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Hi friends! Welcome to the seventh email in the series on simple health tips. Today we're talking about teeth and oral health! Next week we finish out this series talking about sleep...and then I have some really fun stuff planned for after this series. 🤩
What comes to mind when you think about teeth? Brushing, flossing, and going to the dentist, maybe?
Well, I can tell you way back when I started on my crunchy journey, and dropped the fluoride, I decided to make my own toothpaste. Needless to say, it was pretty gritty 😬 from there I've tried numerous more holistic remedies for my oral health, things like activated charcoal, oil pulling, a remineralizing regime, homemade whitening concoctions, and more. Like lots of other areas of health, teeth are treated as if they don't connect to the rest of the body (why do we have to have separate insurance for eyes and teeth?!) But if you haven't heard this already, they're very much integrated with the rest of your body and health.
Story time: when I was around the age of wisdom-teeth pulling time, I went to my dentist and he told me that I "had a big enough mouth" to not have to remove them. Which I could've taken as a backhanded compliment, but I chose to embrace my big mouth. 😆 Maybe it's why I have a podcast now, who knows...but I started thinking about how most people I knew had to have their wisdom teeth removed...and why if we were born with this process would we just have a routine surgery for the majority of the population? (I was a very fun young adult, as you might've gathered.) But turns out that our skulls are actually shrinking. Some food for thought to chew on. Or however the phrase goes.
In thinking about the entire body as a unit, we know the microbiome of your mouth plays a large role not only in your risk for cavities but the health of your digestive tract, and things like tongue/lip ties, using fluoride, the type of snacks we eat or our kids eat, how we eat - whether we were breastfed or bottle fed, how much we had to chew versus eating soft foods, whether we had braces or not, whether we had our wisdom teeth pulled or not all are puzzle pieces to a larger picture of our whole-body wellness.
So here are the top most simple mouth-health tips I've learned over the years that might sound a little controversial...but if you want to do more research, check out Dr. Mark Burhenne on Instagram!
- Stop using mouthwash: you're killing all the good bacteria and actually causing a worse environment in your mouth leading to canker sores, higher risk for cavities, etc. Use a tongue scraper!
- Stop using fluoride: use a toothpaste with hydroxyapatite instead. Fluoride is a neurotoxin and hydroxyapatite is much more effective anyways.
- Eat quality animal fats and fermented foods: traditional diets are known for good oral health and healthy strong teeth. Think: grass-fed and finished meat and butter, coconut oil, bone broth, kefir, sauerkraut, etc.
- Sleep with your mouth closed: mouth breathing causes the mouth to be dry and increases your chances of getting cavities. Keeping your mouth closed keeps your teeth moist and gives them ability to fight bad bacteria with good bacteria.
We'll be back next week for the eighth and final email in this series on simple health tips on sleeping better! Stay tuned for what's after that! Thanks so much for reading, I'll catch you next time.
Warmly,
Natalie
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