Kelly Ripa Says Getting Botox in This Surprising Place Has ‘Changed My Life’

The admitted “teeth clencher” says the injections helped her with her nighttime struggle

Kelly Ripa at Family Equality's Night at the Pier Gala held at Pier Sixty on May 12, 2025 in New York, New York.

Kelly Ripa in New York City in May 2025.Credit : Adela Loconte/Variety via Getty

Kelly Ripa says she was a “real teeth clencher” who would grind her teeth at night — until her dentist recommended Botox injections in her jaw, which she said “changed my life.”

While riffing with husband Mark Consuelos about her bedtime routine on the June 5 episode of Live with Kelly and Mark, Ripa, 54, shared what she’s done to stop grinding her teeth.

“You have so many things going on in your mouth. You’ve got your retainer, you’ve got the little band, the thing …. Do you have upper and lower retainers?” Conseulos, 54, asked, teasing his wife about her multiple appliances.

Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos on Live With Kelly and Mark

Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos on the June 5 episode of ‘Live with Kelly and Mark’.ABC

“I’m not going to tell you because you live with me and every night you watch me get ready for bed,”  Ripa retorted. “I’m going to let you figure out whether I wear an upper and lower retainer.” Conseulos joked that “whatever it is,” it causes Ripa to slur her speech “for the first few hours at night and the first few hours in the morning.”

But the dental appliances, she explained, are because “I was a tooth grinder“ — until she “got Botox in my jaw because my dentist recommended it and it’s changed my life. It’s changed my life.”

“I was a real teeth clencher,” she continued, joking, “I clench my teeth because I don’t want what I’m thinking to come spilling out of my mouth.”

The real issue with the nightly habit, as Consuelos explained, is that tooth grinding, or bruxism, “can cause tooth wear. You grind your teeth down. It gives you jaw pain, muscle pain.”

The cause, he said, is “anxiety and stress … caffeine. Annoying husbands cause this.”

Botox can be “promising and beneficial in the treatment of nocturnal bruxism,” one study published in the National Library of Medicine explains, saying it may be “an alternative and effective treatment for nocturnal bruxism and masticatory [chewing] pain.” Along with tooth and jaw pain, Consuelos joked the habit can cause someone to develop “those over-built” jawlines.

“For a guy, it’s good,” Consuelos said jokingly, because it creates “a nice strong jaw line.”

Young woman's hands holding the case where she keeps her invisible silicone aligners for dental correction. mobile orthodontics

Stock image of a woman reaching for her nighttime retainer.Getty

The Botox, Ripa explained, helped her reduce her night-time accessories to “upper and lower [retainers], no head-gear.”

“I put my retainer in. That’s what I’ve got going on,” says Ripa, who’s no stranger to Botox; the TV host has previously told PEOPLE that she’s had the injections between her eyebrows and in her armpits, which “helps with sweating,” as well as in her neck, which “stops your neck from aging.”

As Ripa told PEOPLE, “I know about Botox,”