The before and after pics with the charcoal powder were pretty impressive with, of course, a few saying it did nothing for them. I figured I'd give it a go.
I brushed for 2 minutes prior to my regular brushing routine of two minutes with my Phillips Sonicare toothbrush. (affiliate link) You absolutely have to brush afterward, you can't use it in place of regular tooth brushing because even if you've rinsed your mouth, there is still enough crap left in there to make your toothpaste gray after you brush.
After about day three, I noticed the bottom gums of my front teeth felt a little inflamed. I thought maybe it was just getting used to it so I would brush manually so the charcoal wasn't being ground into everything.
After day five, a spot in my top molars was getting very sensitive and not in the way whitening strips make your teeth feel. This felt like a big throbbing cavity would probably feel. I did it one more day and I just couldn't take it anymore. I knew the only thing I changed was using that stuff so I discontinued use due to the inflamed gums and soreness like the package said to do. I was lucky that I was able to return it without an issue so I wasn't out any money for it. I got online and started doing some actual research. Yeah...should've done that first. All kinds of articles talking about how bad that is for your teeth and how it can strip away enamel because of the abrasion of the activated charcoal and the more enamel that comes off, the more porous it gets and can then absorb the color of the charcoal which would look like a horror show.
Within four days of not using it, my teeth felt totally fine so I know I made the right decision for me.
The irritating part (other than the actual irritation it caused) is I feel like it made my teeth very slightly darker!
So yeah, even if you trust a blogger and buy something based off of their suggestion (even moi!) make sure you do actual research because as nice as reviews are to read, that isn't research. You know what they say about opinions and rumpholes...everybody has one.
If you choose to go that route, more power to ya, just know the potential risks involved so you don't ruin those pearly whites!
What recommended products have you used that flopped for you?
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I've generally had good luck with things I've ordered. I've bought products that didn't really work, but nothing that's caused actual damage or done the opposite of what I bought it for. I thought about the charcoal whitener, but decided it wasn't for me a few months ago. I'm a coffee drinker, but I also have really sensitive teeth so whitening is challenging.
ReplyDeleteI can't do whiteners because I had one tooth fixed that was broken and it's 'capped' on the bottom with bondo, so any whitening I did would not work on that tooth so it would really stand out. Kind of on the same line with charcoal that I tried is the charcoal black head remover scrub by Garnier that does not work for me at all. I can scrub my nose until the cows come home and it just doesn't do anything. So that was a bit of a disappointment, but I used a coupon so I wasn't out a lot of money. We also used that Flex Seal stuff on the outside of the house (the clear one) and it turned yellow on us so we have all these yellow stains around the house. That was very aggravating.
ReplyDeleteBuzzkill. I was afraid to use something like that in my mouth.
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