Have you thought about how you look without your teeth intact? Well, it won’t be something alluring anyway. As trivial as many think it is, the teeth does a lot to add some glamour to our faces, of course apart from masticatory and other sundry functions.
Asides the glamour, think about speech without your teeth. It’s practically impossible. Or, it’s possible, except, of course, that you’re going to sound so incoherent that only few would want to associate themselves with someone who speaks in such a bad manner. So, it’s extremely necessary for you to take care of your teeth and that’s what we’re gonna help you do. But before that, we’ll take a look at diseases that could ruin your teeth.
Cavities (Tooth Decay)
Tooth decay destroys an essential part of our teeth that strengthens and defends them, the enamel. When the teeth are left at the mercy of dangerous bacteria, these bacteria could hang on to your teeth and form a sticky film called dental plaque. This can lead to tooth decay.Your teeth are designed to last a lifetime — of course, if they’re natural. Tooth decay affects everyone, whether you’re a child or an adult. It affects everyone, so far the natural teeth are still around.
Apart from plaques, gum diseases could also lead to tooth decay, especially among children.
Gum Diseases
Gum diseases, also known as periodontitis or gingivitis, are diseases that harm the gum that keep the teeth firm in their place. When the dental plaque we just talked about stays for too long on the teeth, it forms a hard, somewhat harmful covering (which is called tartar) and sadly, brushing doesn’t clean tartar. The longer these two (tartar and dental plaque) stay, the more damage it does to the teeth.
Eventually, your gums become sore, red and swollen, and this is known as acute gingivitis. If gingivitis is left untreated, it can detach your teeth from the firm grip of your gums, leaving pockets here and there that can get infected. This is called periodontitis, and if this too is left untreated, such teeth become damaged and your dentist may have to remove them. Of course, these are not things you’d love for your teeth, and we’ll go right now to how to care for your teeth
How to Care for your Teeth
Brushing your Teeth
Well, this cannot be overemphasized. Brushing has been the age-long first step to taking care of your teeth. It’s quite the simplest way to care for your teeth. Brushing may be of utmost importance to your dentist, the way even hold your toothbrush while brushing also plays a major role in making your teeth healthy. While brushing, you should ensure that you hold your toothbrush at 45 degrees to your gum line so that both your gum lines and teeth surface can make contact with the bristles.
Also, you should make sure to brush your teeth for about two minutes so that the greater part of the teeth is touched. Once you’re done with your teeth, you should face your tongue. Scrub your tongue and the roof of your mouth to rid the mouth of any bacteria; which in turn gives bad breath no chance.
Flossing
Here’s another alternative that actually complements brushing and does not substitute it. It is common knowledge that flossing consumes a lot of time. Despite its time-consuming characteristic, one fact should remain in your mind: even after brushing, up to 40% of your teeth surface may not have been touched. Flossing helps to remove some food particles and germs that just brushing cannot remove.
What’s more to flossing? Flossing has the ability to reach deep into your teeth — something brushing may not help you achieve. Therefore, it is only wise for you to floss at least once a day.
Shun Smoking, and Drink Less Alcohol
You’ve probably heard this a million times from the dentist. Avoiding tobacco is a sure way to keep your teeth from danger. Tobacco has a special ability to cause oral cancer and/or periodontal diseases, and shunning its intake is one way to prevent these unfriendly visitors from coming anywhere close those precious teeth. Of course, tobacco is just one way to contract these dental diseases.
Alcohol is also a determining factor when it comes to tooth destruction. It is brewed from certain chemicals that can cause a problem or more to your teeth; but of course, taking a few cups or a bottle often will not do any damage to your teeth, as long as you keep the right dental habits.
Avoid Coffee, Tea, Sodas, and Sugary Drinks
These beverages could be cool, yeah, but if you think your lovely teeth are cooler, then you should consider tuning them down to the barest minimum, or at least taking them in moderation, ‘cos no doubt there are nutritional values to them.
Soda is particularly dangerous to your teeth because not only does it weaken them, it can lead to tooth cavities as we have discussed earlier. Soda does not really pass for a discoloration agent like tea and coffee which are the major culprits. These beverages are made of stuff that could greatly discolor your teeth if taken in humongous amounts.
Healthy Diets Are Cool for you
This is especially important for your teeth. Teeth work well when there’s a sufficient amount of calcium in the body, and only good food could provide that for you. It is essential that you consume food that is rich in calcium, such as milk, cheese, yogurt, fruit juice, and other vitamin and calcium-rich food.
Therefore, you should take extra care to ensure that you don’t take excess or too little of these foods.
Curb your Intake of Sugary Foods
Sugary drinks are one of the most deadly threats to your dental health. Now, what goes on when you take in sugary foods? When you ingest food that is high in sugar, bacteria present in the teeth breaks down this sugar and produce acids, leading to a steady buildup of acids on the teeth.
However, eating sugary foods will not put you at any risk of dental disease if you take care of your teeth properly. As soon as you take any sugary foods, do well to clean your teeth by brushing so that any residual bacteria left off by these sugars could be eliminated.
Chew only Sugarless Gum
Producing saliva in your mouth is an important process for the mouth, and chewing gum can help you do just that. Once saliva circulates around the mouth, its alkaline nature neutralizes the acidic effect that bacteria create. So it is important to chew gums. However, if you chew sugary gum, the gum creates a neutralizing effect, but it contains bacteria which produce another acidic effect. Therefore you might have succeeded in neutralizing an acidic effect, but the sad thing is that you have created another acidic effect!
Final Words…
Every day, we see people grapple with dental problems. The extent of damage these problems cause vary from minor tooth issues to a total defacing of the face. Dental diseases are not things you should court, because their consequences might be so enormous that you don’t have a way out. So you should stay healthy, see your dentist regularly, and put on a bright side always!
