This has been a source of stress for many years. Why do I always have a white patina on my tongue?! I can scrape it off with extensive toothbrush action, but it always comes back. My doctor has prescribed anti-fungal lozenges, but they haven’t really helped. Does anyone else have a similar problem?
Are you a mouth-breather, by any chance?
Lay off the Vodka & Bleach mixed drinks.
Turpentine: I’m not sure what it means to be a mouth breather, but I do snore loud enough to wake the neighbors. Is there a connection?
xizor: I have a feeling bleach would do me a lot of good. It would probably kill off those candida, who I suspect are the source of my problem.
Now that I think of it, Turpentine might be a good way to get rid of it.
Actually, xisor may not be that far off.
Do you drink a couple before hitting the hay?
I only noticed myself after drinking the night before. It really doesn’t matter how much I drink, either. If I don’t drink, nothing that isn’t washed away with a pop, water, or after that morning brush. If I do, paste city. Looks pretty disgusting if you ask me.
Yeah, CnoteChris, you’re probably right about the alcohol connection. I usually get the white tounge while drinking. Beer does it more than anything. When I’m drinking only red wine, however, that white tongue mysteriously turns to black.
I really should try to use smilies, but y’all know I meant to include one at the end of that last post, right? I just can’t be bothered.
candida only gives little white dots on the tongue where the colonies are, not an all-over white layer (says the science geek…) & regularly sucking anti-fungal lozenges will kill of the good fungi (part of the natural flora of your sking/mouth/wherever there is a surface in the body) which tend to out-compete things like candida most of the time & keep them at bay (the lozenges may also harm ones lower in your digestive tract and you definitely don’t want todo that!).
Black tongue - you sure you’renot drinking vodka? 
fierra: Thanks for the reassurance about candida. I hate to think of carrying around a yeast infection in my mouth. The black tongue thing was, of course, an exaggeration. But then just try to drink a bottle of Ravenswood Zinfandel and tell me you don’t have a tongue that looks almost black.
When I was getting a check up once, the doctor told me that the coating was due to lack of vitamins in my diet. I got a good “one a day” time pill, and it actually help clear it up…just my 2cents.
Thanks, Atreal. I know my diet sucks. I’m just happy to know that there might be some explanation for my white tongue other than HIV infection, which I know I don’t have but still worry about like a mad hypochondriac.