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Surveys show that Independence Day is the biggest cookout day of the year. If you’re celebrating with a feast of hot dogs, fresh grilled corn on the cob, burgers, and other traditional treats, we have some tips to help make your holiday dining fun for you and safe for your braces, so you don’t miss out on any of the fun in Tampa! 

• Skip the “Finger Foods”

Traditional BBQ fare like ribs, burgers, chicken legs, and corn on the cob are usually eaten with fingers, not utensils. This means biting into these delicious favorites with your front teeth, which puts pressure on your braces and can lead to bent wires and broken or loose brackets. 

But being careful with your braces doesn’t mean you have to miss out! Use a knife and fork to cut food into smaller pieces or cut the kernels off the cob, and you can chew with your back teeth, protecting your brackets and wires. 

• Edit The Menu

Crunchy, hard, and sticky foods should never be on the menu when you’re wearing braces. These foods can damage your wires and brackets or get stuck between your braces and your teeth. 

A Fourth of July BBQ is the time for clever substitutions. Exchange crusty rolls and seeded buns for softer, seedless versions. Dig into the potato or pasta salad instead of munching on crunchy chips. Skip hard candies, nuts, and sticky smores and enjoy creamy soft desserts like yogurt parfaits, colorful berries, and soft ice creams.

• Water’s Always a Good Choice on a Hot Day

Proper hydration is essential for both your overall health and your oral health. Drinking water helps prevent cavities by washing away food particles and bacteria and reducing acidic conditions in the mouth. A swish can help dislodge food from your braces when you can’t get to a toothbrush. And water, unlike some darker beverages, won’t stain the enamel next to your brackets.

• Keep Up the Good Work

During your busy holiday, whether at home or on the road, be sure to make time to brush and floss as directed after meals and before bed. 

Talk to Dr. Gregory Dyer about easy ways to protect your braces and teeth for stress-free holiday dining. Everyone at GSD Orthodontics wants to make sure that, whether you’re enjoying a meal with family and friends, marching in the parade, oohing and aahing at the fireworks, or all of the above, your Fourth of July is filled with healthy, happy smiles!

A lot of patients ask us why Dr. Gregory Dyer and our team at GSD Orthodontics work tirelessly to give our patients straight teeth. Of course it’s nice to have a smile full of evenly-aligned teeth, but did you know that straightening your teeth can keep them healthier as well? Straight teeth lead to better oral hygiene, increasing your chances of keeping your own natural teeth for a lifetime!

Straight teeth are also less prone to decay, because they collect less plaque, that sticky colorless substance that forms on our teeth. When you visit GSD Orthodontics for your initial consultation, Dr. Gregory Dyer will examine all aspects of your teeth, face, smile, and jaw.

If you’re wondering whether your teeth might cause problems because they are out of alignment, please give us a call to set up an initial orthodontic consultation at our convenient Tampa office. Dr. Gregory Dyer can help you decide whether or not you will benefit from orthodontic treatment.

Questions? Give us a call, ask us below or on our Facebook page!

When you replace your old toothbrush every three or four months with a new model, you accomplish three things:

• You keep your teeth cleaner (frayed brushes don’t clean as well)
• You protect your gums (you won’t be scrubbing harder to get your teeth clean)
• You add another toothbrush to your growing collection of used brushes

If creative recycling is one of your talents, you might have already discovered how handy repurposed brushes are for cleaning delicate or hard-to-reach spaces around the house. But those old brushes don’t have to spend their entire existence cleaning! Here are some ideas from Dr. Gregory Dyer to give a new, artistic life to your old, uninspired toothbrush.

• Splatter Painting

As your bathroom mirror can confirm, toothbrushes are great for splattering. Why not put those bristles to creative use by adding color bursts to canvas, wooden picture frames or boxes, fabric, cards, gift wrap and more? Just dip the tips of the bristles into the paint, point them toward your surface, and brush your finger over the head. For more formal effects, splatter paint over your favorite stencils on paper or fabric. Or work your magic by splattering around a stencil for a dramatic silhouette.

• Children’s Painting

Your child might find it great fun to use an old toothbrush to create new works of art. The easy-to-grip handle and wide bristles are perfect for painting those first masterpieces. Splatter painting is also a wonderful art activity for children—but be prepared for some clean-up!

Texturizing Clay Pieces

Whether you work in potter’s clay, polymer clay, or Play-Doh, an old toothbrush can provide any number of interesting textures to your piece. Press the bristles into the clay for a sophisticated stippled background, or brush long gentle strokes for a striated effect.

• Carpentry

Wood glue creates strong bonds when you are joining edges, mitering corners, or fitting mortise and tenon joints. It also creates a sticky mess when you use your fingers, a wood or plastic spreader, or one of your good paint brushes. For any gluing jobs or joinery, try a toothbrush for greater control and easy application.

• Jewelry Making

If you work with jewelry pieces, you know that sometimes there are nooks and crannies that are almost impossible to clean or polish. Try a gentle brush with an old toothbrush and the recommended polish for your piece—but do keep brushes away from the delicate surface of pearls. And for the boldly creative, why not use your toothbrush itself as jewelry? There are online instructions out there for transforming that old brush into a colorful bangle bracelet.

In turns out that there’s a second career waiting for your toothbrush after all! Make sure to clean your toothbrushes thoroughly before using them in another role. After that, let your creativity run wild—including your creative recycling! It’s just another way you are crafting a more beautiful environment for all of us.

Healthy teeth make you happy to share your smile with the world. But there’s more to your smile than its beauty! There’s a lot of hard work going on, too. 

Teeth Are Designed for Efficient Eating

Because humans are omnivores, we can eat both meat and plants. That’s why our teeth have different shapes—they’re meant to help us process different types of food. 

• Incisors, our front teeth, have sharpish edges to help cut through meats and other firm foods when we bite.
• Canines, the pointed teeth, help tear food into bite-size portions.
• Premolars are flat topped teeth with two cusps, raised points which help us grind food.
• Molars are the flat-topped teeth in the rear of the mouth. They have four cusps to grind and crush food into a paste-like consistency. 

So: Incisors and canines bite and tear food into smaller pieces, which molars and premolars then crush and grind into a paste. Bite, tear, crush, grind—why all this food aggression? Because that’s the key to healthy digestion. 

Successful digestion begins with chewing. Chewing:

• Starts the process of breaking food down into digestible particles.
• Increases saliva production. Saliva binds food particles so that we can swallow easily.
• Expands the surface area of food particles, which allows the digestive system to extract nutrients more efficiently. 

When biting causes you pain, it can be hard to chew food. Swallowing becomes difficult when food particles are too large, and digestion becomes uncomfortable.

Bite pain can occur when there’s a deep cavity or an injured tooth, but it can also be caused when the teeth and jaws don’t fit together the way that they should. This misalignment is called a malocclusion, or bad bite. And while a malocclusion often makes eating more difficult, it can have further damaging effects as well.

Teeth Are Designed to Be Good Partners

While eating is probably the first thing that comes to mind when we think about dental duties, our teeth also work in coordination with other parts of our bodies. A malocclusion can interfere with these normally smooth interactions, affecting:

• Tooth and Jaw Health

Biting, chewing, and clenching put hundreds of pounds of pressure on our teeth and jaws. A misaligned bite misapplies this pressure, which can lead to damaged and unevenly worn teeth, tooth grinding, headaches, jaw pain, and other problems. 

• Speech

Our teeth work with our tongues and lips to form many of the phonetic sounds which make up speech. Try saying the word “teeth,” and see how your tongue and teeth work together! Misaligned teeth and jaws can affect speech development in children and pronunciation in children and adults.

• Face Shape

Our teeth and jaws help give shape to our faces. Alignment problems can affect facial symmetry and self-confidence.

You Can Help Your Teeth Work Their Best

Daily brushing and flossing, eating a healthy diet, and regular visits to your dentist for exams and cleanings help your teeth perform their many daily duties. But if bite problems are causing troubles with eating, tooth or jaw pain, difficulty speaking, or self-consciousness, it’s time to team up with your orthodontist. 

And just like your everyday dental care, orthodontic treatment works best with your active participation. 

• Make sure your teeth are their cleanest with careful brushing and flossing. You may need to brush and floss more often while you’re in treatment.
• If you wear braces, eat a braces-friendly diet. 
• Wear aligners, bands, or appliances for the hours recommended each day.
• Keep up with your orthodontic visits to keep your treatment on schedule.

Talk to your orthodontist to learn more about how to help your teeth work their best for you—and be ready to share that beautiful, hard-working smile!