How long does it take to remineralise cavities?

 How long it takes to remineralise cavities, reverse decay or regrow receding gums depends on three factors.

1. Your symptoms, how severe they are and how long you’ve had them for
2. How wholeheartedly you are able to engage with holistic healing strategies
3. How much time you feel is available

The most thrilling part of my work as a natural oral health coach is hearing back from people who have successfully saved a tooth from a root canal or extraction by following the Holistic Tooth Fairy Way. 

 Unfortunately I can’t wave a magic wand to fix your dental problems overnight. Unlike visiting a dentist who spends no more than an hour or two to drill, fill and bill, working with natural healing strategies requires an ongoing commitment to self care. 

 Most of my coaching clients see significant improvement to their teeth within the first three months and their gums within six months. A few determined and lucky people have healed dramatically within days or weeks of starting the Holistic Tooth Fairy Way.

When is it too late to remineralise a cavity

One of the most frequently asked questions I get asked on the free 15 minute assessment call is whether they’ve left it too late to heal their tooth or gums holistically.

 The interesting thing about this question is that it most often comes from someone whose symptoms are comparatively mild, but because it’s an isolated incident and the worst thing they’ve experienced, they feel scared and hopeless.  

I was thinking about how to make a flow chart for deciding whether or not it’s too late to save a tooth. But even the most complicated tangle of factors would still be too simplistic to decide whether it’s worth trying to save your tooth.

Often it’s a matter of timing that makes the difference between being able to heal your teeth or gums holistically, or not. The severity of your symptoms and how long you’ve had them may be the deciding factor for  e.g. a three year old abscess is going to take longer to heal than a three week old infection.

When the problem has been going on for too long, there may be no time left to allow for the incremental improvements of holistic healing. 

If you let an intermittent niggle develop into an intolerable toothache, ongoing pain undermines your ability to stick to a healing protocol for long enough to take effect. 

The main consideration for deciding whether or not it’s too late, is not usually the seriousness of the problem, but your willingness to wholeheartedly commit to consistently practicing a Very Intensive Protocol.

Ultimately it’s rarely the symptoms that hold the answer to whether it’s too late to save your tooth or gum from a dental procedure, but how wholeheartedly you are able to engage with all four realms of the Holistic Tooth Fairy Way and practice nutrition, jaw relaxation, hygiene and metaphysical strategies consistently and persistently for as long as it takes to heal

Your ability to heal faster than the problems can progress may depend on whether you utilize ‘short cuts’ such as eating animal products or take a ‘fast track’ 1:1 intensive with a natural oral health coach 

That’s why we need to have a conversation so I can get a sense of who you are, not just what is happening in your mouth.

We need to consider not only your symptoms, oral health aspirations and dental diagnosis, but also your lifestyle, your priorities and your personality.

One thing I can can say for sure, is that the sooner you start applying your own personal Very Intensive Protocol the more flexibility and fun you can have in the healing process.

Finding time to remineralize cavities

Another aspect of time seems to make a significant impact on whether your tooth can be saved. It’s an intangible quality of spaciousness. Saving a tooth seems to require an attitude that there is enough time. Paradoxically, the more time you feel like you have, the faster a tooth seems to heal. 

Note I’m not talking about the amount of obligations you are juggling. Your days may be packed full with work, kids, side gigs and more, yet you can hold it lightly with a flexible, expansive way of thinking about your personal experience of time. 

I see this kind of spacious attitude to time working it’s teeth healing magic most effectively when you 

• relax about what you ‘should’ be doing, 
• let go of perfectionism and 
• allow your intuition and body wisdom to guide your decisions from day to day. 

 I suppose a few souls grow up with this kind of graceful self-trust around time (I don’t know many). Most adults only learn about it later, if at all, usually as the result of a crisis that rearranges your priorities. 

For some people that crisis is embodied in our teeth.

Therefore, practicing the Holistic Tooth Fairy Way may involve embracing a new sense of time. 

Instead of toothbrushing in a mindlessly rush on your way to work or bed, you could find it becomes a moving meditation on self love and forgiveness. 

Instead of grabbing at snacks to graze on the go, you could find yourself sitting down to a home cooked meal and savoring it with grace.

How long to keep practicing?

One final FAQ about time is to do with how long to keep going with a teeth or gum healing protocol. 

Once your cavity has started to remineralize, the root canal has been averted or your gums begun to regrow…how long will you need to follow the Holistic Tooth Fairy Way?  

The answer depends on whether your oral health problems are isolated and straightforward or chronic and multifaceted.

Are your current symptoms unusual for you? Are you generally in good health overall?  Then you may find that after this particular problem is resolved you can return to your old habits with no further problems.

Or are you more like me and your teeth are your health weakness? Is your mouth the part of your body that will always be ready to communicate when something in your life is out of alignment with your highest good?

Then you may need to follow a modified version of your healing protocol for life.

 I’ve been practicing what I preach for 7 years and yet I still get symptoms flaring up in my mouth when I’m stressed. For as long as I want to keep my teeth, I’ll be following the Holistic Tooth Fairy Way… for the rest of my life.