PFB EP 28
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KAREN: Welcome back, ladies. Today, I'm so excited to be interviewing Michelle Jorgensen. You may know her as living well with Dr. Michelle on Instagram. She's a dentist and a naturopath. Welcome to the show, Michelle.
MICHELLE: Thank you. I appreciate you having me on today.
KAREN: Well, I'm so excited to talk to you because as you may know, and as some of my listeners may have seen on Instagram, I went down a rabbit hole of researching dental and oral health and how that contributes to our overall well being when I had to have a tooth extracted and I had to decide between am I going to get a root canal or am I going to get the tooth extracted and what are the, all these long term, you know, risks of root canals that I'm hearing about and is this something I want to, you know, You know, risk myself, but you're also saving the tooth.
And there's this whole, you know, I'm finding out about fluoride, and I'm learning about cavities, and I'm learning about all these things. And there's so much differing information out there in the health space among dentists and oral surgeons. And many of my local dentists, I saw probably four or five specialists and dentists and surgeons, all but one recommended root canal.
So I thought, man, I need to figure out what's, what is going on here, what's the truth? I'm a big researcher, for anyone who follows me probably knows that usually in birth and physiological birth, but I realized this was a topic that so many of you were interested in, and so I wanted to bring on some of you.
Dr. Michelle here because I found her account so helpful in really clearing the air on a lot of the questions I had surrounding cavities and root canals. And so I want to bring this discussion to the Pain for Birth podcast because I feel it is so important for not only just women to understand how our bodies work and oral health, but especially pregnant women because There isn't an increase in cavities and changes happening in your mouth when you're pregnant.
And so it's even more important during this time to see your dentist. And so I'm inviting Dr. Michelle on because she has just a wealth of information surrounding these topics that I want her to share with you guys. So, Michelle, would you kind of introduce yourself and let us know how did you get into this, Yeah,
MICHELLE: thank you, first of all, for wanting to know more, because I think this is really important, and I'm always excited to talk to mamas.
You know, pregnant mamas, and after you've had children as well, because there's so many of these topics that are important to know now, while you're expecting, and even for you and for your new baby as well. So, thank you. You know, it's interesting, I did not get here this morning, Intentionally. That's always the thing I start with.
It wasn't an intentional path. I was a general dentist practicing. I was focusing a lot on cosmetic dentistry and started getting sick. Myself didn't know what it was. And my biggest symptoms were my gut was just. Trashed. I couldn't eat anything and I had really bad numbness. I couldn't sleep. I couldn't blow dry my hair.
I couldn't put on mascara. Like, nothing where I could raise my arms at all. And it got to the point where I couldn't even hold instruments at the dental office without my hands going just painfully numb. And then memory. I've always had like this really good memory and I couldn't remember anything. I couldn't remember a patient's name from room to room.
So it was drastic. Like, there was something really, really wrong. So I actually had my practice for sale. I didn't know what I was going to do. I was a young mom, myself, young mom of four little kiddos. And, you know, I was the person who puts food on our table and our practice, you know, my practice, my husband worked in it as well.
So if I was going to not be able to do dentistry anymore, we were out of a job completely. So this was a big deal for us and I looking for what was I going to do now if I was going to coach or consult, I always like to teach. So I thought that was maybe a pathway. And along that pathway, someone finally, another practitioner said, you know, you sound a lot like me.
Have you ever looked into mercury as being a problem? And I said, well, I don't have any mercury fillings. I knew that the silver fillings, what we call silver fillings in our mouths, I knew that they were, that they had mercury in them, but I'd never been told that that could be actually dangerous for the dentist.
But my practice was largely cosmetic at the time and people don't like the way those You know, they call them the black fillings. They're not very, you know, they're not, they don't like the way they look in their mouths. So I was taking out a lot of these fillings and never even realized that while I was drilling them out, all of that mercury vapor was released and coming right into my head.
So I got tested, thought, well, I don't have anything to lose because doctors had no answers for me. So I had nothing to lose, got tested. And that's what it was, mercury off the charts. And I had never been told. That that could be a problem. Not only that, but those four kiddos, because we're on a, I can talk about this on your podcast.
Those four kiddos came very, very hard for me. I actually had in vitro for my first two had twins and then we adopted the next two. I've never gotten pregnant on my own and over 30 years of marriage. And I've since learned that mercury is also very impactful on fertility. And I am now going to tell every female dentist that I know that this is something that you should be aware of and you should be cautious of.
So I also think it affected my fertility and everything else in relation to that. Unfortunately at that point, by the finding out point, I was beyond I was beyond done with having children. So there were not, and we're no more kiddos coming my way, but I think that, well, so I started. Having to clear out all the mercury to be able to get well in a lot of different ways.
And the doctor said, well, you can't keep putting it in if you're going to try to take it out. So if you're going to keep being a dentist, you have to learn how to do it without breathing in all the vapors. And I didn't know if there was a way to do that. So I had to start searching and I found an organization that actually was built pretty much around this concept of what's called safe mercury removal.
So there's additional precautions that are taken for the patient. When it's done, but also for the dentist and the dental assistant and you know, everybody in the office, there's extra precaution that's taken. And so I started doing all of that. And all of a sudden my patient started saying, what in the world are you doing?
You know, you're giving him this crazy looking mask on and you're covering me and you're, you know, doing all of this. And so I would explain, well, this is for my own health, but obviously I'm excited that this is going to help you too. And make it a more, you know, a healthier procedure, a safer procedure for you.
And all of a sudden, Things started picking up and people would say, well, gosh, actually, I've been looking for somebody like you, or my doctor's been looking for someone like you. And then doctors started reaching out and asking, well, do you also do this? Cause we can't find a dentist that can do this as well.
And I didn't know what they were talking about. They were bringing up things like ozone. I didn't even know what it was. Stem cells. I had never even thought about using those. I mean, just a lot of things that I had never heard about inside of dentistry. And so I had to go learn. What they were teaching me about doctors and patients, but they were saying, Hey, we've heard this could be a thing.
Why don't you go learn about this? I had to go find obscure classes all over the place. This was, you know, 10 years ago and eventually realized that there are so many health implications long past just mercury. Mercury was mine, but there are so many others inside of dentistry and it. Honestly, we as dentists don't know them.
That's the tragedy in all of this is we don't know them So this is why i'm so excited to teach all of you because when you know Just like you said with karen, you know, you had to go find dentists and had to go find, you know Unfortunately, you had to go to a lot of different places and get a lot of different things to find the answers My mission is to help people know so that now you Find practitioners and I have a directory on my website that are vetted dentists, you know, for so the works are hard to find somebody, but that's how I got where I am because I got sick.
I had to find an answer. And along the way to my answer, I found a whole bunch of other things that no one is talking about inside of dentistry, or at least they were in 10, 10 years ago. Thankfully, now there are a few, there are a few talking about it. things that need to be known. So thank you for allowing me to talk about it.
KAREN: Oh, I'm, we're so happy to hear about it. And, and honestly, it's, you know, what I came down to and in this search for myself was in making this decision of, you know, root canal versus get your tooth extracted, which is a more, it seems to be a more extreme, you know, course to take of get the whole tooth taken out.
But you know, and in juggling with this, like, why are so many dentists, still recommending root canals, or still, you know, have no awareness of the health implications of all these things we're talking about and that you're bringing up here. And I, and I just kind of took a step back and realized, wow, you know, it's not really any different than the birth space.
It's no different than all the obstetricians that just think, oh, it's just, it's no big deal to cut a woman open and do a cesarean, you know, and versus the natural health space where we, we really take these things seriously. And we think, you know what, women can deliver babies. We don't need all this medical intervention or, you know, most of the health industry, you know, throughout, My journey just to discuss of research, you know, and I think many of my listeners are along in this path to at different points in the journey of realizing that you know what the modern medical system, at least the Western one in America, and and in other parts of the world doesn't always get it right.
And very often we're causing more damage than we are helping people. And so our you Our approaches to health are typically symptom related, you know, they're, and they see things as all separate, you know, we don't realize that the mouth has a direct effect on the rest of the body or that how we give birth can affect our postpartum, our motherhood, our mental health.
There are so many things connected. And just like I realized that there was so much Miss, I don't want to say misinformation because that's kind of what they call what we're talking about is misinformation, but, but there was so much that was not understood that there was limitations that the, and, and frankly, outright lies in many cases when we are Looking at and studying modern medicine and their approach to health that it wasn't really truly contributing to health.
It was reactive. It was symptom based. It was heavily relying on prescriptions and in many ways controlled by the pharmaceutical industry, you know, there's, there's a whole, we could go down many rabbit holes here, which I don't want to focus on this podcast, but it just really hit home for me again, that it's like, you know, Karen, it's no different than the birth industry than, you know, the modern medical, you know, birth industry that we shuffle women through and they end up with birth trauma and, you know, all kinds of stuff.
It's no different than many of the, the ways we approach disease and medicine in this country and dentistry, you know, you have again here, this split between traditional dentists who, they're now realizing, yeah, mercury is not the best, but they're still behind the times on a lot of other issues that we're going to talk about in this podcast.
And in order to really find the truth about how these things impact our health, you have to sometimes go off the beaten path. You have to go off the main consensus of what everyone believes and look into alternative medicine, into holistic medicine or holistic dentistry. And so having gone this route in many other areas of my life, it wasn't so much a stretch for me to realize, you know, Just because the majority of dentists might not have the same beliefs, this just, like, just ask yourself, and as you're listening to this, ask yourself, does this make sense?
Is this logical? Like, would it make sense that if I put heavy metal into my body, it could affect other parts of, of my body?
MICHELLE: You
KAREN: know, and
MICHELLE: I think, And mercury, you know, I mean, think about all the things they talk about. They say, don't eat fish, you know, don't eat fish, don't eat don't take vaccines because of, you know, the mercury in it.
But they don't talk to you about the fact that the filling that's in your head is actually 50 percent mercury.
KAREN: 50%. Yeah. And we think, oh, well, that doesn't have any effect. It's just small, minute amounts, right? That's always the response.
Yeah. I really believe too, that part of the problem here is that there's, it's very difficult just on a surface level to connect A plus B equals C.
So, you know, let's say you had that root canal done and down the road, three, four years from now, you're finding that you're having a hard time getting out of bed in the morning. You're tired. You're always run down. You just don't have the energy that you want. And then an autoimmune disease starts popping up.
You have to get Hashimoto's and then another one shows up and then another. And where, in what world would you connect? Oh, I bet it's that root canal that I got three years ago. You know, so there's just not a connection there from a patient standpoint or a practitioner standpoint. You know, most centers, and this is really a symptom of this, the specialization of our medical care in our, in our world.
And particularly in the Western world, everything is so specialized that. A patient isn't coming back. You are not going back to the doctor that did everything,
right?
MICHELLE: And nobody's putting all of the pieces together for you because you're showing up at an endocrinologist to talk about your fatigue and your thyroid levels.
Well, that endocrinologist has no idea what happened with your birth situation or has no idea that you had a root canal done. There's no one person that knows your story. other than you. And so as a practitioner and I get it and I am the last person to ever put down dentists or dentistry or anything else.
I won't do it because I'm, I'm very much part of it. I see the limitation in our view. We just literally don't see very much. We don't see, we don't see beyond what's in your mouth and often not talking to you about. Your thyroid, we're not talking to you about any of these things. So we have a reference point to put them all together.
So that's why I love people like you who are really saying, listen, just, just ask questions. It's actually okay. And you know what? Find a practitioner that's okay with you asking those questions. And if they're not, then they're not the right one for you. And I'll tell people that all the time, if they won't answer a question, well, most likely they don't have the answer.
That's the first default mechanism that we all have is if we don't have the answer, then we just say, no, no, you're wrong. Well, usually they actually don't know that you're wrong. They just don't know that you're right either. They don't know. And as a practitioner, we're supposed to know everything. You know, we're supposed to be the be all end all of knowledge about things.
And so if you go and you start asking your dentist about root canals, about fluoride, well, all they're going to talk about is the things that they know, which is typically what they've been taught in school. And which is not anything about this. I'll tell you that right now. Yeah. Not anything about this and what's it been taught at school or what they've been taught at their local dental association meeting, which is none of this either.
So they're just going to tell you what they know. And unfortunately there's, there's, it's not off everything they should know. So that's really where I'm, you know, trying to teach you and everyone about, about this. And people often will say, well, what is, what is this? Holistic mean, you know, what is, what does all of this mean?
And what is a functional dentist? And what is it like an integrated, like, what are we biologic dentist, biomimetic, like what are all these words mean even, and really what it is, is it's a symptom of the dentistry itself. Doesn't know what to call themselves either. All the rest of it is like, you know, there's no really official term for it.
So I first started out calling myself a holistic dentist. That's all I knew to call myself. And the funny thing is, is when you use the word holistic, you either get two responses. One is, Oh, that's what I want. You know, because people who say that, they know what it means. Holistic means the whole body.
Like everything's, you know, talking about, talking about. Understood. All is one complete whole, which obviously we are. I mean, hello, have you ever noticed you're kind of one piece top to bottom. So you know, it is holistic care, meaning it's all whole, but there's also a whole nother response that comes with holistic, which is like, Oh, you're the crazy people.
All right. So when I go to your practice, you're going to have like beads hanging in the door and incense burning, and you're going to be doing all sorts of crazy voodoo stuff that has nothing to do with science. So that was a strong Like, you know, I said I'm a holistic dentist, there were enough people that went, Oh, you know, and nodded like, Oh, You're one of
KAREN: those doctors.
MICHELLE: All right. Yeah. I don't know what you think is really trustworthy, you know, everything else. There was enough of that sentiment and stereotype, and actually I just started calling myself a health based dentist. Because when you say health based dentistry, It makes sense, right? Yeah. I'm just
KAREN: focused on the whole health of the body, which is, which is a much more Eastern way of looking at the body in Western medicine.
We, the specialists only focus on that organ or that disease or that, you know, symptom of what they're treating, not the whole body. And this, that's exactly the shift in mindset. I think you're talking about, that's at the root of what we're talking about here today is looking at how does everything we do to the body affect other parts of the body.
of the body and the overall health of the patient, which is, which is some of the questions we need to be asking in all of our health. questions to our doctors, our OBs, our dentists, our endocrinologists, everybody, our fertility doctors. Like we, we need to look beyond just the presenting symptom and go, how are all of these things connected?
Cause like you said, we are one whole organism. Can you quickly explain what is the difference between a holistic dentist and a biologic dentist or a functional dentist, or are they all the same?
MICHELLE: They're all pretty much the same thing. It's all. Us trying to figure out what to call ourselves.
There's no standard in the industry. So there's no you take this exam and you become this. That doesn't exist. There are a couple of organizations that there's one called Biologic International Association of Biologic Dentists. They do have a certification exam, but it's really not well known, you know, so you don't have to be certified in the organization to call yourself a biologic dentist.
So functional dentist is basing, basically saying, listen, the function of the body is related to the mouth. Got it. Biologic dentist basically means we're paying attention to the biology of the body in relation to the mouth. Got it. Integrative means we're going to integrate other modalities in relation to the mouth.
Got it. Biomimetic is the only one that's maybe a little different and that's a term that's often sometimes used. Biomimetic is often more about the way they do the fillings. So if you're looking at biomimetic dentist, they're mimicking nature, mimicking bio basically mimicking life is what bio means life.
So biomimetic means mimicking life. They're mimicking what a tooth used to be before it had a hole in it, basically. So how do we rebuild it the way that nature built it in the first place? So biomimetic, maybe more just about the way they're going to fill your tooth. Biologic, functional, holistic, integrative.
They're all pretty much the same thing.
KAREN: They're all focused on overall health. Good to know. And if someone is listening to this podcast realizing, Oh man, I want to see one of these dentists, one of these, how would they go about doing that? Are there networks or organizations or websites they can go to?
MICHELLE: Yes, so I actually on my website livingwellwithdrmichelle. com, I have a directory. And here's the crazy thing. I get about 20, 000 people a week looking for a dentist on that directory. So that gives us a huge marketing advantage. Now I'm going to dentists saying, okay, get your name on here. My goodness.
Could you be, you know, if you're, if you are working inside of the space, get your name on this directory, because there are so many people looking for you. There are a couple of directories that I don't recommend as much anymore, just because they're not as. Heavily vetted is mine, but there are a couple others and we can put them in show notes.
But basically I a o m t is one I a o m t. org. And then there are lots of, basically there are lots of letters, iabdm. org. So those two directories, both of those sites have directories on them, they're good directories, but they're not as vetted, so you're going to have to look through them, and you're going to have to go to their website and say, Okay, are they actually talking about the things that I want to know here?
And make sure that they actually are talking those things. For example, , if they're saying that they do root canals, Well, that might not be the place that you want to go because you're going to have to have a bit of a fight.
If you, you know, you shouldn't have to have a fight with your practitioner. I know you probably talk.
KAREN: I've had, I haven't, I've had many conversations with practitioners that helped me realize, wow, we, they do not all think the same way.
MICHELLE: You don't have to fight with your practitioner. It's your own body and you're, you know, you should have said here, but anyway So betting.
KAREN: Yes, absolutely. That's so important to vet and, and ask the right questions. And we'll get into some of those, like what questions you can ask and what to really look for. Tell us a bit about fluoride. I, that's a big topic. A lot, everybody, every dentist recommends fluoride, brushing with fluoride, fluoride rinse, fluoride mouthwash.
My pediatric dentist recommend fluoride what do you call it? Treatment. And what do you, there's a, yeah.
MICHELLE: Rinse and yeah, everything,
KAREN: everything is fluoride in the, in the dental world. What, what's the problem with fluoride?
MICHELLE: So the idea of fluoride is awesome. In the 1930s, they figured out the people who had more fluoride in their well water actually had more cavity resistant teeth.
Unfortunately, the teeth were also kind of splotchy, splotchy, really chalky white and kind of yellow. So they didn't really look that great, but that was higher levels of fluoride. They also didn't really get cavities. So government looked at this and said, wow, all right, if fluoride can prevent cavities, then why don't we add it to toothpaste?
Why don't we add it to water? Why don't we add it to all of these things? Let's see if we can't prevent cavities. The idea is awesome. Let's, that's a great idea. I love it. Unfortunately, it hasn't worked. There are increased levels of cavities today than there were in the 1930s even. So it has not worked to incorporate fluoride in all of these products and all of these you know, in, in the water and all these things that actually hasn't decreased cavities, but.
The problem also is that fluoride doesn't just affect the tooth. Remember, we're talking about a holistic system here. I had to do a system here. The fluoride doesn't just move, you know, when you, when you ingest it or whatever, it doesn't just go, Oh, I'm going to just, just find the tooth. That's the only place I'm going to find.
No, it actually affects other organs and other things in the body as well. Fluoride actually changes the structure of something called hydroxyapatite, which is the mineral that you see right here. It's the mineral that your teeth are made of, so it's the enamel of the tooth. It's actually the mineral that your bones are made of as well.
So if it's going to change your tooth, guess what it's going to do to your bones? It's going to change your bones too. And what they're finding is much higher rates of fracture levels in areas that have high fluoride in the water, because fluoride makes the bone more brittle. Well, if it didn't really serve its purpose to reduce cavities, But yet it's making bones more brittle.
Is the trade off worth it here? Probably not. But that's not where it stops. Fluoride also interferes with thyroid hormone. Thyroid hormone is activated by iodine. Well, fluoride and iodine are cousins. And if fluoride's in the system, it will bully iodine, push it out, and it will activate the thyroid hormone, but you can't use it.
So you show up with thyroid, low thyroid symptoms, but yet you take a blood test, and it says you're just fine. Now your thyroid levels are normal, but I feel cruddy. Why? Well, it's because fluoride is interfering with the way your thyroid hormones are working. So now it's leading to a lot of hypothyroid issues.
All right, number two problem. Third problem. Big deal for your listeners is that it actually is affecting IQ levels. And this isn't one of these just, Hey, I'm a crazy person. And I want to say this, go on PubMed. If you really want to go, there's PubMed research showing that literally is decreasing IQ levels in children and
highly fluoridated areas. So now I've got three strikes against me. It makes me break bones, it's a decrease in thyroid function, and it's affecting IQ. But yet it doesn't actually even decrease cavities. Is it worth it? No, it's not worth it. So instead, let's do what the problem requires. What is a cavity?
It's when there's a hole in the tooth. The hole in the tooth is from Acid. Either from acid the bacteria create, because they eat sugar, acid from your food, acid from a lot of different things. What happens when that acid sits here is it creates a hole in the tooth. What's lost? Minerals. Minerals are lost or pulled out of the tooth.
The acid pulls minerals out. They create, then that leaves a hole. Bacteria crawl in. They drop more acid. They build a deeper hole. Bacteria crawl further and further in. This is what a cavity is. So the key is, let's just put back what was lost. Which is? The minerals, hydroxyapatite. So cavities can be absolutely, and this is again researched, it's as effective as fluoride in reducing cavities, is Products that have hydroxyapatite in them.
Hydroxyapatite is just the minerals that your teeth are made of. That's all it is. So you need to find a product with hydroxyapatite. I didn't love all the products on the market. So I actually formulated my own. I have a hydroxyapatite tooth powder. I have a kid's version as well. And a hydroxyapatite mouth rinse, because I am completely fluoride free in my practice.
I do not recommend fluoride at all because it's not worth the side effect.
KAREN: That's
MICHELLE: not worth the side effect. Does it, does it strengthen teeth? Absolutely. Absolutely. 100 percent every dentist would agree with me. This is why dentists tell you do it, do it, do it, do it, do it. It strengthens teeth. It does not prevent cavities over the long run.
Research has shown, and it causes all sorts of other issues.
KAREN: Yeah, I saw one dentist, I'm not sure if it was you or someone else, said rinsing with, like, fluoride mouthwash, for example, is like carpet bombing your mouth. You're killing all the germs in your mouth. You're killing the ones that cause cavities, but you're also killing all the good ones, too.
Tell us a little bit about like the mouth microbiome. I've learned a lot about this in the birth world with our gut microbiome and how important that is to make sure that you have a healthy gut because you pass that on to your kids when you give birth vaginally, and that really is 80 percent of your immune system.
It affects everything, you know, whether you get autoimmune disease, how you react to foods, but there's also a mouth microbiome that affects our health as well. Can fluoride and fluoride mouthwash and oral health impact that mouth microbiome? And what's the best way to take care of it?
MICHELLE: The biggest thing that impacts that is traditional mouthwash. So when you're looking at Listerine, what's the number one component in Listerine? Alcohol. It's like 60, 70 percent alcohol. That's why you get that burn when you use Listerine and a lot of these mouth, a lot of these mouth products have alcohol in them.
They haven't had, why do they have them? Because they kill bugs, right? Alcohol kills bugs. That's why you put alcohol on your skin. When you go to the doctor and they're giving you an injection, you know, whatever, they're going to put alcohol on the skin to disinfect the skin before they put it in. So when you put alcohol in your mouth, it's actually going to affect the biome.
It's going to be just like you said, it's going to kill everything. It's not selective. It's going to kill everything in sight. Not only that, but when you're using an alcohol containing mouth rinse, you're going to be swallowing that. Guaranteed. I mean, it's mixing with your saliva. There's no, there's no way you can't not.
If you put something in your mouth, it's some of it's going down no matter what. So it's also going to affect your gut biome because now you're giving alcohol to your gut biome and it's going to completely change that gut biome as well. So when you've changed the biome, it affects cavities are basically That's all it is.
And if you kill everything, including the good bacteria, now the bad bacteria are going to flourish. The ones that create cavities, you're going to have a higher level of cavities because you're killing everything in sight. You're going to have higher issues of gut problems because you're killing everything in sight and the bugs down there that are needed to do their work.
Aren't there anymore? You've killed them all off. So mouth rinse is really, really important to use the right one. Never use anything with alcohol in there. Never use anything with a broad spectrum disinfectant. Basically something that's just like trying to kill everything in your mouth. And most of these rinses do.
A lot of these rinses also have sugars. So yeah. Fluoride containing mouth rinses, bubblegum flavored, guess what, that sugar just fed all the bacteria in the mouth. It makes zero sense to me why they're doing this.
KAREN: Tell us about like xylitol. I see that in a lot of natural toothpastes and mouthwashes.
What's your opinion on that?
MICHELLE: Yeah, xylitol is actually, it's interesting, there's tons of research on xylitol. Xylitol does not cause cavities. Xylitol is not consumable by bacteria. Interesting. So no bacteria can eat it. And that's what that's why cavities form because they eat sugar and then they poop out acid and then the acid dissolves the minerals.
Well, bacteria can't eat xylitol. So I actually have it in my mouth products for that reason. But I don't use it as say a sweetener in food, because it's going to throw off your gut biome because your gut biome actually needs some of those sugars. That's the Their food to be able to do their work. So you're going to throw off your gut function significantly.
If you're using it like this, the sugar you're going to use in making cookies, you know, you go, Oh, these are so great cookies. You know, they don't feed cavities. Well, also they also kill they kill your gut. So we use a little bit of xylitol and it's very, very small amounts in the tooth powder and the mouth rinse, because it makes it taste good, you know, it makes it taste, but it's not feeding cavities.
It's anti cavity. is
KAREN: it important for pregnant women especially to be really aware of what their oral health and to get those cleanings? Like, are there changes happening in pregnancy that can really impact cavities and this germ microbiome and what's happening there? For sure. There's two
MICHELLE: ways that pregnancy really affects oral health. Number one is cavities. There's so many women that'll talk to me and they'll say, oh yeah, this crown and root canal is from this kid. This crown and root canal is from this kid. Mm-Hmm. And you know, I never had a cavity until I had a baby. What's going on there? Well, what's going on there is that you are growing a human.
I'm thinking about that. You're growing a human. You're growing a human when you're pregnant. You're growing a human when you're nursing. What does that human need? Well, you're growing bones. You're growing ligaments. You're growing tendons. You're growing soft tissue. You're growing teeth. You're growing hair.
You're growing, I mean, you're growing all of those things. Everything that baby has when they are born, you had to provide. The building blocks to grow. So if mom, you don't have enough building blocks to grow baby's bones and baby's teeth and baby's hair and baby's everything and keep yours healthy, baby always wins.
So what happens is that your body will donate minerals to feed the baby to grow those baby's bones and you don't have enough. So you're, it'll pull it from your teeth. It'll pull it from your bones to be able to feed baby. And so this is why you get cavities when you're pregnant, where you didn't have cavities before you've got a super supplement and super feed yourself.
Minerals during pregnancy. Otherwise, you're going to sacrifice your own self for this process. So you, I have a mineralization kit online. What it is, is it special minerals? Again, you don't have to buy mine. You buy anybody's but it's specialized minerals that are focused on teeth and bone. Development.
So you're growing you, you're growing your baby and also vitamin D3 and vitamin K2. People don't realize that the mineral alone is just going to float around and cause gallstones, kidney stones, tartar on your teeth. That's not what you want a mineral to do. You want a mineral to get in, build your teeth, strengthen them, get into your baby, build baby.
So it requires vitamin D to grab, to The mineral and vitamin K2 to put it in the cell. So you have to have those two things together in order to keep your bones and teeth healthy during pregnancy and during nursing. I also recommend hydroxyapatite on the outside. Again, let's put minerals on the outside.
Let's put minerals on the inside. Let's keep you healthy. So that's number one thing that I see so often. So many women suffering from and often it's down the road, you know, they're going to come in after pregnant, you know, like you, you know, after, and gosh, I got this tooth. It's totally decayed. Now what's going on, you know, well, baby took everything and now you're left, you're left with this.
So keep your mineral levels high, keep your vitamin D and K levels high in pregnancy. Second one is gums. There are a lot of hormone changes in pregnancy. Have you ever noticed that any women, you know, hardly any, right? Tons of hormone changes. And when those hormone changes, it actually changes the fluid flow on a tooth.
It's crazy changes the way the, the, because again, bodies pulling minerals. into the body to feed the baby. Instead of, so it's pulling things from the inside, from the outside in, changes a lot of gum dynamics. So a lot of things will just say, Oh, that's just pregnancy gingivitis. What it is, it's, it's bleeding gums.
It's sore gums because the body's literally pulling resources from your gums to use in the rest of you. So if you've got bleeding gums, if you have all this going on in your mouth, well, you're Inflamed, which is then inflaming baby. You don't want this to happen and it's leading you to an inflamed situation for birth.
I know that's your talking points. So have to make sure that you're staying on top of gum health as well. Again, this is going to be mineral based. This is going to be a vitamin based and going into the dentist and saying, how am I doing? How are they looking? Oh, they're looking really red. They're really inflamed.
Okay. That means I'm low. I've got it. You've got to even up even more. So the cool thing about the mouth is it's a really nice dashboard. In the mouth and we can go, ah, I see what's going on. All right. Let's fix this quick, you know, cause we can see it where I can't necessarily see your gut. I can't see your bones.
I can't see these, these things, but I can see your teeth and I can see your gums and we can go, oh, you're deficient. Let's add some more.
KAREN: Wow, that's fascinating. Like, oh, you're inflamed. If you have, it makes sense. If you have inflammation in your gums, or you may have it in other parts of the body, it's just a symptom.
It's like a, it's like the warning light, the check engine light in your car, basically is what you're saying. Like when, when you've got issues going on in your mouth, that's a sign. It's also happening in other parts of your body. And this is just, you know, I'm hearing you saying this. And to me, I'm thinking this is just another reason why as, as women, especially in pregnancy, we need to take such.
Good care of our health and our bodies and our nutrition and our mouths, because it's not just impacting us, it's impacting our unborn children, and it's going to impact your birth, potentially, if you've got inflammation, your your body is not going to labor as effectively, you're not going to carry in your pregnancy, you're probably going to have more of those aches and pains, you know, in your third trimester, you're going to be struggling to wake up in the morning, like you mentioned, like you're going to feel more fatigued, like all of these things have an impact and a stacking effect.
And when we take care of ourselves, we can begin to lay those building blocks of getting good nutrition and good minerals. I've heard it with a mineralization is a big deal in pregnancy. Like you said, the baby just sucks all those minerals. And it's not that the baby doesn't get them because the, the, the body prioritizes the baby.
So like you said, it takes it from the mother's bones and Your teeth are your bones. So it's pulling like essential minerals from your bones. And sometimes it can take two years to remineralize after pregnancy. And that's why you can see even, I don't know if you know about this much, Michelle, but they've taken like pictures and studies of children that were born very close together.
And usually the first child has a very strong bone structure and jawline. The second child very often if the mother wasn't was deficient in minerals has a receded jawline and different and bad oral health and other symptoms as well. Because of the way that those minerals even build The, you know, create, you know, in the pregnancy, how the formation and the bone structure forms in the facial structure of that second child.
So there are so many implications to oral health and having proper mineralization and nutrition in your pregnancy. It's so important. And this just reinforces again, the, the vast effects of, of making sure we're, of our choices in pregnancy, making sure we're making those right choices. So thank you for sharing on that.
Let's talk a little bit about the root canals and cavities. And I'm sure there's some women here probably also feeling like, Oh my gosh, I've made the wrong choices. I have not focused on my health. I have not remineralized. Or I have all these cavities. I'm making my appointment right now with the dentist.
What's, what's step one? And what are some practical tips you can give us to, to just take care of our health? I know you've given so many already. And then like what, what are we to do if we're already going down that path? We've got cavities and they're turning into a situation where we may need a root canal.
Or other options.
MICHELLE: Let's talk about what that even means. You know, people always use, in fact, I always, I always push back a little when people say I need a root canal. Well, really? Are you going to die with that one? No. I mean, you made another choice, right? I did.
KAREN: It wasn't the fun option, but it was the one I chose.
MICHELLE: There's always another choice, so you don't need a root canal. No one needs a root canal. You know, I always, people will say, oh yeah, my dentist told me I need a root canal. I'm like, do you? They just look at me. Well I'm like, do you, do you need a root canal? Like, will you die without that thing? No. So let's just talk about tooth, the way the tooth is made.
There's enamel on the outside. That's the part we see. And we already talked about that. That's full of hydroxy appetite of this mineral, special mineralized complex. The next layer in is called dentin, and it has a super highway of tubes going everywhere in the inside of the tooth. That's how nutrients and then the very inside layer is called the nerve, the pulp.
It has the nerve, it has the blood vessels. So nutrients come up from you and or sometimes they reverse vice versa, you know, during pregnancy, they pull in to be able to feed baby. So there's this flow through that blood vessel area in the center of the tooth. And then it goes through the dentin through those little tiny tubules out to the enamel and that's how the enamel gets minerals.
That's how this all works. Well, when a cavity is formed, it, like I said, it pulls minerals from the outside and then the bacteria crawl in into a little hole. If we don't get that bacteria out soon enough, then the bacteria Eat sugar, drop more acid. It's not the sugar that causes the cavities. The bacteria eat the sugar, and then they poop out acid, basically, is how this works.
Yeah, interesting. Exactly. I always like to say it's pooping when it's kids, because they're like, oh, gross. It is. So they, their byproduct, that sounds better, is acid. The acid then dissolves more minerals. It's just like when you pour coke on the battery terminals on the, you know, the car battery. Acid dissolves minerals.
It is what it is. So acid dissolves more minerals. Bacteria are able to crawl deeper into the tooth. Once they get to that dentin layer, they then get into that superhighway. They then can go all the way to the nerve of the tooth quite quickly. So we tell people, I guess people will say, can I heal a cavity?
The answer is yes. If it's still in the outside layer. If it's still enamel because it's all about minerals at that point We just need to get more minerals back into that spot bacteria out minerals in and you can heal it Once it gets to that dentin layer That's when a dentist intervention is needed because it's already spread.
It's already spread beyond that point. It's already on the superhighway We got to get in there and clean the bacteria out and fill up the hole So now if the cavity progresses deep into that dentin and starts to get near the nerve Bacteria drop an acid near the nerve That's why it starts to hurt, right?
This is the sensitivity that starts to come up. It's acid by the nerve. It's not feeling that great. So dentist will tell you, you need a root canal. Why? Well, two reasons. And one is reversible. One is irreversible. If the bacteria in the cavity are just close to the nerve, you're getting a lot of sensitivity.
It's kind of cold and hot sensitivity, you know, sensitive. It's achy. Sometimes we actually can go in, The deepest bacteria, clean that out, and then we use ozone, which is a gas that's sprayed on the tooth and it kills bugs. Ozone is just three molecules of oxygen. Oxygen likes to be in pairs. It likes to have just two.
So it's got this third wheel hanging out over here. Well, that third wheel goes and binds to bugs. So it goes and binds to the bacteria in the deepest layers of that dentin right next to the nerve, and it kills them. So we're able to actually fill over that deepest layer and keep the tooth alive. So in your instance, if your tooth was still alive, like if you could still feel cold and hot, if it was still alive, it's still savable.
We're about. 90 percent successful in saving a tooth at that point, we kill the bugs at that deepest level so we don't remove the deepest level of cavity. We kill the bugs in it. So it's not going to spread because remember, it's the bugs that spread the bugs that create acid. If we kill the bugs, no more spreading.
We fill over it. We save the tooth. We keep it alive. If that bacteria has already gotten to the nerve. And it's killed the nerve inside the tooth. So this is when you get an abscess. This is when it hurts to bite on. This is when your face swells up. If any of those things have happened, the bacteria are already inside the nerve of the tooth.
And at that point, you do only have two choices. A root canal. And I'll talk just a minute about a root canal. But a root canal or remove the tooth. Just take the, because the nerve inside is already infected. That's the problem. Now, why would you choose one over the other? Well, it's all about those tubes.
When they do a root canal, what they do is they actually go in and clean that nerve area out. It's in a little canal inside of the tooth. This is why it's called a root canal. It's a canal inside the root. So they clean it out. disinfect it and fill it up with a plastic like material. Then they put a crown or something on top of the tooth and you keep on chewing.
It sounds awesome. Like it is so awesome, right? You get to keep the tooth. You get the
KAREN: tooth. Yeah. Remove the nerve, remove the big, yeah. All the infection.
MICHELLE: It sounds so awesome. I love the concept. And it was just, it was done to save teeth. And really as dentists, like that's what we're trained to do. We're awesome.
But there's a problem and this problem has become more and more apparent as we have better imaging techniques. Now we can see what's really happening. So what happens is that main canal is filled and cleaned. But those little side tubes, there's literally a mile of them in every tooth. They are too small to clean and too small to fill.
So nerve and blood vessel tissue are in all of those little tubes because that's how the nutrients are transferred. So they clean out the main one and basically seal all this dead tissue inside of those little tiny tubes. That's the problem. So now bugs love dead stuff. They're going to eventually find a bacteria, going to find the dead stuff still in this tooth.
And then your immune system is asked to keep those bacteria at bay. So this is why we see immune system function or dysfunction downstream from root canals, because your immune system is so busy. Keeping the tooth healthy that it sometimes can't keep you healthy. So we see autoimmune issues because the immune system is kind of distracted keeping the tooth healthy all the time.
We see things like cancer because it can't fight off all the bad things that are gonna happen to the body because it's too busy taking care of the tooth. So it has all of these other implications and then the bacteria start to win. The race, they start to win the fight against your immune system, especially if your immune system has to deal with other things.
Like let's say a virus comes along a couple of years ago, you know, all of a sudden all these people had teeth that blew up. Why? Well, the immune system was really busy doing something else. Let's say you have a birth and you go through, you know, a fairly significant life event, either physically or mentally, emotionally, and your body just can't keep up with all of it.
Bacteria start to grow, they start to eat away the bone at the end of the root. Here's the tricky part. You don't feel it. The nerve's gone. You don't even know it's happening. But we have a new diagnostic technique, imaging technique called a cone beam CT scan. These are in dental offices and it's a specialized CT scan that I take of your whole head and I can see, is the bone being eaten away around the end of this root?
Can I see it? That's when my stance changed because about 10 years ago, I started taking these cone beam CT scans just routinely on everybody. And I was. Absolutely floored at the number of root canals I was seeing that had huge abscesses at the end that I couldn't see. And I remember, I always remember the first one that really changed my mind.
It was a woman who came in, she'd had a root canal done years ago. And she said, you know, it's just never felt right. It just, just kind of feels odd. It just doesn't feel right. I don't know. It doesn't hurt, but it just doesn't feel right. And I took a regular dental x ray. I said, it looks great. And any dentist would have looked at it and said, It looks great.
I'd said the same thing to so many people. It looks great. And I just gotten this combium CT machine in the office. I mean, these are, these are not cheap. They're a hundred thousand dollar machines. Okay. So I just got this machine in the office. I said, you know what, let's go take a scan. I'm just so curious.
I took a scan. There was a quarter size hole of bone that had been eaten away above the end of that root and the tooth behind it from that root canal failing. And I could not see it. All right.
KAREN: I couldn't see it. A quarter size hole in the, in the bone, the two. Jawbone. In the jawbone.
MICHELLE: Full of bugs, full of infection.
I could not see it.
KAREN: Wow.
MICHELLE: And I went, I will never not take one of these scans on someone. Wow. I will never do it again. And so now what I see is I take a scan on, you know, so I, I, every single new patient now that comes to my office gets one of these scans. And I would say 80 to 90 percent of root canals that I see.
have new infection around the end of the root somewhere. So now every single time you chew on that tooth, you're driving that bacteria, entire bloodstream. Because that bone has blood in it and it's, you're driving it through the entire bloodstream. It's causing a low grade, acute inflammatory situation throughout your system 24 seven.
KAREN: So
MICHELLE: again, I say, okay, the idea of a root canal is so awesome, but does the implication of it worth it? Is the side effect worth it? And you, you said no, by your choice, you said, no, it's not actually worth it because here's the great news. We can replace it. This truth right here on me. It's an implant. It's a dental implant.
Can you tell?
KAREN: I can't tell.
MICHELLE: It's just smiles like a tooth and it looks awesome, right? And it's been here for 20 years. Now we even have better implants than this one is when now we have ceramic dental implants. So they're completely ceramic top to top to bottom, no metal at all. They're amazing. And that's how we replace teeth now.
Sometimes you don't even need to replace the tooth. I mean, some people are like, you know what? I don't miss it. You're fine then. You're fine. Without the tooth, completely. You know, you have a lot of them. So losing one way in the back, it might be okay. Is it worth the side effect? Is it worth the downstream immune system, you know, immune compromising effects of a tooth?
very high risk factor, you know, of, of actually new infection. Is it worth that risk? Yeah. So I'd say yes. And on a kiddo, if you have a kid that's broken off a front tooth and an accident, you know what? I might do a root canal and that kiddo, because it might be that, that saves them and gives them a tooth.
Until they're 21 years old and I can do an implant in them, you know, so there's situations where maybe it's worth it. Maybe you say, yeah, you know what, actually, yeah, it's worth it for me right now to get a root canal today, knowing it's a short term temporary solution for me.
KAREN: Yeah. Yeah.
MICHELLE: It's taken out in a couple of years from now and I'm going to watch my symptoms real close in the meantime.
KAREN: Yeah.
MICHELLE: That's the problem.
KAREN: And that's kind of what, where I came down to too. I said, you know what, if, if I got the root canal, it was like, I know in the back of my mind, based on the research I've done, I'm always going to wonder in five years, 10 years, is this symptom or health condition I'm experiencing now because of my root canal?
Like it always would be there in the back of my head. And I didn't want a temporary solution. Like, you know, I I'm 39. I plan to live into my nineties. I need something that's going to last me 50 years. Well, root canals don't last 50 years. That long, like, I think I even asked the dentist recommending root canals, how long do they last?
And they're like, oh, you can get one that lasts 10, 15, sometimes 20 years. I'm like, well, that I need it longer than that. Like I'm planning to live longer than 20 years. And then what? Right, and then what? And then what? You're just prolonging getting it removed again, and whatever health consequences you have in between that time, I'm going to have to deal with that.
And like you mentioned, the bone disease that it's gonna, the infection will eventually develop, I won't feel it, it'll eat away at my gums, I already have the receding of my jawbone, which we could tell on the CBCT scan that you that I had, like two of them taken. So I've got that going on. And that might be from grinding, it might be from the infection.
I don't know. But I had they showed me on the CBCT scan. The CBT scan, the, the polyp at the bottom of my tooth and that the root had died. And as you were talking, I'm realizing, oh my gosh, if I had taken this scan weeks ahead, it's possible, or months ahead, I'm not sure how quickly this stuff develops, it's possible I could have saved the tooth.
It was a deep, cavity. It was an old cavity that had to be replaced and then it got deep. And ever since that cavity was refilled, it was the hot cold sensitivity. It was, and it got more and more and more painful until the point that it got, like you said, went through the dentin into the into the nerve, killed the nerve, the infection developed but, you know, I'm facing this going, okay, my tooth is in a lot of pain.
The dentists all say, they all agree it's the, the nerve is dead or almost dead, dying. And so you can't save it at that point. Probably could have saved it if I had known earlier what you're saying. If I had come to see you, that's why I say, go see your dentist, ladies. Dental issues, you know, they, they, they only kind of progressively get worse if you don't intervene.
And so. So important to, to get in, to get in and get it taken care of. And so, you know, I just, I just knew like, it just makes sense to me, everything you're saying. Like you take out the nerve, you take out the blood supply. You can't feel it, but there, but it's still open. You're never fully sealing it off.
You can never get all the germs and bacteria out of those little tubules that go laterally along your mouth. And so you can, the dentist may say, Oh, it's a healthy tooth. Don't remove it. How long is a healthy tooth healthy if you cut off the oxygen and blood supply? It dies. No organ that you cut off a blood supply to, or any part of your body, is going to live.
It's a necrotic tooth. So eventually, it's not if, it's when this root canal will fail and get infected. And it often will get infected long before you realize it, or can, you know, have the wherewithal to go in and get a CBCT scan, this cone scan she's talking about. And by then, how many other health health implications has it affected?
Is this part contributing to your fatigue? You know, sometimes we I think we think as new moms, right, we're raising this little baby and we're like, Oh, this is so hard. I'm so tired. What if it's not just your baby making you tired, but it's It's an oral health issue. It's an autoimmune issue. It's something else going on in your body that you may not have considered.
And I think sometimes it's that we need that light bulb moment as moms because we often, we take care of ourself last, whether we've got little toddlers whether we're, you know, you know, preparing for birth or raising these kids, and we don't realize that, man, this isn't just motherhood making me tired.
Maybe there's other things going on here, and I need to get, I need to get, get in there and get checked out, get these things evaluated, and rule out a few things because you're not supposed to feel exhausted and fatigued all the time. Autoimmune disease isn't, normal. You know, cavities are not normal.
Like root canals and having your teeth, I have a explosion of cavities. That's not normal. There's other things going on. You don't have to feel that way. Just like I say, you don't have to feel terrible in pregnancy. You don't, you know, there are things we can do in our health that can actually prime us to thriving.
And sometimes it takes a little research or a little work, or you have to spend some money to get these things taken care of. But in the long run, You're taking care of yourself, you're being the best mom for your kids, and you're setting yourself up for a healthier pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and in the long run, it's worth it.
And so I chose the long term solution, even though it was more painful in the short term and more expensive, it was get this tooth taken out so that there's not a dead tooth sitting in my mouth of just inviting bacteria and infection. Yep. Good choice. Good choice. Thank you. Feels good to have a dentist say that because all the other dentists were like, why would you take out a healthy juice?
It's
MICHELLE: not healthy. That's the problem. It's not healthy.
KAREN: Because it's not going to be, yeah, it's not healthy when you cut off the oxygen. And I want to be healthy. I want to be healthy over holistically moving forward. So thank you. This has been such good information for, for mothers, for anyone listening.
Is there anything else you want to share on that you feel like our listeners really need to know in their journey of dental and oral health and overall health?
MICHELLE: You know, I do think it's important to understand a little bit about the kiddo, child development as well. Yes. I was going to ask and I forgot.
Thank
KAREN: you.
MICHELLE: Yeah, from it's interesting because again, back to the 1930s, there was a doctor named Dr. Weston Price. He was a dentist, and he was actually the head of the research department of the American Dental Association. And he was disturbed by the number of cavities in kids. So he took 10 years and he went and traveled the world, found indigenous society.
So places where the modern diet, modern kind of medicine hadn't touched yet. And the beautiful thing about his research is that he had a camera so he could take pictures of what he found, which was really pretty cool. We couldn't do this today because we couldn't find places that haven't been touched by modern diets and modern medicine.
And you know, there's, it doesn't exist, but because we have his photography, there's a His photographic evidence as well as the research and what he was finding is exactly what you were explaining earlier about the growth of the growth and development of faces, about facial structures, about overall health.
And he was studying how does what people eat pre conception, during pregnancy, postpartum, how does this affect The growth and development of children. And they, he found that there were a lot of diets, very specific for both mom and dad, even preconception to be able to make it. So the baby had a better chance of being healthy.
It's really fascinating research and it still stands up today. Like literally almost a hundred years ago, this research is still setting up today. And one of the things he found is that the top job. is the first bone affected by malnutrition. And it's really interesting because my son, when we adopted him, he was two and a half years old and his top jaw was so small.
It was actually inside of his bottom jaw, which it shouldn't be like you should have the, but the top just should be wider than the bottom jaw. He'd been so malnourished and we have been fighting this for 15 years, 16 years to try to get his teeth and jaws to grow everything else. So that malnourishment shows up in facial structures.
And when there is small facial structures that affects breathing, well, breathing affects growth and development.
KAREN: Yeah. If
MICHELLE: you can't nose breathe, if baby can't nose breathe, if they can't get enough air in, then they can't get growth hormones stimulated and you're going to see then increase in this deficiency.
So The fact that the nutrition levels weren't there to begin with creates a small job, then you can't breathe very well, which then perpetuates the issue. Basically, growth and development doesn't happen. So if you have kiddos that are having issues with growth and development issues, they're very small focus problems, a lot of ADHD symptoms, that sort of thing, bedwetting.
Loud breathing at night. You can hear them the second they go to sleep. All these things are evidence that they are not getting the air they need and they're not gonna be able to grow like they should. This goes for you too, moms. If you are not able to breathe through your nose, if you're not able to get the air you need to sleep at night, then it's going to impact a lot of things.
So there's a lot that goes on with The facial structures here that are really important to know. So finding an orthodontist that's actually aware of functional issues. There's an organization online called toothpillow. com. I really highly recommend them because they'll do everything virtually for you.
So if you have a child that has any of these issues they're mouth breathing at night. You should never mouth breathe. If you're mouth breathing, things are not going correctly with your growth and development, ADHD, bedwetting, check out toothpillow. com. And they're gonna tell you how you can actually work to, to grow the mouth properly, to grow all these structures properly so that you can get proper air for proper growth.
And a lot of these go away, a lot of these things go away. So there's a lot going on and then mom, mom is the same, the same for you too. There's a lot of things we can do from a growth standpoint for you as well. Even after, even after you're old, you know, even after you're not a kid anymore a lot of things because oxygen is so essential.
For every single, like you'd said, you know, you can't cut off the oxygen to the tooth. Well, you can't cut off the oxygen to you and your body operate very well as well. So if your mouth breathing, if you have attention issue, you know, like focus issues, memory issues, a lot of those things, most likely you're not getting the oxygen you need as well.
So. Those are just some resources. I always like to point out to people, go check them out. I didn't get to talk much, but go check them out. There's some information online that you can find.
KAREN: That's so helpful. I know I'm looking into some of that too, for my family. I've heard, I've seen lots of people now with mouth tape that they put on at night to, to prevent the mouth breathing.
And my, one of my daughters well, both of them, two of them actually have gotten expanders because their jaws were so small. And so these are things I'm looking into too, right alongside you, you mamas and listeners. So I'm, I'm just so grateful, Michelle, for the information you're You're giving us. I feel like so much of this is actionable things that we can do as moms.
And if anyone's overwhelmed listening to this, just take it one step at a time. Get yourself checked out first, make that dentist appointment, find it, go on Michelle's website. Let me make sure I get the website name. It's livingwellthedrmichelle. com. Yeah. Living well with Dr. Michelle.
MICHELLE: Yep. There's all sorts of stuff on there.
Go on Instagram too. I mean, if you are feeling overwhelmed, just go find the one topic you want to learn about.
KAREN: Yeah. Go, you'll know in your spirit, like what's the one thing you need to take action on today and then just make a list and just, you know, make that dentist appointment for your kids or orthodontist appointment.
I'm going to look at toothpillow. com because really this is just, it's holistic health, right? We were. Look, it's growth hormones. It's development. It's, it's your, the mental health. It's everything is so connected. And so this has just been a goldmine of information. So thank you for everything you've shared.
And we'll put all these links in the show notes as well. And some of the products that you discussed, the mouthwash, the toothpaste, all of that stuff. I'm definitely going to try those out as well. And thank you, Michelle, for, for joining us and for sharing everything you've shared. It's been, Truly just an honor to have you on this podcast.
MICHELLE: Thank you for the opportunity. I appreciate all you're doing.
KAREN: Thanks. We'll see you guys next week
