Why the fuss over flossing?

New research suggests that flossing your teeth does not work and could be a waste of time.

GREAT news! It seems there is no scientific evidence to prove that flossing is beneficial. At last, I can abandon my nightly masochistic ritual, safe in the knowledge that my teeth won’t resemble six shelled peanuts randomly stuck into my gums a few years from now.

As for the three kilometres of floss I’ve stockpiled in my bathroom ( it was on special offer a few months ago), I can always use it to supplement my meagre first aid kit.

If you come to my place, trip and crack your head open on my coffee table, I will be able to stitch up your wound with dental floss. Or so I’ve read. It’s also good for treating ingrown toenails, lopping off skin tags and removing a ring stuck on a finger. Away from the first aid box, your redundant floss can also be used to slice cheese, cakes, bananas... But please don’t be stingy and use the ingrown toenail floss on your banana cheesecake. But I digress. I don’t know how many times I’ve had a dentist poke at my teeth and gums with a sharp instrument, and then ask, “So tell me, how often do you floss?”

If your dentist ever asks you such a question, don’t even think about lying. He’s only asking because he knows just by glancing inside your mouth that you’re a delinquent flosser. Even if you spend an hour before your appointment flossing each tooth carefully, he will know that you’ve only flossed once in the last six months.

In the past, whenever he was less than impressed with the state of my teeth, my dentist would retrieve a giant set of false teeth from a cupboard and show me how to brush and floss properly. I’m sure he must have thought I was clueless.

I blame my parents – lovely people with a cavalier attitude towards dental hygiene. They both grew up on a farm, miles away from the nearest dentist. The farming life can be brutal, but it teaches you to put small things like the toothache into perspective.

From an early age, my mother and father witnessed sheep dying during childbirth, lambs that were stillborn, and mildly sick cows being slaughtered in an attempt to save the entire herd.

As a cow, you would have no idea that the innocent clearing of your throat, brought on by a rogue blade of glass sticking to your tonsils, could result in you being dragged behind the barn to be slaughtered.

Considering my parents’ upbringing, you might then appreciate that regular brushing was low on the daily to- do list, especially during the lambing and calving seasons. With a long list of chores to do every day ( farm animals don’t take the weekend off ), there would have been little or no time for regular dental appointments.

And if a tooth was giving trouble, no attempt would have been made to save it – it would simply have been whipped out at the first opportunity.

This attitude stuck with my parents, even when they had a young family of their own. As a child, there was no guarantee that I would find toothpaste in the bathroom on any given day. When money was tight, my mother obviously decided feeding her six children and providing her husband with an adequate supply of nicotine came before healthy teeth and gums.

When the toothpaste ran out, I would often clean my teeth the same way people must have done more than a century ago. A damp toothbrush dipped into a bowl of salt, or covered with soot scraped from the inside of the chimney, a few swipes across my teeth, a quick rinse, and I was done.

On those occasions when the family budget extended to toothpaste, my siblings and I would literally gobble it up. I loved the fruit- flavoured stuff created spe- cially for children. I would squirt it straight from the tube into my mouth – I doubt it ever touched my toothbrush.

Of course, my mother soon realised that the toothpaste wasn’t being used for its intended purpose and began buying some nasty tasting stuff that came in a block and smelled of disinfectant.

Needless to say, my teeth were a mess. Whenever the dentist rolled up in front of my rural school in his mobile clinic, I knew I would have to undergo a few rounds of drilling and fillings before the week was through.

As an adult, I don’t have a problem brushing my teeth twice a day, but flossing has always been a tedious activity that I’m glad to give up.

If you have trouble with ingrown toenails, do drop me a line. I’ll be more than happy to donate my stock to a good cause.

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