Greetings. New Zealand naturopath, Eric Bakker. Author of Candida Crusher and I’m also the formulator of the range called Canxida. Thanks for checking out my video. It’s incredible how many emails I get over the years and also feedback I’m getting on YouTube. When people say, “Help, I’ve got bad breath. What am I going to do? My mouth is stinky. It’s affecting my relationships. I’m really embarrassed. My girlfriend or my boyfriend hates me. I can’t talk to people anymore. I’m staying inside. What am I going to do?”
If you go to sites like WebMD or all these other kind of sites, the Mayo Clinic and stuff like that, you’re going to find three, four or five pages all relating to bad breath. The causes, the treatments, all the potential things. I looked at one site and it talked about rectal cancer or something linked to bad breath. Be careful what you read. I’ll have to do some videos about be careful of Dr. Google because lots of people spend way too much time on the internet trying to find out what’s wrong with them. They go to Symptom Finder. The funniest one was I had a lady who thought she had a rare kind of brain tumor and she found it through Symptom Finder. Talk about that another time.
Bad breath is a condition called halitosis and it affects many different people. Bad breath can range from not so good to “Wow, go away from me. Don’t come near me.” From fecal breath to the point where you’re almost dry retching. I’ve been seeing patients now for some time and I’ve had over the years only a handful of patients. Some are in my room so bad that I just about dry retched. It was like really offensive. Seriously offensive.
The tragedy is many people with seriously bad breath are not even aware of it themselves. Some people have had breath so bad for so long that they’ve become used to this bad breath. A bit like body odor. A bit like dandruff. A bit like certain skin conditions. If you live with something long enough, it becomes part of who you are. It becomes part of your relationship with your body. And your partner may accept it. Your kids may accept it. It’s to the point where you think “Well, it’s normal. I’ve got dandruff like snowflakes all over my clothes. It’s normal. What’s your problem? Nothing wrong with dandruff.” I’ve got a friend like that. Every time I look at him, it’s almost like he’s been out in the snow. I’ve got another friend with breath that’s very offensive. I’ve spoken to him on a few occasions and he said, “There’s nothing wrong with my breath. There really isn’t.” When you pull your head back when someone talks to you, you know it’s pretty stinky.
What causes bad breath? What can we do about it? How can we remedy bad breath? We could set up a YouTube channel on bad breath alone. That’s how many videos I could do on this one particular topic. This will be one of a couple of videos I’ll eventually do on bad breath. Halitosis has many different causes as I mentioned. They can range from things like medications you take, foods you eat, gum disease. It could be a sinus problem. You could have issues with your stomach. There could be lots of different causes.
But the key thing that I’d like you to do if you’re watching this and you’ve got bad breath is to ask people to be very open and honest with you, family members and friends. Give people a scale from 1 to 10, 10 being like “back off,” “don’t come near this person,” to 1 being “okay.” Get them to put on a sliding scale from 1 to 10 what they think your breath is like. It’s good for people to be honest with you and for you to understand to what degree your breath could be affecting other people.
The second thing to do is to find out what is causing this bad breath. How many people in the family have got it? How many people around you have it? It could be a certain type of infectious reason why you’ve got it. The main thing is get your teeth checked out. Go to the dentist and find out what’s wrong with your mouth, if there is anything. Have you got gum disease? Have you been to a dental hygienist? Have you got any bleeding gums, any loose teeth, root canals, bridges, caps or anything with your teeth that could be suspect? That’s the very first thing that you check out. Root canals are a very big one because many people have anywhere between 1 to 5 or even more root canals. They can become really stinky and toxic in the mouth. It’s important.
Yeast infection in the mouth is not that uncommon, especially denture wearers. I’ve seen quite a bit of oral yeast infections. Look at the tongue. The tongue should be a nice clear color. There can be a slight white film on the tongue for healthy people when they wake up in the morning. But if the tongue is cracked down the center, if it’s scalloped down the sides, if it’s got huge white patches down the back, that can be a big problem. The tongue is a very good indicator of digestive health. Many different civilizations throughout the millennia have looked at tongues for a diagnosis. The Chinese and the Indians, Ayurvedic medicine, very big on tongue diagnosis.
I can remember when I was a kid, the doctor always looked at your tongue. They got this stick out. I remember I used to think it was like one of those big ice cream sticks. They put the tongue depressor in and they’d say, “Go, Ahhh.” And then they look at your tonsils, your tongue and everything. But they don’t do that so much anymore. That’s a good indicator of oral health, but also gut health. I believe your stomach plays a big role in what’s happening in your mouth. Many times I’ve actually people improve the odor from their mouth just by digestive enzymes alone. You can take a good probiotic enzyme formula and that can have a huge impact on your oral hygiene.
A couple of tips and tricks for you. Make sure you chew food properly. Make sure you brush your teeth regularly, at least two if not three times per day if you’ve got bad breath. Floss your teeth regularly. Get your teeth checked out. Make sure that you’re eating a whole foods diet and not some crappy McDonald’s diet. Every time you have a drink, you have a sip of Coca Cola. That’s not going to do a lot for your gut is it? What you eat will dictate to a big degree what you look like, how you feel, and also your gut health. Eating good foods and especially whole foods, you’ll have a lot less chance of having stinky breath. If you’re going to rely on nuggets, burgers, fries and Coke with meals two or three times a day, you’re probably going to end of up stinky and fat and have a lot of associate health problems.
Tea tree oil toothpaste is quite a nice one to use. Baking soda on a clean toothbrush can help quite a lot, too. Please keep away from those alcohol mouth rinses. I think they’re really crap for the mouth. They kill off the bacteria. Do you wash your whole body down in a bottle of methylated spirits when go have a shower? Do you do that? Do you get a half a gallon of methylated spirits and pour it over your head? That’s what you’re doing with your mouth with those oral rinses. I think they’re crap. I can’t understand why people use mouth rinses. When you’ve got a healthy diet like I have, you chew food properly, you’ve got good dental health, your breath smells quite sweet. There’s no stink and you don’t mind being around other people when they’re like that. Nothing worse than having offensive breath.
Try the probiotics. Try the enzymes. It’s going to help you quite a lot. Another one that you may want to try is zinc lozenges. Zinc and vitamin C because they can really add to the oral health as well. Those are just a couple of tips for you to try to get your head around the bad breath. But the investigation is the important part. Go and talk to your doctor or naturopath about the bad breath. It’s important for your practitioner to have a good examination of your lifestyle and diet to see where the potential is, the causes. Because I can tell you now, if you nail this cause, the stinky breath will go away. That’s going to really increase your confidence. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve seen over the years with bad breath that cost them their relationship, their occupation, everything. All because of the odor coming from the mouth. It’s not pleasant. Food for thought. Think about it. Thanks for tuning in.