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Dental spacer

#1
elte Offline
I found out a few months ago that it has been a wisdom tooth that has been causing trouble for close to 30 years now.  I had thought that the problem was from a hole where I had lost a molar, but it turns out that all the teeth in that quadrant of my teeth are there.  I had to confirm it by using my curved tip hemostats.  I clicked the curved tip into each dip between each top tooth and counted 16 teeth.  That means that the problem was an errant wisdom tooth all along, I guess, partially impacted.  The slant of it was acting like a one way valve, letting food in through a tiny gap between it and the second molar in front of it, but not letting it back out.  

I originally got relief by using plastic cut from a milk jug, cutting it to size, and inserting it between the wisdom tooth and the second molar, both near the back.  The plastic blocked off the space and fit tightly in there.  That time frame was way back around the beginning of the trouble 30 years ago.  It stayed in there all the time except for when I was brushing my teeth and using a Waterpik.

Skip ahead to about ten years ago.  I had to eventually make a bigger one out of the thick plastic on the bottom a milk jug, but about ten years ago it had become too loose and would keep coming out.  One day I noticed it was gone.  I had swallowed it without noticing.  For a long time after that, I just used the curved tipped hemostats to pull out tough food strands when they would pack in there, and when done eating use the Waterpik.  Eventually, the Waterpik broke down for good.  I got a used one thinking it wouldn't have the same problem, but well, you know.  That was actually the third one, the second one in ten years.  The first one lasted over 20 years (with a patched hose). I had recently cut a palm-size piece of plastic from the plastic seal of an oatmeal canister, and was (and still am) using that to push food out from the space.  I could mention that the space is termed a gum pocket, to my knowledge.

Jump to now.  It occurred to me that if I insert a new spacer between the two teeth and force them apart some more, that will lessen the pressure that stuck food can cause.  So, I cut a small piece of plastic from the lid of an oatmeal can (different brand of oatmeal, different sealing method than the other can type mentioned above) and  am sticking in the space during times between eating. (I take it out during eating unlike earlier times.) I put it back in after brushing, and brush it before putting it back in.

A side note about brushing teeth.  I use a multilevel bristle brush with a small head (Colgate Classic with tongue scraper. Twice as good as any other brush that I've tried)  I brush the right teeth with my left hand and the left teeth with my right hand.  That eliminates awkward positioning of the right hand when trying to brush the inside of the teeth on the right side, especially the bottom ones toward the front.  It takes some practice to get the left had trained, however.

I could finish this narrative by mentioning that the dentist wanted to pull the tooth when I said my gum was sore from the food trap involving the gum pocket, but not in those somewhat technical terms.  However,  I couldn't deal with getting it pulled since it really does a lot of chewing, and it could cause unforseen problems with it removed, like the bottom wisdom tooth wanting to rise up once its opposition from the errant wisdom tooth in the opposite jaw is removed.  The Law of Unintended consequences.  My other three wisdom teeth have been okay, and now this one should work better, too.  Besides, it is one of the few teeth without a filling or cap (it seems so, anyway), and these wisdom teeth appear to be my largest teeth, and do work in proportion to their size.

I came back to this thread to add a few more notes on those wisdom teeth.  I have been eating a lot more raw vegetables lately to try to keep my diabetes under control.  However, that has brought to light some observations.  One is that all of my wisdom teeth have pockets between them and the molars in front of them.  Strands of tough vegetables get stuck in those pockets.  I use the hemostats to grip onto and remove those strands.  I could probably be pretty accurate by saying that the other three wisdom teeth are tending to cause more trouble than the one involving the homemade spacer.  After eating a meal with a lot of raw vegetables, and after using the hemostats to remove all the stuck strands that I can, I have to spend considerable time flossing between those pockets to remove the rest of the strands.  All the efforts might still be better than getting all four of the wisdom teeth pulled because they are my biggest teeth and add a lot of grinding power.  Since they are nearest to the pivot points of the two jaws, they have the most leverage and chewing force of all the teeth.  Sometimes even with them adding that extra leverage, my jaw muscles still get tired chewing the tougher vegetables.

Also, another little dental-related life hack occurred to me a while back.  An option to help to not brush teeth too often if a person is suseptible to tooth decay and doesn't want to brush too much and wear off enamel is to apply a very small bit of toothpaste to the brush and then brush that along the gum above the front teeth.




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