The Mystery of the Thinning Enamel: Case Closed

I previously blogged about the state of my teeth. Some cavities, a cracked tooth, and thinning enamel on my front teeth. I had a deep cleaning done last month. Yesterday was the filling. And somehow I hadn't really realized how big the cavity was. Either that or it grew really quickly (which they say it can once it hits the dentin). They shot me up with Novocaine and dug out the cavity. And given the sensitivity and the fact that they had to give me two shots of Novocaine, they thought the decay might have hit the nerve and I'd need a root canal (I never really knew what a root canal was, but now that I do, ugh!). Thankfully, I narrowly escaped that.

In any event, they drilled out the cavity, then as they were preparing the filling, I explored it a little with my tongue. I had a hole nearly the size of my tooth in my tooth! Seriously! It was like a hole with a tooth shell around it. I couldn't get over how big it was, I still can't, it was nuts.

Anyway, during this whole cavity and filling process, I asked the doc about my thinning enamel (indicated by some yellowing of the teeth. Sometimes this means staining, in which case whitening is called for. Sometimes it means thinning enamel, which lets the yellow dentin underneath show through. In my case it's the later. And what sucks is that enamel doesn't grow back). I asked her why it might be thinning, and she went through the same things that the lady who cleaned my teeth mentioned - acidic stuff like juice, soda, possibly tomatoes (though they wouldn't be that bad). I rarely drink juice and infrequently drink soda. So I was still at a loss. Continue the filling process.

Then a lightbulb goes off in my head.

I eat a lot of fruit. My breakfast every morning is a fruit shake, something like this:

1 banana
2/3 of a half a cantaloupe or 1/3 container of defrosted strawberries
1 nectarine/peach/handful of blueberries
dash of water
2t flax seed oil
scoop of whey protein powder

I drink this (and it's usually a glass and a half worth of shake), then I brush my teeth and head out. Basically, the problems are twofold. The acid from the fruit gets on my front teeth as I drink the shake and sticks on the enamel. Then I go brush my teeth and the acid works as an abrasive to wear away the enamel. So I think I'm being so good and having fruit for breakfast and brushing my teeth, but really I'm wearing them away. You can't win sometimes, can you?

Or wait, maybe you can! The dentist then provided a solution for me, because she acknowledged that fruit is a very healthy option. Buy straws. Drinking my shake through a straw will send it right to the back of my mouth and bypass the front teeth completely. On top of that, rinse out my mouth with water before brushing my teeth just in case any of the fruit acid stuck on there. Woohoo, easy solution!

Healthy food and teeth

I went to the dentist yesterday. I hadn't been there in a really long time (given how my last insurance had my closest in-network dentist as nowhere I could get easily). They recommended a deep cleaning, fillings for two cavities, an onlay (cracked tooth, like a mini-crown), and eventual extraction of two partially erupted wisdom teeth. Blech.

Yesterday was the first of many parts to address all that. And it was the deep cleaning. If you've never had a deep cleaning, it takes about 2.5-3 hours. No that's not a typo. I sat there with my jaws cracked with for a full 2.5 hours. They had to use an anaesthetic gel on my gums because of the bleeding and how deep down under the gums they were cleaning. Definitely like the gel better than novocaine, which for me generally lasts until bedtime and causes me to bite my tongue at least once without realizing it.

The dentist commented on how yellowed my teeth have become. I've heard this before, and had dentists recommended whitening (not covered by insurance). This, however, apparently wasn't a discoloration of the teeth. I don't smoke or drink coffee much (though I do drink tea a lot, and the dentist said tea shouldn't have that much effect). So I learned about a new (to me) cause of yellowing.

My enamel has made a great escape.

And this has happened very slowly (looking online, it seems that there are people who lose enamel more quickly, but it's generally due to other causes, like bulimia, but for slower loss, there are the causes I'm discussing below, according to my hygienist).

So then she goes through the things which eat away at enamel, the main one being soda. And unlike the incidence of soda leading to low bone density (and osteoporosis), this isn't just dark colas. This is all soda. And it's because they're acidic. But I don't often drink soda. So then she asks about juice, which is also acidic (especially orange juice). Nope, I drink juice even less than soda. She goes back to cleaning my mouth.

Then, as we're talking about my health in relation to several years ago, she throw me the kicker.

It's my salad dressing that might be the culprit. The vinegar, to be more precise, which is very acidic. I make my own salad dressing, which is a good 50% vinegar. I also eat tomatoes, which are very acidic. And it's apparently eating away at the enamel of my teeth, letting the layer of dentin underneath show through (and dentin is yellow).

It could also be sugar from candy, which is another cause of enamel loss. I don't eat a lot of candy, but I'd have to admit that I eat more candy than I eat salad (though I eat more veggies than I eat candy).

There's apparently no way right now to replace the enamel on the teeth, though scientists are currently working on a synthisized version. I'm going to keep eating salad, and probably will keep eating some candy (though I'll try not to eat too much...it's the eternal battle). More important is the flossing. I'm really bad at that. Ergh.