Angry About My Lousy Teeth
0
0
I have just had the fortnight from Hell. A week of agonising tooth ache followed by root canal and another week of painful recovery. What is it with human teeth not being up to the job? WTF cannot our teeth last the distance along with other functioning parts of our body? I am angry about my lousy teeth. And like all good humans I am looking for someone or something to blame. I have walked the straight and narrow, for a decade, when it comes to my oral hygiene. Done the right thing diet-wise, according to the experts. Still I suffer like a bastard left out in the cold.
Frustrated By The Failings Of My Teeth
You know, I am tired of that story I peddled about the kid who ate too many sweets. I am fed up with the narrative purporting to point the finger at my indulgent character. Indeed, I’m bloody furious about my lousy teeth. You know, its like a kick in the teeth when you are down. Exposed nerve pain strips you of any dignity and the basic joy of eating. Even a drink of water can set off a chain reaction of shooting pain in the nether regions of my jaw. Why does this shit happen and what is at its core?
Dentist Points The Finger At Sugar
There I was reading an article published online by dental experts, as you do. This toffy nosed dentist from some private London clinic was being interviewed. Mister Dentist told it plain and identified the problem we all endure. The perpetrator, the number one culprit, is sugar – refined sugar to be more precise. This dentist with half a brain put it all in evidentiary terms. He stated that if you examine the prehistoric skulls with teeth, virtually none of them have tooth decay. It is only after we started farming sugar and refined it back in the 16C and it became a major trade commodity that tooth decay went ballistic. The Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, and British made their serious wealth on the back of trade in sugar, tobacco, and slavery. All of these things were interlinked with enslaved Indigenous Indians and Africans working the sugar plantations. This sweet substance, this drug really, was in high demand throughout Europe. Millions of dark skinned people were worked to death and died of introduced diseases in the Caribbean, the Americas, and even in northern Australia. Sugar cane farming has a dark history of degradation and shameful behaviour by whites.
“The first place to cultivate sugarcane explicitly for large-scale refinement and trade was the Atlantic island of Madeira, during the late 15th century. Then, it was the Portuguese who realised that new and favourable conditions for sugar plantations existed in Brazil, where a slave-based plantation economy was established. When Brazilian sugarcane was introduced in the Caribbean, shortly before 1647, it led to the growth of the industry which came to feed the sugar craze of Western Europe.”
Sugar is a drug, in the same way that other unnecessary substances like alcohol, opium, cocaine, etc are. We love them and some devote their lives to consuming them. They cause untold damage to millions of lives, billions of lives, and cost us big time. Sugar has flown under the radar for much longer than, say, tobacco but is just as poisonous to our health. Sugar and alcohol are interrelated, as lots of refined sugar goes into our favourite tipples. Think sweet bourbon and cola, the popular drink of working men and women. Consider the fact that the DV crisis, the violence against women crisis is tied to alcohol consumption. Drinking too much amplifies behaviours. These folk drink too much in part because they like the sweet taste. The sweet deceit. A woman is killed by her partner or former partner nearly every day in Australia. Booze plays a big role in this. Sugar plays a role in this too. Still angry about my lousy teeth!
Our dentist tells us that it is the acidity generated by the refined sugar in and around our teeth when we snack on sugary stuff. The bacteria adores sugar, plaque forms, then infections, and holes in our teeth, the pulp dies along with the rotting tooth eventually. You and me are faced with the tricky question posed by our dental practitioner. Root canal therapy and crown or extraction? Oh no, not another missing tooth! Weighing up expensive options with no guarantee that they will last. The sugar addicted society in which we live is complicit in this sorry situation. The lack of government intervention to protect its citizens. The f****** free market economy that promotes and pushes unhealthy, sugar laden snacks and drinks endlessly to children. That same free market economy that shuns dental care from Medicare downunder. You are free to be coerced and encouraged into eating shitloads of stuff that is bad for you. Cause making money and profitability is more important than anything.
I told you that I would find something to blame. Pity that it’s all bloody true.
Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of Bite & Smile: Delving Into Dental Care for an Informed Choice – his brand new book.
©WordsForWeb
