Flora may not be showing her teeth in this picture, but let her smile be a reminder to you.
Floss your teeth. Regularly.
I went to the dentist tonight for a cleaning and my hygienist said that my teeth and gums did much better during her scaling work due to flossing my teeth. I knew this without her telling me because I went through the cleaning without stabbing pains in my gums and gripping the armrests to keep from ripping the implements out of my mouth. During my last cleaning I was nearly in tears by the time my hygienist was done with me. It hurt that much. Today it felt, well not like tickling, but certainly not horribly painful.
So seriously. Floss your teeth. And use an electric toothbrush. Doing both of those things have really helped my cleanings go faster and with less pain.
Also, if you live in the east end of Toronto, and you need a dentist, go to http://www.dentalcaretoronto.com/. They’re nice people, and I’ve been going to them since 2002. (Disclosure: this is not advertorial, it’s just me saying something nice about people who provide me a valuable service for my health.)
I told my dentist I’d start flossing and taking better care of my teeth when I get a minute in the day to myself again 🙂
I kept saying the same thing, but after my previous cleaning, I thought “this really hurt and I don’t want it to hurt again, so I better make the time to floss”. (The joys of having teeth that are very close together.)
But I only have one kid and she’s still in a crib so it’s easy to keep things under control while I’m getting ready and husband is still in bed (oops, I mean “preparing for his day”). 😛
That said, Flora’s watched me while I floss and she knows what it is (“Flossin’!”). Maybe she’ll be my conscience when she’s older.