Thursday, October 29, 2009

Halloween, Teeth, and Braces



Halloween is an exciting time - dressing up and free candy. Life is good. Dentists and orthodontists are not huge fans of eating a lot of candy. We were young once ourselves and you have to have some fun.

The sugar from candy will make your teeth dirtier, faster. With braces, cleaning your teeth is more of a challenge, but totally doable. Cleaning your teeth is not that hard when you are young and healthy, even with braces.

We recommend that you clean your teeth for 2 minutes before you go to bed and for 2 minutes when you wake up in the morning. Concentrate on brushing by the gum line. Those gums have to feel the bristles. This is important even if you do not have braces, but with braces, those bristles have to get by the gums to clean your teeth. Its not that hard - it is really important.

One more thing - be gentle when you eat your candy. Your braces are not permanent - they are semi-permanent. When your teeth are nice and straight with that great smile, we will remove the braces without hurting you or your teeth. The braces are designed to come off your teeth with the correct kind of pressure. Chomping into any food with enough force will snap a brace off or bend a wire.

That damage can slow down your treatment. As we tell all of our patients - eat softer, slower and smaller to reduce the pressure on your braces.

Our number one advice is to have fun. Happy Halloween.