Everything has to be perfect! It’s your wedding day. Your smile needs to be perfect too, of course. You don’t want your teeth to let you down!
But there’s so much to do in time for the big day. To get wedding ready.
That’s why planning ahead also means booking a teeth whitening session at your local friendly smile centre.
In this article – you’ll get some real handy tips for getting your smile wedding ready, including:
- Your dental whitening countdown – the all-important timeframe for booking a teeth whitening dentist before your wedding.
- EMS airflow® dental deep cleaning – a gentle, non-invasive method of teeth whitening.
- Eating, drinking and general oral hygiene – what foods and drinks to avoid in the run up to your big day, plus smartening up your daily teeth brushing and dental flossing routines.
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Before going down the aisle – your dental whitening countdown
If you’re a smoker and regular drinker of red wine, tea or coffee – you only have to look into a mirror to see if unsightly staining has formed on the surface of your teeth.
Perhaps you’ve given regular dental checkups a miss in recent years?
It’s important not to leave your teeth whitening programme until the last minute. It can take weeks or months to achieve a noticeable difference – and the result you want!
Your countdown to starting treatment at a teeth whitening dentist
6 – 12 months before your wedding
Teeth straightening
Even before cosmetic general dentistry or deep cleaning teeth begins at your dental centre you may need a type of aesthetic general dentistry known as orthodontics.
Orthodontics is – a branch of cosmetic dentistry that focuses upon treating irregularities in the teeth and jaws, such as crowding, overlapping, rotated and crooked teeth.
For example, to look your best on the day you may decide on:
- Straightening one or more teeth
- Correcting a misaligned bite pattern
2 weeks – 6 months before your wedding
A course of professional teeth whitening usually takes around 2 weeks or more to see noticeable results. However, successful dental whitening could take up to 6 months or more, depending upon:
- Extent of surface discolouration, and/or
- Deep staining of enamel
Getting wedding ready with teeth whitening – how it works
Dental whitening works by:
- Bleaching beneath the surface of tooth enamel
- Removing discolouration and making surface enamel colour lighter
An active dental bleaching agent is used to:
- Penetrate the upper layer of the tooth enamel
- Break down and remove the molecules causing the staining
The surface or structure of your teeth is not affected in any way.
Your dentist will use a typical dental bleaching agent such as:
- Hydrogen peroxide – in a higher concentration for a shorter treatment time
or
- Carbamide peroxide – in a lower concentration for a longer treatment time.
Teeth whitening – preparation and treatment
Teeth whitening or teeth bleaching services are straightforward:
To prepare … your dentist will put a lip and cheek guard into your mouth.
This is designed to:
- Make your mouth feel comfortable while it’s held in place to keep your mouth open
- Protect your tongue from the whitening agent used in dental cleaning
A second layer of protection is also applied to your gums to minimise any potential irritation or reaction.
The treatment … your dentist will then apply a hydrogen peroxide dental whitening gel to the surface enamel of your teeth.
What you should know:
Peroxide bleaching gel is high strength. This is different to the typical products sold in your local store, which may simply contain citric acid or bicarbonate of soda.
This means your teeth whitening:
- Takes a much shorter time to work, and is
- More noticeably effective
If you repeat the process more than once while you’re at the dentist you could achieve the desired shade of white even faster.
or …
You may decide to get your teeth wedding ready with EMS airflow®
EMS Airflow® dental deep cleaning
This is dental whitening for super-sensitive teeth and gums! That’s because EMS airflow® is a gentle and less invasive cosmetic dentistry for deep cleaning teeth.
The latest advanced system – called the EMS Airflow® Prophylaxis Master – was launched in Australia in 2017, and is often used at your friendly dental clinic and smile centre.
If you’re putting off an appointment with your local friendly dentist because you suffer from dental anxiety, EMS Airflow® can help get your smile wedding ready!
EMS Airflow® is:
A fine jet spray made up of:
- Air
- Warm water, and an
- Ultra-fine powder called Erythritol Plus, a natural sugar alcohol.
How it works:
A precision nozzle directs the air / water mix in a concentrated micro-stream across the surface of your teeth, and penetrates up to 5 mm into those difficult-to-access areas of the tooth.
EMS Airflow® has proven to be more effective than traditional manual dentistry for removing:
- Surface staining and discoloration
- Dental plaque
- Biofilm* and calculus (tartar)
*Biofilm is … plaque which has solidified around the base and surface of a tooth to form a dark, yellow tartar, known as dental calculus. Only professional dental cleaning can remove the hardened plaque.
Eating, drinking and general oral hygiene
Now your teeth are deep-cleaned and wedding ready – you now need to keep your smile pearly white and shining for the big day!
But how to keep your teeth in pristine condition?
The answer is:
- You must not eat or drink anything that might easily stain your teeth!
Especially:
- 1 – 3 days (minimum of 48 hours) after your teeth whitening treatment has completed.
This is because the whitening agent makes your tooth enamel temporarily slightly weakened and porous.
Food and drink to avoid:
- Dark coloured drinks – red wine, black coffee and tea.
*Choose instead: water, milk, coconut milk. Alternatively, drink tea or coffee through a straw to reduce contact with outer tooth surface.
- Dark coloured food – including barbecue, tomato or pasta sauce and spices (paprika and turmeric), chocolate and coloured sweets.
- Acidic food and ingredients – such as citrus fruit and richly coloured vegetables and berries like beets, tomatoes and pomegranates. Other teeth staining risks to avoid include balsamic vinegar, pickled ingredients and processed meats.
*Choose instead: light-coloured food, such as pasta, cheese, white fish, cauliflower and grilled chicken.
Top oral hygiene tips you must do to protect your smile!
As the days tick down to the big day itself, you need to protect your smile!
Keeping your teeth clean and fresh means paying extra attention to:
Brushing and flossing
It’s all-important to keep to a routine of:
- Brushing your teeth twice a day – and for at least 2 minutes! Ensure to work the bristles at an angle to your teeth and always right up to your gums.
- Flossing every day – use a new flosser every time!
- Lightly rinsing your mouth with water – after you eat or drink any dark-coloured food or liquids.
How to keep your brightest smiles on the day itself
Your wedding day has arrived! Time for your biggest, brightest smiles.
Here’s some simple tips to keep your teeth glowing white from wedding day morning to night:
Remember to not only brush your teeth after your wedding breakfast but also throughout the day.
Give your smile confidence a special wedding day boost by brushing and flossing when you freshen up between ceremony and reception.
Summary
Smokers and regular drinkers of red wine, tea or coffee are always more likely to have discoloured or deeply stained teeth. Especially, if you haven’t been to the dentist for a check up or treatment for a long time.
Getting your teeth wedding ready might only need a short session of teeth whitening. Or you may decide to have veneers fitted to conceal heavily stained teeth.
It’s always recommended to plan for dental whitening up to 6 months before the wedding. You may first require cosmetic dentistry for chipped or crooked teeth.
To achieve noticeable results, your dentist will safely apply a high-strength concentration of teeth whitening agent which is not readily available at your local store.
Another type of dental cleaning can be performed by using EMS Airflow® technology, with its gentler, less invasive jet spray.
FAQs
It usually takes around 2 weeks. But it could be up to 6 months for severely discoloured/ stained teeth.
Normally, up to 2-3 years. But could be only a few months if you daily smoke or drink tea and coffee, and neglect thoroughly daily brushing and flossing.
The EMS Airflow® Prophylaxis Master is designed to tackle deep staining and hardened plaque. Or you could opt for dental veneers which exactly fit over and conceal your discoloured teeth.