How often do you brush your teeth? Sure, we’ve all been told the ‘twice-a-day’ , but how many of us strictly follow it?
Are there any cultures out there with alternative practices that still maintain good oral health?
I’m intrigued to hear your brushing habits, thoughts on this, and any interesting findings you’ve stumbled upon.
When I’m working, ever morning and most nights, when I’m off, hopefully once a day if I’m lucky. It’s easier to just wallow.
I’ve found my people lol. Work is the only thing that motivated me to brush my teeth. On my off days, my mouth will sometimes feel gross and I’ll brush it to get rid of that feeling. When it’s not bothersome, I forget to do it
Yup, at that point my social anxiety of smelling bad in public is stronger than my depression.
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Sorry to hear. Good your on top of it 👍
Good oral hygiene practices don’t really differ between cultures. Cleaning your teeth properly is cleaning your teeth properly.
It does a bit here though, in my country dentists recommend 3 times a day, not 2.
I’m pretty sure the Congo pigmies don’t have the same hypersonic oral b toothbrush as me.
Yeah like some cultures have used charcoal, others alcohol as mouthwash. There are some key differences aside from the face that we all clean our teeth.
Diets vary a lot, though. In a culture where processed / high sugar / high carb foods are the norm (and sodas) you probably need to clean your teeth more often than someone living in a ‘raw foods’ kind of culture.
Twice a day, once in the morning or whenever I get ready for the day and once before bed. I also brush my tongue with a tongue brush/scraper. My current struggle is trying to get flossing into my routine. I know if I keep at it, it’ll get better, but right now it’s hard to want to go to bed with the taste of blood in my mouth.
To all of you who don’t brush in the morning, are you all nose blind? Morning breath is the worst, second only behind coffee+morning breath. Have some consideration for your fellow humans.
Water piks are a lifesaver. While I’m sure they are not as good as flossing they do get your gums healthy enough to take a mild beating. At that point you could floss here and there to remove biofilm.
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I always wondered whether it’s flora and fauna dependent to some extent, so some people have bacteria that don’t damage the teeth and other have the nasty ones and have a constant battle.
I’ve been a massive slut for a couple of years. I wonder if it was possible to pass those germs on.
I’m 80% once a day [night time] and touch wood, only ever had one filling needed and that was back in 2009. Bro sciencing it but I chalk it up to drinking a lot of water and shlooshing my mouth out after meals, especially if i’ve had orange juice, ice cream or other not good for teeth stuff. A bit of gum maybe too, but I don’t know how much of BigGum fills our heads with random fake science.
I did have a ‘uh-oh’ phase a few months ago where my teeth were super sensitive, but some Sensodyne, mouthwash and twice daily sorted it out and now i’m fine again…and back to my old habits lol; enamel must of taken a lil beating.
Dentist says things are always fine, so I just keep it up /shrug
Beginning of the day and after my last meal of the day, plus before I take a nap if I do (they feel funny if I don’t)
Usually 2x a day, when I get up and when I go to bed.
I only ever brush before going to bed, never in the mornings.
I probably started doing this around 6-8 years ago, and have had no problems at my annual check-ups.
Genuinely feel for people who have to spend time in enclosed spaces with you.
Congratulations for winning the genetic lottery with the robustness of your teeth, but brushing is also about hygiene. Body odour isn’t physically bad for you, but it is for everyone who has to be near you. Same with your breath.
Dude your breath probably smells and people are too polite to tell you.
On your tongue there are a lot of anaerobic microbes (on everybody’s tongue, it isn’t a hygiene thing, they just live there). When you have your mouth closed for a long time, it creates a oxygen poor environment and these microbes thrive in that. They cause bad breath, so after people sleep or simply have their mouth closed for a while, the breath starts to stink. If you look in a mirror and your tongue has a kinda white or brownish tinge, this is because of the microbes. Everybody should brush their teeth and especially their tongue after sleeping. When looking in a mirror the tongue should be entirely pink and look healthy. Clean the tongue as far back as you can, to prevent bad breath.
If you smoke this isn’t true, your breath will stink no matter what.
So for your teeth it probably won’t matter much not brushing in the mornings, but for your breath it matters a lot.
3 times a day.
I brush after each meal, floss after lunch, and use a waterpik after dinner before brushing.
Probably excessive, but it’s less than 15 minutes a day total to keep my teeth happy.
Thats absolutely bizarre to me. Do you travel at all? How does that work?
At least twice a day, usually three times a day, but I have “reasons”.
After not taking really good care of my teeth for too many years, I needed surgery. I recovered completely and kept my teeth, but was clearly given the message that if I want to keep my teeth I need to be diligent about their care. I’ve lived long enough to understand the value of having a working, pain-free set of a choppers. So, I complied.
Once I had recovered from the surgery and infection, it became clear I needed braces, so my dentist suggested Invisaligns. These have the “benefit” of making you brush your teeth every time you take them off (to eat, to drink anything staining) and put them back on. I have to wear my braces 22 hours a day to comply with the treatment.
My normal routine is to get up in the morning, take my braces off, have as much espresso as I want and maybe some yogurt, then brush my teeth with a stain-removing paste (Arm and Hammer Peroxicare) and put my braces back in. Then at lunch I pop out the braces, eat, brush my teeth (Peroxicare), then pop my braces back in until dinner. Dinner, rinse repeat, but then I use a Crest Gum Detoxify before popping the braces back in before bed as part of my ongoing post-surgical routine.
I also use a water flosser at least once a day.
My teeth and gums are really healthy now and I intend to keep them that way.
thats awesome that you were able to turn that around! I’m looking at doing invisalign here soon too.
Twice a day, and if I need to freshen up.
Twice, but there’s times when I’m too exhausted to bother.
Twice a day, but I occasionally miss the one at night after a night out. Still haven’t had any cavities!
