Monday, March 31, 2014

13 Natural Home Remedies For Sore Gums


1. Stop brushing with regular over the counter products and make your own paste: 1 cup baking soda, 1 tablespoon hydrogen peroxide, 10 drops of peppermint extract. (Have done this since the late 80s)

2. Make a healing mouthwash with cloves. Cloves help heal toothache and gum pain. Boil one cup of water add 1 tablespoon of cloves and turn off heat. Let it steep for 1 or 2 hours with cloves until cool. Then put in a dark bottle and use it as mouthwash. Great stuff. 

3. Up your vitamin C Eat more C-rich foods. It's not just lemons that can help with gum disease, but other foods full of vitamin C such as oranges, grapes, kiwi mango, papaya and strawberry are good choices, too. Vitamin C is an antioxidant, and antioxidants are found to promote connective tissue growth and bone regeneration, which can be affected by various gum problems.

4  The best product that gives relief is a combination of vinegar (Balsamic is the best) and salt. Depending on how severe the pain is you might want to make a facial mask of the vinegar and salt, and apply it to the affected area. This should give you 24 hour comfort. It will expel the topical bacteria surrounding the inflamed area. However, until you remove every chip, from broken teeth, foreign particle or tarter, the pain will reoccur. 

5. Put vanilla extract on the area of where the gums are hurting.

6. Take supplements and eat foods that boost the immune system (Echinacea, Lysine, Goldenseal, garlic). Apply tea tree oil to the infection. Use mouthwash several times daily, preferably something that's not too harsh. I like Desert Essence's stuff, especially the kind that contains tea tree oil. Biotene is also good, or you can just gargle with an equal mixture of hydrogen peroxide and water.

7. Wintergreen Oil is the only thing that helped me when I had severe gum pain.

8. Make a sea salt solution. Dissolve a small amount of sea salt in a cup of warm water. Swish a sip of the solution in your mouth for 30 seconds and spit it out. Repeat several times. Salt water will reduce swollen gums and draw infection out of any abscesses. Add this mouth rinse to your twice-daily brushing routine.

9. Apply tea bags. Steep a tea bag in boiling water, remove and allow it to cool until you can handle it comfortably. Hold the cooled tea bag on the affected area of your gums and keep it there for about five minutes. The tannic acid in the tea bag can work effectively to relieve gum infection. Directly applying the tea bag to your gums is more effective than simply drinking the beverage. Plus, drinking too much tea has a dental downside: discolored, tea-stained teeth.


10.  Rub some honey. Honey has natural antibacterial and antiseptic properties, so you can put it to work treating your infected gums. Once you brush your teeth, rub a small amount of honey on the problem area of your gums.  Given honey's high sugar content, you want to be careful you don't overapply it and do your best to put it on your gums only rather than on your teeth.

11. Drink cranberry juice. Cranberry juice can prevent bacteria from sticking to your teeth, so try drinking up to 4 ounces of the unsweetened juice daily.

12.  Make a lemon paste. Make a paste from the juice of one lemon and some salt. Mix it well and apply to your teeth. Let it sit for a few minutes and gargle with warm water to rinse it off. Lemons offer a win-win solution for treating gum disease. First, they're an anti-inflammatory, which makes them helpful in treating infected gums. Not only that, but lemons contain vitamin C, which can help your gums fight off infection.

13.  Increase your intake of vitamin D. Vitamin D has anti-inflammatory properties, so be sure you're getting enough of this vitamin when you're trying to heal swollen gums and prevent the condition from reoccurring. Older adults should particularly take note of this vitamin. According to the National Institutes of Health, higher blood levels of vitamin D seem to be linked to a reduced risk of gum disease in people age 50 and older. Get your vitamin D fix by soaking up the sun at least 15 to 20 minutes twice a week and eating D-rich foods such as salmon, whole eggs and cod liver oil.