How Stress Can Affect Your Oral Health

Stress can cause your body to manifest all sorts of health problems, especially if you have chronic stress. When it comes to your mouth, your mouth can start to have mouth sores, most commonly canker sores. Stress can also cause your body to have a weaker immune system, which can also cause damage to your teeth and gums. Find out how, and why a little stress relieve can help your oral health!

What Is Stress?

We’ve all heard of it, and we’ve all had it at some point. Stress is a lifetime companion that comes in and out of our lives at various moments in time, and how we react to it can have serious effects on our overall health, including our oral health. Stress is the body’s reaction to external forces or events that cause physical, emotional, or mental tension. Whenever we feel stressed, our bodies release adrenaline and stress hormones (like cortisol) to prepare the body for a fight-or-flight response. Stress is a normal part of life, but excessive stress can lead to health complications and lifestyle behavioral changes, such as becoming physically inactive, changing dietary habits, and increasing alcohol intake.

How individuals react to stress is largely dependent upon their personalities. But even those people who are easy-going and have adaptable personalities can struggle with excessive stress if they lack control in their lives. Chronic stress, which usually occurs through the presence of low socioeconomic status, work stress, marital stress, or caregiver strain, also increases your risk for debilitating diseases, such as cardiovascular disease and periodontal disease. Many times the way that we react to the stressful situations or environments that we find ourselves in can be manageable, but some situations are out of our hands, like where we were raised or how much money we have. As we learn to recognize the signs that our bodies are undergoing too much stress and what to do about it, we will be more equipped to protect ourselves from future pain and health problems.

How Stress Affects the Body

Because we are each different, our bodies’ reactions to stress vary. While stress has been explicitly linked to increased risk for diabetes, heart disease, depression, aging, and gastrointestinal problems, it also has a large impact on your oral health. There are a few major complications that stress can cause, which damage your teeth, gums, and mouths. When you’re stressed or anxious, you can experience something called bruxism, which is when you grind your teeth while sleeping. Grinding your teeth wears down your enamel and can even chip your teeth. Clenching and grinding your teeth can also make your mouth and jaw sore, which can make it difficult to eat and chew. Excessive stress can also alter our eating habits and cause us to eat poorly. Many times, we seek out sugary, “comfort food” to cope with what we are experiencing. The more we eat sugary foods, the more likely we are to develop tooth decay, which can require a lot of dental work and time to fix.

Stress negatively affects the hormones in your body. Specifically, it can reduce the amount of saliva that your mouth produces, thus causing dry mouth. Having a frequently dry mouth allows for bacteria to build up on your teeth, allowing for cavities. As your hormones change due to stress, it also can decrease your body’s immunity to infection and ulcers can begin forming in your mouth. Ulcers make it even more difficult to brush your teeth and keep your mouth clean. Additionally, stress greatly affects how quickly your body heals. Your body’s ability to fight off infection decreases and the healing process can take much longer to occur. Lastly, people who are dealing with extreme stress tend to avoid doing the activities that they normally would do, including maintaining their oral hygiene. As we deal with excessive stress, we are more likely to neglect brushing and flossing our teeth, which bad dental habits can lead to tooth decay and gum disease. Stress has a number of impacts on our bodies, but the effect that it can cause on our oral health, if left untreated, is startling and dangerous.

Tips For Relieving Your Stress

If you consider yourself a stressed-out person, what should you do? There are many options, large and small, to help yourself relieve the tension and stress in your life that may be causing you oral health problems. Try including some of the following tips for reducing the stress in your life:

• Exercise
• Eat a healthy diet
• Avoid unhealthy habits
• Meditate
• Get enough sleep
• Write in a journal
• Seek counseling

Being physically active can increase the endorphins and other neuro-chemicals that enhance your sense of well-being and improve your state of mind. Exercise helps refocus your mind and improve your mood. Try jogging, walking, yoga, swimming, biking, or housecleaning to get your body moving. Eating a well-balanced diet full of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains gives your body the nutrition it needs to function properly and fight off infection. When we’re stressed, sometimes we look to unhealthy habits, like eating too much, smoking, drinking, and other substances that harm our bodies. These habits should be avoided at all costs. Another important tip that many people struggle implementing in their lives is getting adequate rest each night. Stress affects our sleep, so make sure to develop a relaxing bedtime routine, listen to soft music, and put distractions away to help your body wind down before bed. Writing in a journal allows you to get your thoughts and feeling on paper, while counseling allows you to identify your sources of stress and develop a plan of action in the event that you’re feeling too overwhelmed or trapped by your stress.

Maintaining Your Oral Health

If you are noticing problems with your oral health, make sure to schedule an appointment with Stonebrook Family Dental at (303) 872-7907! We can help you navigate your oral health to obtain a healthy mouth and a stress-free life!