"People who smoke cigarettes, they say:
“You don’t know how hard it is to quit smoking.”
Yes, I do. It’s as hard as it is to start flossing." - Mitch Hedberg
After a couple of good cleanings and a few months of using a good toothbrush and flossing, I can say that my gums don’t bleed easy anymore, not even at the dentist.
The reason they bleed so easily when the dentist jabs at them, is cause they’re irritated from all the plaque buildup and improper cleaning.
Not my joke, but a good one:
Dentist: When was the last time these teeth have been flossed?
Patient: You should know, doc. You did it.
Patient: last night (as always on the evening before dentist appointment)
Because flossing sucks…
in reducing interproximal gingivitis and dental plaque
Good luck removing that stuff stuck between your teeth with mouth wash alone. Their method didn’t even address that.
That doesn’t say flossing sucks, just that mouth wash is at least as good, but at least one is needed for good dental hygiene.
mouth wash is at least as good
Mouthwash has a couple of downsides.
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It does not discriminate good bacteria from bad bacteria. If you stop or delay treatment, you have a chance of getting a runaway situation with nasty bacteria.
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It does not remove plaque. If you stop or delay treatment for a while, bacteria make and settle down in to plaque. You’re relying on dental visits to remove the plaque.
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Mouthwash does not remove food lodged in the gumline or in between teeth.
If you don’t like flossing, I’d recommend getting a waterpic. Keep your tongue scrubbed and brush after every meal. Only use mouthwash if you start having funky smells / tastes / things seem off.
No cavities in 25 years. Unfortunately, the 25 years before that did not go as well, it took me a long time to sort out dental hygiene.
You can’t make me! No! No, nooooooooooooi
I wouldn’t dream of making anyone do anything… Okay well, that’s a lie but certainly nothing dental related.
Yeah, I personally floss as well, I was just quoting the paper that the previous person linked to refute his claim that flossing sucks. And I anecdotally agree with your points as well, would be nice to see if there are any publications that support them though.
Hell, I don’t even trust a single study anymore… This one was done in India under the pressures of not having enough dentists to cover their massive population.
The actual point behind it might be if you’re not going to floss, definitely mouthwash
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I found a weird fork thing to hold my Floss. It made flossing a lot more bearable.
I always found itbhardto manuver the Floss around in my mouth with my hands. And I didn’t like the disposable flossed.
Anyway. I can find a link for it if anyone cares.
I’m gonna need that link bro. I’m the same. I have a tiny ass mouth and big ass hands. I also hate using the disposible ones because it just seems like so much waste.
I’ve heard them called plackers.
it’s like this. not vouching for any brand this is just the first search result. I actually got one at the dentist today and look forward to using it because floss picks totally changed my flossing habits but I also don’t like the extra waste
It’s the third panel that really makes it lol
What’s going on in the second one for the strands to diverge like that, though?
Pulley mechanism for more force
I don’t get how is it that brushing is normal for everyone but somehow flossing seems to be an impossible task. It literally takes even less time. It’s so quick and simple that it just seems dumb not do it. Well, to me at least. Clearly that’s not a very popular opinion.
Requires actual effort to floss right. Requires 0.1 effort to hold the vibratey brush to my teeth for two minutes
Invention question: would anyone here be willing to wear a ~perhaps frightening~ helmet that just does all the head hygiene stuff automatically?
I speed up shaving by covering the inside of a hockey mask with razor blades and then nod
At that point just get your teeth removed and buy dentures.
Let me introduce you to my friend depression. It makes self care way more difficult :)
Unfortunately neglecting self care makes the depression worse, which makes it harder to do self care.
I can’t fit one of my giant mitts in my tiny mouth let alone the two required to properly hold floss. I hate using the disposable floss picks because of the plastic waste. So for a long time I could just never floss properly unless I wanted to make a pile of plastic waste.
I did get a water pick now though and that works nice. Also to all the people who say water picks don’t clean as well as floss I say, you may be right but also that thing can blast limescale off of my sink so I’m pretty sure it does a good enough job on my teeth.
This, of course, is after the hygenist is done raking your gums with a prison shiv.
… if your mouth is healthy, neither of these things hurt or bleed. The “shiv” is used to measure the pull away happening between your gums and teeth. If you brush/floss regularly, that gap will be small and not inflamed so it won’t hurt or bleed. Likewise with flossing, your mouth is bleeding because it’s fighting off an active infection in the gum tissue. If you flossed enough, there wouldn’t be an infection there to fight and no bleeding would occur.
That may be true in many cases, but some people have more sensitive gums, so it depends how skilled the hygienist is. When I last switched dentists, it was the first time I’d never bled during a visit. Prior dentists told me my oral health was good, but my gums were just very sensitive.
But seriously, my dental hygienist is pretty rough because my permanent retainer grows tartar like crazy, but I’ve never bled since I started flossing daily.
It looks years before my dental hygienist finally explained it properly for me.
Your gums are inflamed from fighting all the bacteria etc from not flossing. When your gums are inflamed, they’re extra full of blood, so when you do floss, you bleed a whole bunch. It has nothing to do with “toughening up your gums”.
I’ve flossed every day since and haven’t had a problem.
Bonus tips: Tie a loop of floss so you can pull tension between two fingers without garroting/strangling your digits by wrapping a wire around them 8 times. Use proper Butlerweave floss instead of the plastic strip junk. The plastic slides over everything super easily, like the plaque and stuff you’re meant to be removing. If you’re having trouble getting in the habit, floss before you brush. It’s easier to skip if it’s added on after your normal routine. Also, if your life is so fast that you just don’t have the time, you’re probably not brushing your teeth long enough either. Dedicate 5 minutes a day to take care of the only (free) set of teeth you’re going to get!
Genuine question: the fuck is butler weave floss?
Butlerweave floss: A special woven thread construction removes plaque from between the teeth and beneath the gum line without shredding or breaking.
Never floss … floss for three days leading up to dental visit
Dentist pokes around and makes my gums bleed
But I floss every day!
(this was me about ten years ago … I floss every day now, mostly because I really, really, really hate seeing the dentist)
Smelling the floss after being in the Backcountry for a few weeks without floss (just a travel toothbrush and little time to use it), was all I needed to be a daily flosser for life.
Just be careful not to obliterate your gums from daily damage
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This gif is brilliant.
Saved
When I was a kid, the shitty dentist we went to constantly shamed me about not doing a good job with my teeth and drilled and filled everything he could. We eventually went to a better dentist, but then I ultimately ended up with damage from orthodontics, followed by a couple decades of poverty and depression. I can’t even describe the kind of anxiety I have over the thought of dental work. Yeah, my mouth is crap now, but I floss multiple times a day and brush regularly. It’ll probably cost more than what I have in my retirement fund to fix my teeth.
BTW - when my kids were little I had a conversation with their dentist about the shape of teeth. Sounds like I was genetically fucked from the start with deeply grooved teeth that are extremely difficult to avoid cavities. So fuck my childhood dentist for seeding that shame and anxiety.
I like when they use the picks to get all the plaque out, then you feel your teeth with your tongue and you can feel all the sharp ridges that were dull from all the buildup.
Reminds me of when I had a transphobe actively jabbing my gums and blaming the “estrogen” for weakening my gums.
Thankfully that bitch did not stay there long.
Is it a bad sign when your hygienist doesn’t even bring it up anymore? 😅
“How’re your teeth?” “Well…I’ve been trying to-“ “Right…have a seat.”
C’mon, where’s the trigger warning for folks with dental PTSD?
Also I came to post the Mitch Hedberg joke, that’s a classic 😁
I decided during COVID to try to work on my health in whatever way I could get to stick. And I think flossing was my most successful endeavor. I did 2 things that really helped me ease into the habit: 1) I bought a water pik 2) I thought about what it is that keeps me from flossing and I let those things go. So I started off just using the water pik. I did that for about a year and sometimes I would forget, but I’d just hop back on it next time. Just doing this alone helped me to physically feel the difference in my mouth and after a bit, I didn’t like how it felt if I forgot. After about a year I started using floss and this brings me to the things I needed to let go. I needed to learn how to use floss properly, but growing up poor, I would often get in trouble for using too much of something including floss. But some of my teeth are tight and I need a longer piece to get enough leverage. I also don’t like being wasteful and didn’t like using longer pieces especially since it’s plastic waste. I decided to let all of those things go and just use big ass pieces of floss so I could learn how to do it properly. This helped a ton and over time as I got better, I used the water pik less and less and now primarily use floss every night. And now that I’ve learned how, I can use smaller pieces and also have switched to a more environmentally friendly floss. I would say this process took me about 2 years, but I don’t have issues at the dentist anymore like bleeding gums or metal tools jabbing at me. It’s made a big difference and helped me to look at other problems in a similar light: what’s stopping me from doing this and how can I remove those barriers?
Same thing here, also during the pandemic. Only difference on my end is I have also incorporated “Superfloss” into my flossing regimen since I find it easier to get under my permanent retainer
Try Waterpik. A game changer. I could never floss but waterpik is fast and easy.
I will second this, I could never bother with the effort that is required to do wire floss correctly but I got a waterpik and I was able to do it regularly. I’m now to the point that I can use the highest pressure level without causing any gum bleeding so it’s still strengthens your gums because 10 is nasty (on the countertop model)
I use the 10 setting to clean limescale off my sink. I’m pretty sure it could strip latex paint if you tried.
For those that are curious about OP’s quote
Dentist basically doing their CrossFit
