Collectively Wise

Dental Floss vs. Bone Loss? Who knew?

Ok, this must sound ridiculous.  I'm a 40-something year old and can't say I ever really put the two together.  Not really, anyway.

I know I can't be alone.

A few years back, I spent time working in a parent co-op preschool.  There was a little girl there, cute as heck, but who very obviously had a MOUTH-FULL of cavities.  Even as a completely untrained and only partially paying attention (to the teeth) adult, the white polka-dots all over her teeth were striking.  Her mom?  PhD scientist.  Yep.

I can't tell you what logic loop brought them to the conclusion that out of control cavities in baby teeth were ok.  But somehow, it made sense to them.

So, I know, I am not alone.

When I think about taking care of teeth, I worry about cavities.  The idea that sucking on lolly-pops and drinking soda cause tooth decay, makes sense to me.  So, I brush my teeth.  I brush them when I get around to it.  Once a day.  Maybe more often, but definitely whenever they start to feel furry.  That's where I draw the line.  Furry teeth are gross.

So, ok, that works.  No need to call an expert.

Beyond that, though, when I start to think about flossing, or brushing more, or doing whitening or water pik or anything like that, that seems a bit harder to justify.  My laundry list of responsibilities is pretty long.  And spending a lot of time in the bathroom, doing what feels equivalent to preening, well, seems a bit self-indulgent.  And since cavities come from lolly-pops and soda, and I've already brushed all that off, what's the point?

I guess I need a good mental model to convince me of anything more.

It's amazing. My daughter has 42 teeth! (and she's only 8)

I take my kids to the dentist regularly, and had the opportunity recently to see this panoramic x-ray of the mouth of  one of them.  As a medical device engineer, I've seen lots of x-ray images of different parts of the body, so it was easy for me to identify many of the things visible in this image.

To me, this kind of diagnostic is fantastic.  And what it shows is even more incredible.  My daughter still has 14 baby teeth, but you can see a mouth full of adult teeth growing and forming in her gums and jaw bone.

As a parent, it's my responsibility to keep her teeth healthy, so that when she is an adult, they will be in good shape and hopefully she will have developed good habits of brushing and flossing.

She's lucky, in a way, that she has big beautiful teeth.  They come from her father.  She's not so lucky in that she looks more like me, with a tiny mouth...  You can probably anticipate the problem...  No, there's not enough room in there for all those teeth.