Ashley Beels

Education

University of The Pacific Arthur A. Dugoni School Of Dentistry, BS in Dental Hygiene, Class of 2012

Cal Poly SLO, Masters in Educational Leadership and Administration, Class of 2013

Institute for Integrative Nutrition, Class of 2014

Breathe Institute: MyoMentor, Myofunctional Therapy, Class of 2022

Harvard Medical School Post Graduate Medical Education: Effective Writing for Health Care, In process: Graduation Date July 2024

Specialties, training, areas of interest: Sleep-disordered breathing, airway-centric dentistry, biological and holistic dentistry, body compensations, oral appliance therapy (DNA, EOT, Myobrace, MAD), TMJD, nutritional counseling

My Story

My story with oral myofunctional wellness started when I was just 9 years old. Like many children, I struggled with thumb-sucking as a child. Despite 5-years of orthodontic treatments, my underlying issues were never addressed, leading to shifting teeth and mouth breathing. It was not long until my mouth breathing led to sleep-disordered breathing and jaw pain as a young adult. To attempt to fix the crooked teeth, dentists I worked for suggested Invisalign. This pattern happened 4 times- all in attempts to straight these teeth that just kept moving!

After 10 years in dentistry, I learned about oral myofunctional therapy and sought out treatment for myself, suspecting this was the root of my forever-shifting teeth. It was no surprise I was diagnosed with several dysfunctions, including a reverse swallow (tongue-thrust) and a tethered oral tissue (tongue-tie). I share this to let you know that I myself, a dental professional of 10 years, alongside the 22 dentists I worked for in my career on the Central Coast, all did not know what we did not know: that we dental professionals had not been adequately trained on non-functional tethered oral tissues, TMJD, sleep disorders, swallowing dysfunction, and how to evaluate properly. For this reason, I believe an oral myofunctional therapist should work in every dental office, pediatrician’s office, and ENT’s office to assist in the proper development of the craniofacial structures of our youth, avoiding dysfunction, pain, and more invasive procedures in the teenage years and adulthood.

I started my oral myofunctional practice within my dental practice, Rooted Dental Wellness in 2021. However, a year later I outgrew the space and opened Untethered in 2022. For those familiar with RDW, Untethered is connected to Rooted Dental Wellness and has an entrance right next door.

Untethered is now offering group oral myofunctional therapy for children, a fun social setting for kiddos to learn myo in a more cost-effective approach to care. Untethered also has space for other providers who are offering care such as lactation consulting, feeding therapy, speech therapy, palatal expansion, and mini-myo (a play-based therapy for children under 5). Untethered has now completed over 200 cases, and we are growing our practice to include airway orthopedics and orthotropics.