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6 DIY Dental Tips
By Yumi Sakugawa, Intent.com
Here are six essential DIY tips to care for your teeth, gum and lips. After all, who doesn’t to have a pearly smile and soft lips for cheap?
1. Make Your Own Toothpaste. Store-brought toothpaste contains fluoride, and ingesting too much of it can have long-term, detrimental effects on your health. You can completely avoid this problem by making your own all-natural toothpaste containing no harmful ingredients. Mix 3 tablespoons baking soda, 10 drops tea tree oil, 10 drops peppermint essential oil. Mix together into a paste and store in a clear glass jar to use up for the entire week.
2. Make Your Own Mouthwash. Just as how making your own natural toothpaste is a completely safe route, creating your own natural mouthwash will prevent adding more potentially harmful chemicals to your body. You can make your own mouthwash with 2 drops pepperment oil, 2 drops tea tree oil, 1/2 teaspoon sea salt and 1/2 cup warm filtered water.
3. Whiten Your Teeth Without Teeth Whiteners. You can dip your wet toothbrush in baking soda and brush your teeth for a whitening effect.
4. Be Your Own Dentist. Why wait until going to the dentist to give your teeth the properly cleaning they need? You can buy your own gun picker, tooth scraper and dental mirror at your local drugstore and dedicate at least one day a week to really cleaning out all the hard-to-reach nooks and crannies between your teeth to prevent future expensive (and painful) dental operations.
5. Keep Your Lips Moisturized. Instead of constantly buying little plastic vials and tubes of lip balm, save yourself the money and prevent the extra consumption by using jojoba oil, virgin olive oil, vegetable oil or cocoa butter on your smackers when they feel a little dry. If you want to exfoliate, you can mix olive oil and sugar in a mixture and rub against chapped lips to get rid of dry areas.
6. Freshen Your Breath. Bad breath? You can chew on fresh parseley leaves, mint leaves, spearmint leaves or fennel seeds.
If you’re interested in a different kind of dentistry, check out this article on holistic dentists.
Intent.com provides content and community for who you aspire to be–personally, socially and globally.
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38 comments
add your comment »I am going to try these out, thanks for the tips!!!
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Here we use a fantastic home recepie:
fill a glass pot with :
-White argila (kaolin) one or two cups
-Green argila (illite) one cup
-Peppermint essential oil (botanically and biologically defined, please, and check that the lab has used gaz chromatography also) five drops
-orange essential oil (same) five drops
-baking soda (just a quarter of a tea spoon because it does have a terrible taste!)
-Stevia rebaudiana powder (leaf powder, with no additives) one spoon or less (to your taste, and you CAN taste with no danger)
-AND a vegetal oil, the one you like, for the smoothness of the whole paste. One full tea spoon.
Now, add slowly warm water (not hot, it has to be under 50 Celsius degrees) and stir with a spoon. When the texture is exactly what you want, transfer in a plastic bottle with a hole and a cap (reusable small clean ketchup pots are just great for this!). A wisk is also a good tool, for argila tends to agglutinate with water in the beginning.
And use at your own rythm. The stevia plant will make the toothpaste just as sweet as those you buy in the shops, but with no aspartam inside !
And yes, this incredible toothpaste has a great taste, cleans perfectly your teeth and gums, and never hurts you in any way. It is fantastic for kids, who hate too strong tastes in toothpastes, and the lack of sweetness in regular home made or organic tooth pastes.
Hope you all enjoy.
Sophie
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I've found non-flouride toothpastes in health food stores. I agree with what was said about flossing. I haven't missed a day in well over 20 years, and I don't wake up with morning breath or have bad breath, unless I eat something like garlic.
I've heard people say they just can't get into the habit of flossing, but I tell them to make themselves floss every night for a month. Once you do that, you won't be able to stop. I've even hobbled into the bathroom after surgery because I can't go to bed without flossing.
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Winter Wheat - Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! I needed the giggle!
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I should add that salt and baking soda can be used safely as a mouth rise if they are completely dissolved, either in water or mouthwash. Adding a splash of hydrogen peroxide to the mix and swishing in your mouth for 30 seconds or more helps to break up that pasty "dry-mouth" film that can accumulate; and salt, baking soda or epsom salts dissolved in the mix can help draw out gum infections.
Another healing mouth rinse can be made at home from ingredients available at the pharmacy with no prescription needed -- the same basic ingredients used in "Magic Mouthwash," which is often prescribed by dentists. Just mix in equal parts:
Children's Benadryl (or a cheaper generic or store brand) and
Liquid Antacid (Maalox or generic/store brand)
Swish for 30 seconds or longer, then either spit it out or swallow. You may feel a tingling or numbing sensation; this is temporary, and should dissipate within a few moments. This mix works for me to fight and heal many different mouth and gum irritations and infections.
As I understand it, the only major difference between this concoction and prescription "Magic Mouthwash" is the addition of Lidocain (viscous 2% solution), also in more-or-less equal parts.
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Using tooth soap is a good alternative. It's not abrasive and does a great job. I use Dr Bronner's soap with the peppermint essential oil in it and it tastes fine. A bottle of it should last you about 2 years.
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Let me add my own experience to the voices warning against using baking soda (or salt) as toothpaste. I made this very mistake, and regretted it dearly. Brushing with baking soda so damaged my tooth enamel and gum tissue that after only a few months of the practice, my teeth and gums became so sensitive that I required veneers to replace my lost enamel and gum grafts to rebuild my gum tissue -- in total, about $5,000 worth of dental bills.
Baking soda and salt are far too abrasive for use on teeth or gums. One could get the same effects (and consequences) from using fine sand. Don't do it.
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One book my boyfriend and I both absolutely LOVE is "Cure Tooth Decay: Heal & Prevent Cavities with Nutrition" by Ramiel Nagal. It is fascinating and full of great information about healing your mouth from the inside out, as well as natural dental ideas.
I have really enjoyed that book. Just thought I'd make a recommendation! Enjoy!
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Hi,
This article is great.i’ll put this article to my bookmarking page.thx for post man i’m following you. Thanks for those beautiful tips.
thymian
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there is one serious problem with all this talk of using baking soda: it should NOT be used on a daily basis or the stuff will erode the enamel on your teeth. it is, after all, abrasive. i should know, i use it to grind stains out of my counters; clean copper, stainless steel, and cast iron; and also clean my oven - stuff's whizz at removing all those black, burnt-on bits.
best idea is to use baking soda on an as-needed basis otherwise you'll notice your teeth getting darker, appearing more and more yellow, brown, or even grey as the enamel wears away and the dentin shows through more.
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