My Story & Cure

XH890 · Post by **XH890** » Mon Nov 18, 2013 1:45 am

Hello everyone, I'd like to share my own story about battling bad breath. I'll be honest it is probably due to my laziness keeping up with my oral hygiene, but when I was young I could really care less about it, I would just wake up and throw on whatever to wear and head out the house to school. Little did I know the years of social suffering I'd have to edure. It was brought to my attention in 3rd grade when I tried so hard to get these 2 girls to become my friend, but in the end was shut down when they told me "your breath stinks". It was pretty bad when I reached middle school, I have taught myself to hold my breath and slow my breathing so that don't offend people. I became very introverted and quiet. In summer school I overheard someone telling another person "she stinks..". It got even worse in high school.. I literally had 0 friends, NEVER ate lunch in the cafeteria, and wreaked terror to the person I was sitting next to everytime I entered the room. They would fan the pages in their book like they are looking through it or have thier arm up on the desk to block the side of their face that I was on.
I was so desperate to do something to fix it, but to no avail. I would brush my teeth for 10 minutes and tounge and then use mouthwash but it would quickly go away and be replaced with a terrible dry bitter taste within 10 mins of having my mouth shut. I even bought gum in bulk and chewed on it everyday I went to school. I happend to be grouped up with the 2 loud mouth girls in the class and they told me straight out "your breath stinks" and laughed, I was embarassed and just looked down. I was so angry and always wondered 'why me?', all I've ever wished for since the beginning was to have fresh breath.
Luckily some brave soul came along and we ended up dating for a year. I never allowed him to french kiss me, because I didnt want him to crawl in his skin having his tounge inside my rancid mouth. Even during the loving he would always turn his face away or have me face away from him. Thank god he never mentioned anything about my BB, i think i'd just die if he did. The relationship ended and I was alone thinking that no one is ever going to want to be with me and that id be alone forever. I did have a few men who were interested in me come talk to me, but then i'd see thier face as they recoil back from my BB. It crippled me from having a social life, getting a job, and even going to college because I couldnt stand offending people with my BB and concentrated on it more then what the teacher was teaching us.
I had a wisdom tooth removed which was adding more to the cause of bad breath, when it was pulled out it smelled putrid and rotten so I was glad to get that out of there, but I still had bad breath.
The breaking point for me was when I had random children - on seperate occasions cover thier noses or hide it under thier shirts as I spoke. I just told myself that I have been a victim for far too long and that I've had enough and will not go through the rest of my life living in this humiliation. I decided to get my teeth professionally cleaned, It had been SO long since I've had them looked at by a dentist. I asked my mom about it and I was insured under her name, so I booked an appointment at my local dentists office to get them cleaned.
Upon examination I was having gum pockets in my back molars of about 5mm & 6mm and bleeding upon probing meaning periodontitis, a terrible gum disease that causes many things one of them being bad breath. The hygenist was even shocked that I had pockets that deep because she had complimented me on my strong nicely aligned teeth just moments before the probing. She had to do a deep cleaning called scaling and root planing which is when she cleans UNDERNEATH the gumline where the tarter and bacteria buildup is (where ur toothbrush cant get to) and then regular cleaning on my other teeth (only above the gumline). During the cleaning I could feel grains in my mouth, kind of like if you have sand in your mouth. That was all the built up crap that was underneath my gumline giving me BB. The whole process was done in about 2.5 hours with no numbing, it wasnt painful.
The next day I could definitley feel the difference because I do not have a bad taste in my mouth anymore and have been babying my teeth and making sure to brush, floss, and mouthrinse it like it was my religion.
I don't have bad breath anymore and it was gone overnight with one simple soulution. I have wasted so much of my life with something that could of been easily cured with a visit to my dentist and I am very thankful that I know now that it was because of my gums and not any internal issues. I know that for some people it is not so easily treated like mines was, but please go to your dentist and have them measure your gum pocket depths and get a deep cleaning, thats where you should start first. Then maintain a healthy oral routine to prevent the tartar from building up again!

Thank you for reading!

liza22 · Post by **liza22** » Mon Nov 18, 2013 3:30 am

That's great you found your answer and it was a fairly simple one. I've had deep root cleaning and scaling and unfortunately that didn't help me. Thanks for sharing your answer. I'm sure it will help others.

Stinkynick · Post by **Stinkynick** » Mon Nov 18, 2013 8:22 am

Great news! Congratulations.. If you don't mind me ask

Stinkynick · Post by **Stinkynick** » Mon Nov 18, 2013 8:25 am

Great news! Congratulations.. If you don't mind me asking, did the odor come from your nose as well? And how long has it been since the cleaning?

I hope this is your permanent cure, best of luck!

halitosisux · Post by **halitosisux** » Mon Nov 18, 2013 9:46 am

Thanks for sharing your story with us.
Can you please tell us your age now and how long you suffered with BB?
Did your gums ever bleed?
Did they smell if you rubbed them?
Were these teeth with the deep pockets anywhere near this stinking wisdom tooth you had pulled?
Please add any other specific information you think might be relevant, such as any other typical BB symptoms like tonsil stones, tongue coating, tongue odour, smell of saliva, etc, both before and after being cured.

Thanks.

XH890 · Post by **XH890** » Sun Dec 01, 2013 5:14 am

Well I am sad to say this, but it was not a permanant cure

I actually dont think the dental hygienist did the job right, but then again i dont want to push the blame on other people just because im frustrated. My bad breath is back.. I dont know how bad it is, but I know that I STILL have it because people are backing up from me and covering their noses when I talk. Its quite disappointing because I am keeping up with my oral healthcare, my gums dont bleed and I floss and use mouth washes and scrape and scrape and scrape, but still... bad breath. Maybe its my tounge? I'll just try to keep working on it, expecially in the very back of my tounger because it does get pretty coated back there at the end of the day.. even though i am drinking water all the time. I will keep updating.

@halitosisux:
I have suffered with BB for 18 years, which is probably embedded into my dna right now..

My gums bled all the time when I brushed my teeth, and since I was uneducated about gum disease and all that jazz at the time, i thought that it was just me killing the "bad breath" germs. I have not rubbed my gums or anything but i have noticed that when I lick the gum area where the wisdom tooth used to be, I get a nasty odd taste.

The 5 & 6 millimeter dental pockets were 2-3 of the back molars of all 4 quadrants. My front teeth had pocket depths of 1-3.

I never had tonsil stones, my saliva always smelled (because i thought thats how saliva is supposed to smell like, but its not), I had almost a permanent white coating on my tongue.. it was very difficult for me to remove.

halitosisux · Post by **halitosisux** » Sun Dec 01, 2013 11:14 am

Sorry to hear, but what actually made you think you were cured in the first place?

Have you been back to check your depths again to see if your treatment improved this. Do your gums still bleed if you probe them? The cleaning would have cleaned out the trapped debris and bacteria too, causing the smell, and if the pockets are still deep they'll be full of bacteria and debris again. Have you tried irrigation? Throw some chlorhexidine in an irrigator and keep going with your efforts to bring your gums back to health.

Does your tongue actually smell? it's no good saying it's coated if there's no odour coming from it, because coating is not always due to the same reasons and most of the time a coating (typically) is completely harmless and doesn't affect the breath, even though it can make you think it does because of the taste buds nestled within this surface coating. See recent posting of person who has had this confirmed by an expert breath specialist.