And teeth. This stuff will do nasty things to your gums. And receded gums never recover.

Unless you do an incredibly painful graft right? I have a buddy who had to do that in college and man it seemed incredibly unpleasant. They harvested the skin from the roof of his mouth IIRC

Edit: yikes sounds like it gets worse and might not even work

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loloquwowndueo an hour ago | parent | next [-]

My dentist has been peddling this procedure to me for years. It sounds incredibly invasive and painful and they don’t even promise it’ll cover 100% of the recession, nor that it won’t recede again unless one goes for an even more invasive jaw realignment which involves, I shit you not, intentionally fracturing the palate bone to make more space to align the teeth.

That was the “let me stop you right there” moment.

(Not even going into how much these horrendous procedures cost!)

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port11 an hour ago | parent | next [-]

What you’re describing sounds terrible in isolation, but usually these measures are only done if truly needed — at least in Europe?

I passed on the jaw realignment surgery, knowing that the consequences are more bone wear over time and that I’ll never fully recover usage on the left side of my mouth.

None of the dentists/orthos/surgeons involved said I *had* to do it, there is a trade off. Breaking your jaw might weaken it down the line, but bone wear along the tooth line isn’t great either. It’s a tough call.

Grafting is another thing I’ve been postponing, but now the proximity to my roots is getting painful as sensitivity piles up.

Again: this is all optional and full of trade-offs. Sibling comment suggesting you change dentists is not doing a fair assessment of the situation.

People with bad teeth, on average, die younger and have worse diets.

	▲	loloquwowndueo 12 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		> usually these measures are only done if truly needed — at least in Europe? I’m not in Europe :) Nah my dude, my dentist peddles all sorts of ridiculous unnecessary treatments. Invisalign? I’m 50, I don’t give a shit about how my teeth look, just want them not to fall off all at once. Invisalign is a subscription for your teeth. No thanks. I stay with this dentist because they are friendly, technically competent and a 5-minute walk from home. Literally the only downside is the FUD to get me to go for those treatments but it’s just steeling myself to say “no thanks” every 6 months.

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ptaffs an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

i had this suggested to me by a locum dentist, and i agree. This is totally off topic and going further so but if you didn't already, you should change your dentist.

	▲	loloquwowndueo 10 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Thanks but I won’t. My dentist is fine otherwise, I can say “no”, they’re ok with me saying “no”. We get along great and I find that’s both hard to find and super important - no better way of putting off dentist visits than having a dentist you dread seeing every 6 months.

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data-ottawa an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

I had to do a graft and it wasn’t especially painful. I got painkillers but only used them on the first day.

The recovery period sucked, I needed antibiotics and couldn’t eat anything solid for two weeks.

If you can behaviourally prevent needing gum grafts you should.