I have had one cavity in my whole life before the last 12 months, now it is like all my teeth are literally rotting out of my mouth. I started noticing it 6 months ago and everytime I look or go for another filling or exam there are more.
No changes in diet or hygiene when this started, I have started trying to cut out acidic drinks and candy now though. It isn’t like I suddenly started consuming them though.
I mean I can’t even get them filled fast enough, everytime I look in my mouth closely I find more. No evidence of gingivitis or gum disease, it is just literally like cavities are forming everywhere.
I have not taken up meth or stimulant use, my mouth doesn’t feel excessively dry.
I have woken up several times with my mouth dry apparently due to me breathing out of it during sleep. But I mean damn man. This is just depressing.
Dry mouth can contribute to tooth decay, and maybe it’s the change that caused this suddenly. But at a certain age if you don’t have good hard enamel to start with decay can advance rapidly. This hit me hard around age 30. My situation is different from most because of a lot of damage to my teeth earlier in life, but it seemed to take the next 10 years to get everything stabilized, just enough time for the all the repairs done much earlier to start wearing out.
Good luck with all this, brush and floss regularly, use a flouride rinse, get frequent cleanings, and get the damage repaired as soon as you can to keep it from getting worse.
We could use an ongoing dental problems thread here, just to gripe about the annoyance that keeps on giving.
I had one filling until the age of 40, I think my long term pot smoking habit even though I smoked very small quantities contributed because of the dry mouth. By the age of 50 I had lost all my bottom teeth and at 60 I lost the top also. I only brushed in the morning and once at night which is also bad.
Do you have a lot of stress / have you had a lot of stress recently? I had a big rash of cavities during college, and then again right after graduate school (2002-2004), and have only had one since. My dentist said that stress can change your mouth pH and/or make the conditions more favorable for decay bacteria, as well as change your eating habits.
The damage from acidic drinks and sugars is all cumulative, so the older you get the more damage you’ll see. You also might want to ask your dentist if you have any occlusion problems that are putting stress on particular parts of your teeth. Your best bets for reducing the damage are to avoid exacerbating factors (above-noted acids and sugars, smoking, mouth-breathing), brush and floss thoroughly several times a day, use a fluoride rinse like Act, and be sure you go to the dentist twice a year for cleaning and evaluation.
All that stuff works wonders for some people, but there are some people who just have weak or inadequate enamel. My mother has always been obsessive about dental health, flossing and brushing like a madwoman at every opportunity and never missing appointments, and she still has cavities at nearly every visit.
Get a prescription for Prevident. If you can’t, you can order Prevident 5000 online from Canadian pharmacies w/o a script. I much prefer the Very Berry Gel though.
I don’t see a location for you, but my first thought was, “Are you in Calgary?” because the junk science followers won a victory here recently and voted fluoride out of our municipal water.
I can’t imagine why the sudden change, but I bet your dentist has some theories. What does she/he say?
I got my first set of dentures at age twenty-two and it changed my life in ways I still find difficult to express. (And it wasn’t “1813” or whatever.) We (ex) were trying to get pregnant and the OB/GYN told me my body (body! was so full of infection that it wasn’t wise to try to conceive in my present state. So my husband paid for my new teeth (extraction done in the hospital.)
I’d spent ten lifetimes in pain I wouldn’t wish on anybody. Apparently I inherited the Irish/English weak tooth enamel. Couple that with never being taken to the dentist, or taught to brush my teeth, and you get abcesses on a nuclear scale. Enough to jerk your head around (like the Exorcist? :p) when they broke in sweet, rancid floods in my mouth.
Don’t hesitate to do whatever needs to be done. Be brutal in bypassing “kind of” fixes. Go with your common sense for what will last.
Am I the only one here that thinks the OP should get a second opinion? I’ve gone to the same dentist for 20 years; one time he was booked with other appts so another dentist in HIS practice was my dentist of the day. That dentist said I had a cavity and wanted to fill it right then. I insisted my regular dentist check it first. My dentist came over from whatever job he was working on to take a look; and he said it was nothing to worry about and it could wait to see if got any worse. That was like 5 years ago, and they’ve never mentioned since.
Isn’t this just a situation where it takes a really long time to go through your enamel and finally you’ve hit that tipping point? I didn’t have a single cavity my whole life until I got to college, and then I suddenly had seven.
I’ve had more tooth decay in the past few years. My dentist has me using a prescription fluoride toothpaste and a prescription fluoride rinse. He’s hoping a couple decayed areas on my teeth will get better without needing a filling. Apparently fluoride can reverse mild tooth decay.
I’ve had unusually heavy plaque buildup my last two cleanings. I bought a sonicare toothbrush based on the dentists recommendations. My teeth feel cleaner and I’m hoping my next 6 month dental cleaning won’t be nearly as painful. Getting heavy plaque off hurts.
I thought brushing 2x a day was recommended. I’ve heard brushing too much can wear down your enamel. Besides, I don’t know if plaque has much chance to do damage in 12 hours as opposed to 8. I’m obviously not a dentist though.
To the OP, has any dentist figured out what is happening? I would ‘guess’ either dry mouth or acid in your mouth could play a role. Its weird if your lifestyle hasn’t changed, but now you are getting this problem.
Have you been tested for GERD? Some people regurgitate stomach acid into their mouth at night, if so that could play a role. GERD can also cause dry mouth at night.
I think much is not known about this, or at least not known by some dentists. A lady I dated had had zero cavities until she became pregnant, then had 23 of them during the pregnancy. The dentist insisted it was only random coincidence and was unconnected to the pregnancy. I just can’t swallow that one.
Every pregnant woman I’ve known (and over there years there have been a good number of them, from all walks of life/areas of the world) has the same cavity story. Apparently the first things that ‘go’ during pregnancy are the nails and teeth, and it’s rare for them to recover.
No evidence of gingivitis or gum disease, it is just literally like cavities are forming everywhere.