This issue has caused a number of heated discussions at my house. Mr.Q brushes before breakfast. I think it’s disgusting to spend the entire day with breakfast rotting on your teeth. I brush afterward, like all rational people.
The idea of conversing, kissing, or otherwise interacting in the breakfast hour is as repulsive as brushing teeth before breakfast.
As I said before, I rinse my mouth with water after breakfast. If I’ve eaten something substantial, like eggs, I might use mouthwash.
It’s hard to avoid any face-to-face confrontation at all, isn’t it? If nothing else, inevitably, one of us is going to breathe in the direction of the other, and, so far as I am concerned, it should not be with non-brushed mouth.
My wife is adamant that brushing one’s teeth before breakfast is necessary to remove toxins (or something) and I’ve given up debating the issue with her.
I don’t usually eat breakfast on weekdays, but when I do, I brush before and after.
Seriously. My man friend is adamently in the “brush after breakfast” camp, which I don’t really have a problem with - until we’re traveling together, and I am treated to his AM stench mouth for hours sometimes, depending on flights and when he can actually get his precious brekky. I don’t know why he insists on being so fixated on this habit or pattern, especially when he knows that I can’t stand to smell his morning breath. Dude, do whatever you need to when I’m not around, but could you just brush before eating ONCE so I don’t have to spend the next 3 hours downwind of your stank mouth? :rolleyes: I once insisted he go into his bag and retrieve his brush and paste, and go brush in the airport restroom, or I’d have to request another seat on the flight. Jeeeze, it’s just brushing, be a little considerate.
Me, I’m one of the later eaters - I take some meds that need to go in on an empty stomach, so that goes in first, then a cup of coffee while I’m getting ready, then brush. I pack breakfast (usually breakfast biscuits and yogurt) with lunch, and always rinse with water during and after. Have a brush and floss at work if needed as well. My motives are twofold: maintain my own mouth and not disgust everyone I’m in contact with.
I brush right after I get out of bed in the morning, thanks to my family where everyone brushed their teeth, immediately upon getting up. I used to water rinse after eating, when I was a kid. But now I brush after every meal, except in unavoidable circumstances.
Is everyone’s mouth really that putrid in the morning? Have my wife and I got especially underdeveloped senses of smell? We regularly talk to each other, kiss each other and even very occasionally, if by some miracle our daughter has decided to sleep in, have sex before breakfast and before brushing our teeth. Neither of us runs gagging from the other.
There, I said it.
Brushing is normally the 1st thing in the morning after getting up, though checking email in bed usually now procedes that. Coffee soon follows - this takes care of the off taste toothpaste gives to food and OJ.
My guess is that you have gotten used to each other’s stink. Bring a third party into the situation, and you’ll have a reaction.
I brush first thing in the morning. It wakes me up and it does get rid of that sleepy mouth smell. It is so ingrained in me that it positively disgusts me when I see romantic couples in movies/shows wake up and start kissing each other. Blech. Yuck. I can’t even describe how much it turns my stomach, and whoops! a romantic moment is utterly, utterly, ruined.
Yes, definitely
If I bring a third party into the situation, it’s not going to be a little mouth odour that gets a reaction. 
If it’s a work day I brush first thing while I’m getting ready and I don’t have to worry about it affecting the taste of breakfast because I probably won’t eat for another hour or two. On the weekend if I know I’ll eat breakfast right away I won’t brush until after, or maybe if my mouth feels overly trashy I’ll just do a quick brush with only water. If I know I won’t eat right away (maybe get up at 9 and going out to brunch at 10) then I’ll brush right away because the toothpaste taste will be gone by the time I eat. I also brush every night before bed.
That said, this seems to be one of those stealth judgey threads where people who do something a certain way can make themselves feel superior to those who do it a different way. All in good fun, I’m sure. A couple things that stuck out at me:
If you are eating close enough to someone that they can smell your breath then I think that right there is the problem. You either need better respect for other’s personal space or if one of you has morning breath so bad that the person across the table (or the waitstaff!) can smell it then I suspect a bigger health issue and brushing probably does little but cover it up for a few minutes.
If you have “breakfast rotting on your teeth” after a typical meal then by all means I think you should brush after, but I don’t think that’s typical for people who don’t wear dentures.
The message I got growing up - “brush after every meal”. I never heard the message - “brush before every meal”.
Brush after the meal. Each morning during the week I wake my partner with a kiss. I’ve been up for maybe an hour and a half by then, had a shower, breakfast, BRUSHED MY TEETH, walked the dogs and got the paper. He’s only just woken from an overnight without brushing his teeth (what a horror!) and I never notice “morning breath”.
Why brush before coating your teeth with masticated food, food acids and sugar? Do it after to clean all that off and go through the day with clean, non-fuzzy teeth.
After. I can’t eat for hours after brushing because the pepperminty taste makes all other food (and most other drink) taste disgusting.
You brush your teeth to get food and plaque off your teeth. You do it after each meal if you possibly can. Brushing your teeth to freshen your breath is using the wrong tool for the job and wasting time, since it takes longer than any other method.
As soon as I get up and after breakfast, lunch, supper and any snacks in between and finally just before I go to bed. I keep a toothbrush and paste at work, as do a few of my coworkers. My friend thinks that I am brushing the enamel right off of my teeth. I don’t think so - I just feel better with a fresher mouth.
I only brush once a day, just before going to bed, unless I eat something that sticks in my teeth and that I can’t remove some other way.