With the month of Thanksgiving coming to a close, have you ever thought about the wonderful tasks our teeth do for us? Take, for instance, the small piece of pesky thread that hangs from the hem of your clothes. If you pull it, it’s going to snag and bunch. What do we do? We use our teeth! Much more important than a string is our beautiful smiles. Each day every one of us pulls the corners of our lips in an upward gesture to show our pearly whites. It’s OUR smile…… Each smile is unique and our teeth play a big part in this. Just like fingerprints, tooth prints are different for each person.
Another reason to be thankful for our choppers is the help they give us to consume the foods we enjoy. How hard do our teeth work on Thanksgiving Day? There’s the turkey to mash and rolls to chew. Pumpkin pie to devour. We sometimes take for granted while sitting down to a meal, our teeth prepare our food for digestion. Crushing each morsel so that we can get the nutrients we need.
Did you know that the enamel on our teeth is the hardest substance in our body? Now, this doesn’t mean we can rip off bottle caps or chew ice with them. The body can’t repair or regrow this strong enamel so protect your pearly whites from chips and cracks.
Another way we can show love to our teeth is to keep them shiny and clean. If you don’t floss your teeth, you will miss 40% of your tooth surfaces. That’s almost half the surfaces in your mouth!
When we bite down on our back teeth, we use up to 200 pounds of pressure? This is a mega amount of pressure (still no ice chewing-sorry ice chewers). With this amount of pressure, we can do some real damage if we are grinding or clenching. Treat your chompers nicely, if you are grinding, invest in a protective night guard.
There are numerous tasks our teeth perform for us each day from removing that extra thread to uniquely expressing ourselves through our smile. Next time you think about it, give your teeth a thankful pat on the back. Let them know you don’t mind them hanging around!
