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“You know what the problem is? We’re all too scared of the dentist. That’s why our teeth are falling out!”

So I went to some teeth-smith’s and said Ah.

As I’ve been blessed with a gorgeous ivory smile, I was ready to say ‘Be’ soon enough. B being, paying the bill. The amount of cash a saw changing hands in the front office – mind you, my million dollar smile didn’t cost that much – made me consider a career change.

The pile of green being shoved in the dentist’s drawer was evidence enough for me to realise that many people indeed suffer from dentryps – which I gather from Ed’s Medical terminology page means broken teeth. I might be wrong about that.

What I’m not wrong about is what is most commonly considered the dominant cause for bad teeth: sugar and bubbly drinks.

Another thing I’m not wrong about is the long lines at dentists. And if that isn’t proof enough, the fact that few dentists are suffering despite a quickly shrinking world economy must show that there’s no odontophobia to speak of.

So was my daddy right?

I don’t think so! You can’t blame dentist fearing the shark, or the monster! You can’t blame a two-toed sloth for not needing one! It’s not our odontophobia that gives us bad teeth, it’s the smucking huhyooge (thanks Lisey’s Story) amounts of sugar in all foods, and the fizz.

Sugar itself doesn’t attack teeth. What attacks teeth is acid – and fizz is acid. The reason sugar is bad for your teeth, is because if sugar spends some time mixed with your saliva, it automatically turns to some kind of acid.

The solution immediately becomes obvious. First of all, refrain from drinking fizzy drinks, or anything else acidic. Secondly, once you start consuming sugar, keep doing so. When we add more sugar into our mouth, the old sugar will be swallowed before it can turn acidic. This will make sure it can’t burn holes in our teeth. So when you eat a little sugar, keep going and going until you can wash your mouth with something that’ll take all the sugar out of it!

Previously posted on My.Opera, when they still had a blogging service. I’m rerunning the Daddy Said series here; when I feel like, I’ll write a new episode. This one I wrote in 2009, and tweaked only slightly to include the internet a little. Thanks for your patience; I’m trying to get back to a weekly post, but someone very special has started distracting me.