Sweet Success: How To Have Horribly Good Teeth This Halloween

Halloween Hijinks

It happens every year. You’re on a routine Target run, shopping list in hand, and the second you grab a cart you start noticing something a little different. Instead of the typical one dollar items at the front, your eyes take in a sea of shelving absolutely stuffed with candy of all kinds. It’s that time of year again: Halloween. Even if you don’t celebrate it, everyone is familiar with the infamous “month of candy”, also known as “the best time to be a dentist”. And even with this year’s Halloween looking a little different, it’s easy to overindulge in the sweet stuff during the month of October, and even easier to develop cavities that we didn’t have before.

The best Halloween candy

While there’s no such thing as teeth friendly candy, there are a few choices and swaps we can make that will be easier on our mouths and minds. And as long as we’re not sitting in front of the TV with the latest true crime show endlessly eating a bag of candy corn, it’s okay to indulge in some of the sweet stuff this October.

Chocolate

Everyone’s favorite sweet treat also tends to be one of the safest for our teeth. Most chocolate is soft and doesn’t linger on the teeth for too long. Even if we do get a bit here and there, most of it washes away with a quick mouth rinse.

The worst Halloween candy

Indulge even less in these popular offenders, unless you really enjoy those filling appointments.

Chewy, sticky sweet

Chewy candy that sticks to the teeth is the absolute worst offender, as anything that is allowed to linger on the teeth will cultivate a large colony of bacteria, which becomes more and more difficult to dislodge as time goes on. Needless to say, this means cavities. Outside of this, there are a few others to watch out for:

Sour candy

Anything coated in a veil of sour sugar, from gummies to mints to hard candies will be disastrous for your tooth enamel. Sour candy also tends to be incredibly acidic, and if you eat too much of it, this acid will attack your enamel, essentially removing the protective “shield” that it provides your teeth.

Holding off the Halloween horror

It might seem like there’s almost no candy that you can eat this month, but keep in mind the moderation compromise; just don’t eat too much. On top of this, be proactive in scheduling a cleaning appointment with your dentist, so that the horrors you encounter this October can be safely and professionally cleaned from your mouth and your memory.