Bad teeth can have all kinds of negative effects on our lives, preventing what we can and can’t eat and causing unappealing bad breath. Our teeth can also make many of us embarrassed by our appearance, making us shy of smiling and affecting our confidence when meeting new people. This affects a huge proportion of us, but few of us do anything about it. If you’ve long dreamt about having pearly white teeth, now may be time to bite the bullet and take action. There are all kinds of steps that you can take to whiten your teeth. Here are just a few…
Brush up your dental regime
Brushing up your dental regime may be the answer. It’s best to brush morning and night and to do it for two minutes at a time. Pay attention to each tooth your brushing and make sure that you’re brushing at a diagonal angle towards the root of the tooth. Special fluoride toothpastes may be able to remove stains and get your teeth whiter over time. Experiment with different brands to see what works for you. Make sure that you change your toothbrush every three months – bristles generally get damaged after this period and don’t have the same effect. If you’re using an electric toothbrush, the same applies to replacing brushheads.
Try natural whitening methods
There are some weird and wonderful natural tooth whitening methods out there that have been proven to work on individuals. A common bizarre one that really does make a difference is brushing with activated charcoal. This helps to remove plaque and staining, although does require you to rinse thoroughly and brush your teeth afterwards to get rid of the charcoal. Oil pulling is another technique that involves swilling coconut oil in the mouth for five to twenty minutes. This too helps to remove staining. Apple cider vinegar and mulched up lemon peels can also work as natural whitening toothpastes. Used once to twice a week, these DIY pastes are very effective at breaking through the plaque. However, due to the acidity, it is best to not overuse this treatment, otherwise you could cause damage to the enamel.
Eat and drink the right stuff
Certain foods and drinks are notoriously bad for your teeth. Coffee is a big culprit for staining – reducing your coffee drinking habits or brushing your teeth after every brew could reduce discolouration. Wine is also very bad for tooth discolouration (both red and white), causing your teeth to turn grey – which is much harder to get rid of than yellowing. Sugary snacks are also an obvious offender. Soda drinks however do the most damage, directly coating every surface with sugar and causing the enamel to rot.
Stop smoking
Tar in tobacco will make your teeth go yellow. Some heavy smokers can even end up with brown teeth in older age. You could help prevent this by buying a vaping kit from a company such as Aspire e Cig and taking up vaping instead. Whilst you still will be ingesting nicotine, the tar is removed, which is the main cause of yellowing.
Cleanse your palette
Whether it’s between meals or directly after smoking, you can reduce the chances of yellowing simply by cleaning your palette. Drinking a glass of water could help to wash away the plaque and other chemicals which are likely to cause staining. Non-sugary chewing gum is also ideal for this, picking up all the plaque from your teeth. A more extreme method – but ones that’s certain to work – is brushing your teeth or using mouthwash after having each meal, snack and cigarette (in the short term, it could be a way of speeding up the whitening process).
Laser treatment – the last resort
If you’re really concerned about your smile and none of the other methods are working, professional treatment is always an option. Veneers are becoming less popular as they greatly restrict what you can and can’t eat and can be tricky to clean. Laser treatment is very costly but is guaranteed to whiten your smile by removing the stained layer of enamel. Other treatments exist that may use similar methods to get rid of this outer layer of enamel. Many people that get these treatments do report having extremely sensitive teeth afterwards, so bear this in mind!