could effectively destroy my quality of life for years.

If you’ve made it this far and any of this sounds familiar, consider seeing a dentist who can make a professional guard for you after confirming TMJ/bruxism. Maybe it helps no one, but if it can prevent one other person suffering so long it’s worth the share.

Obviously one month in is a risky time to declare victory. I’ve spent the month trying to identify any other variables and I can’t think of any off the top of my head. Really hoping it sticks around!