floss

You can floss in the shower, in front of the bathroom mirror; you can floss while watching TV. You can floss whenever you want to. But do, do floss. It has come to my attention that flossing is an often overlooked hygienic habit of unswerving importance. Flossing on a regular basis not only cleans your teeth, help prevents plaque build up, it also prevents gum disease (which new studies are showing may be a risk factor for heart disease!(1) ) Ask you dentist, she will tell you.

I didn’t always believe in flossing. I was a toothbrush and toothpaste addict and I gave the minty brushy combination my full allegiance. Dental hygiene has always been of the utmost importance to me: I bushed my teeth after every meal if it was possible and no matter how tired I was I never forgot to brush my teeth before bed. My friends made fun of me for how compulsively I brushed. Yet every time I went to the dentist, the news was cavities, fillings, drillings, and with this, the bills. I brushed my teeth with more conviction and more often then a lot of my friends, yet some of them had never even had one cavity. I was jealous of their strong-teeth DNA and resigned myself to fate of cavities.

I don’t know how flossing escaped my attention. I think it was in part because I just didn’t believe it reasonable request—how is this silly piece of string really going to change my dental destiny? You really want me to drag it between each tooth? Every night?

Don’t get me wrong. I did floss, especially after eating chicken, corn or stringy mangoes. I flossed when I remembered to, when I saw that silly little white box in my bathroom drawer. It just didn’t happen every night.

But a while back something changed. I went to the dentist and I still had cavities. I had to pay for some of them out of my own pocket because insurance didn’t cover them all. The dentist also told me I was brushing too hard, that it could cause my gums to recede, a terrible sounding thing. My complete allegiance to the toothbrush broke at that moment. Brushing, the wrong way, could be harmful! My trustworthy the friend, the toothbrush, had let me down again. You really need to floss, my dentist told me, every night. This time I heard her. I also happened to be preparing to head out of the country, and I’d be living out of suitcase for 2 months. I packed floss, and there in my toiletry bag it was impossible to avoid. I began to floss every night.

After two months of traveling and flossing, it became a part of my routine. If I get in bed now and suddenly remember that I haven’t yet flossed, I begin to imagine I can feel my teeth rotting in my mouth and I am compelled to get out of bed and floss.

Perhaps you are part of the 15% of Americans who do floss on a regular basis(2). But if you do not yet floss every night and are feeling a bit daunted by that piece of string, here are some tips for how to incorporate it into your everyday life:

1) Tape some floss to your remote control or bathroom mirror to remind you to floss.

2) If you remember to floss, but still feel reluctant to start in on all your 32 teeth, tell yourself you only have to floss one tooth. This will seem like such a small, quick task you won’t be able to say no. After awhile of flossing just one tooth, you will start to want to floss more teeth; that string is already in your hand after all. (3)

3) Still feeling reluctant? Reward yourself. If you floss, allow yourself to watch an extra 15 minutes of TV or stay an extra 5 minutes in a warm shower.

Flossing. A small, unglamorous thing is that important: it cleans your teeth, helps prevent plaque build up and bad breath. It’s worth an essay. It’s worth five extra minutes in the bathroom at night. I recently went back to the dentist. She said I had beautiful teeth. Just getting a compliment from a dentist convinced me even more that flossing is worth the trouble.

sources:
1.UPI.com - “Dental floss may lower heart disease risk” December 17, 2008
2.BusinessNetworks, “Food/Accessories” - http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb3235/is_16_21/ai_n29128325/pg_1)
3.One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way by Robert Maurer