Bad Breath: How to Tell If You Have It, and What You Can Do About It
Recently I had the pleasure of working in a dental office as a hygienist for the day. My 2:00 patient had arrived for his preventative maintenance appointment (aka “a cleaning”). I struggle with calling these visits “a cleaning” because there is so much more than cleaning that should be taking place….anyhow, back to the story.I went to the reception room to get David (my 2:00 patient), and was taken aback by his handsomeness. Although I am (very happily) married, it is always nice (and a little intimidating) to work on strikingly beautiful people. Seeing as it was the middle of the day, David was well dressed, well groomed and had cologne on that brought you even closer to him. He is the CEO of a company and very highly respected in his field.
Bad breath trumps good looks
As we were chatting about changes in his health history, something became very apparent to me; David had the breath of a dragon, honestly it was worse than a dragon and I found myself unable to concentrate on anything he was saying. My focus turned from paying attention to what he was saying to trying to dodge the vapor that was spewing from his mouth.
I felt bad, really, I did, but I had lost focus on what David was saying because I was so taken aback by the whole picture; a man very well groomed, very handsome, and smelled of amazing cologne….that is until he opened his mouth and started speaking. Here is my dilemma:I have no relationship with this man; I was working as a sub in an office so the chances of seeing him again were slim to none. This clearly was not his first dental cleaning (in fact the office referred to him as a VIP patient), yet it seemed as if this man had no idea what evil lurked in his mouth, and how offensive his breath was to the world. What was I to do?
Sometimes bringing up bad breath can be uncomfortable
In my true Gumption form I braced the subject; I asked David if he was interested in knowing what I was seeing , and if I saw any issues that looked like they were related to home care would he like to know about them. He accepted my invitation and gave me permission to let him in on what I was seeing.
Once I am given permission, I typically find ways to talk about subjects that may be uncomfortable. Had I not asked his permission to talk about the issues that I was seeing, his likelihood of resistance to change would be high. I feel that this is a fundamental step in dentistry that we do not do, and because of it, people are not owning their disease….there was no way a “cleaning” was going to cure David’s breath issue, but him knowing how to focus at home with the right products would certainly help the situation.I asked David if anyone (dental or non dental) had talked to him about his breath, or if he was aware that he even had bad breath. To my surprise, the answer was NO! Not his wife, not his co-workers, and sadly not his dental office. He had no idea that after speaking 5 words, no one was able to focus on his brilliance because they were too focused on dodging the evilness that was coming from his mouth.The issue was coming from his tongue and the inside area of his lower teeth. We spent time looking at all of the healthy areas in his mouth and where his efforts were showing up, and then we looked at his tongue. He had never been taught to brush it or to gargle vs. rinsing, or to know how it was supposed to look if it were clean.
I gave him a few tips that day on brushing and gargling and sent him home with a recommendation for Tooth and Gums Tonic and the 21 Days to a Healthy Mouth program.
When he got home that night he asked his wife if she noticed his breath and she confessed that she did, but she felt bad saying anything, and the next day his co-workers reported the same thing.This is the stuff that breaks my heart and fills me with purpose. It honestly makes me mad to know that hundreds of people noticed the issue, but felt too uncomfortable saying anything; and that he was a VIP patient in an office, yet had never been told what was going on.
There are ways to determine if you breath is bad or not
So how do you know if you have bad breath? There are 2 easy ways to determine if you are offending the masses.
Lick the back of your hand and wait 40 seconds and smell the area that you licked. That sweetness or lack thereof is what people smell when you face them and talk. You may notice after reading this that some people turn their head slightly away from you when speaking. Often this is because they are aware that they have bad breath….or they are aware that you have bad breath.
Take a spoon and drag it down your tongue. Use the edges of the scooping side to collect the bacteria. Have a look and a smell at that. It sounds gross, and it may make you want to gag, but it’s the true nitty gritty in what people smell when they talk to you.
Conquering bad breath once and for all
I am happy to report that David completed the 21 Days to a Healthy Mouth program, and is enjoying the new products that he has found (thanks to the starter kit in the 21 Days program).He reports that the Tooth and Gums Tonic not only works at controlling his breath, he notices that his mouth is noticeably cleaner all of the time, and he loves how the Sulcabrush gets to the areas on the inside of his lower teeth that were also causing issues.He also states that he loves knowing how to tell if his breath is fresh or not, and he even notices that his food tastes much better now.According to the ADA (American Dental Association) nearly 50% of the US population has bad breath, and of those, 50% have chronic bad breath. Conventional products often do not fix the issue, and instead mask it for a short time and make it worse in the long run.
Products like Tooth and Gums Tonic make a huge difference, and really help to not only destroy the bad bacteria associated with bad breath, but it also helps to feed the good bacteria that help with clean breath.So my question to you is, are you kissably fresh and healthy, or a fire breathing dragon? Hopefully these tips will help you tell for yourself instead of waiting for someone to tell you, because chances are, they won’t say anything, but they sure will notice it!So, if you know someone that has bad breath, but you don't know how to tell them, send them this article and let them know you care. I promise, if you had a booger in your nose, you'd want someone to tell you instead of waiting until you look in the mirror and notice it's been there for who knows how long!Sometimes it takes a bit of an uncomfortable moment to let someone know that you care, but once you go there, it will get better, I promise.
