Food for health #2
When food threatens your teeth
The new curses for our teeth are both a too agressive hygiene and a propension to make or swallow acids. Here’s why.
A tooth’s anatomy
The gum is the pink fragile part above your teeth.
The part of a tooth you can see is called the tooth crown. It’s covered with enamel, a very hard but abrasive material.
Above, the tooth’s root can’t be seen in a healthy young adult’s mouth, but appears naturally over time. It’s covered by a thin layer of cementum; a very tender material that disappears easily with friction.
Under those two layers, there’s a third one called the dentine. This one is very sensible to hot, cold, and touch when it’s exposed after both enamel and cementum disappeared.
Finally, at the center of the teeth, there’s the pulp: a center canal composed of blood vessels and nervous systems that doesn’t matter in this article.
Agressive hygiene is not hygienic
That’s the first curse. Don’t forget to brush your teeth from top to down, and only from top to down. No bottom up, neither any transversal move. A transversal brushing from back to front will retract your fragile gum. Moreover, the arc shape of it favors tearing in the lower part of that arc. The transversal move will deepen the tearing slowly by slowly on the gum, creating a slot of one mm long. Going on with that brushing will continue spreading tissue; the slot will open itself to leave room for tooth shaving. The cementum will be bare and attacked in turn, leaving room to the dentine and to pains caused by hot, cold, and touch.
In addition to a bad movement, the situation would be worsened by an abrasive toothpaste (composed of silice for instance, like in a lot of “whitening” toothpaste), a hard or medium hard toothbrush, and toothbrush bristles of different lengths (because all the brushing strength will applied on a few strong bristles).
Remedy: brush your teeth from pink to white (therefore top down only, from your gum to the teeth) with a fluorinated toothpaste without silice, a soft toothbrush with bristles of the same length. Your pains will disappear in 3 to 5 days.
When the food you eat can win against your teeth
That’s the second curse. Take back the tooth’s anatomy. An acid food absorption repetition, like the little lemon juice in the morning, acid orange juices, vinaigrette with too much vinegar, will melt your teeth’s enamel and cementum in acid stagnation regions. Those regions are the dental faces against the cheeks, more often below.
In case of repeated vomiting, we’ll get the same results on the teeth up in front, on the palate side. If you have acid lifts by night, you’ll get a tooth melting below in the back.
You’ll get the same pain explained before, in contact with hot, cold or touch.
Remedy: stop acid food for a time. See a doctor for gastroesophageal reflux disease. In the meantime, rinse your mouth with a teaspoon of baking soda in a half glass of water (it’s a base, killing acidity). Afterwards, your teeth will remineralize themselves on their own. They’ll do it even better with the help of a well fluorinated toothpaste. Unfortunately, the melted parts won’t rebuild themselves.
Therefore!
If your teeth hurt you in contact with cold, hot or touch, if you don’t have caries and if gritting your teeth don’t hurt you, verify your brushing, and check out if there’s any acidity issue with your diet. Following those advise should relieve you quickly.
