If you suffer from dry mouth, you know how annoying it can be. People typically produce 1.5 liters of saliva, which makes everything from swallowing to breathing easier. If you’re producing less, swallowing and breathing becomes harder.
But multiple conditions can lead your mouth to feel dry — like swallowing is difficult or cotton has come to inhabit your mouth. Stress, medications and nutritional deficiencies can cause dry mouth. Conditions from Parkinson’s disease to lupus can cause your mouth to feel dry, and cancer treatment is also a common cause.
Fortunately, there are many home remedies for dry mouth. Here are five of them.
Water
Nothing beats water as a solution to dry mouth. Drink water throughout the day. Fortunately, H20 is easy to come by and easy to work into your life. Get a water bottle to put on your desk and sip on it throughout the day. Either bottled water or water from your tap will work. If you find it difficult to drink a lot of water, put ice and lemon or lime slices in it to make it pleasant and palatable.
Suck on Sugar-Free Candies
Sucking on hard, sugar-free candy will stimulate your saliva and cause you to produce more. Be sure to buy a type that you’ll suck on gradually rather than be inclined to bite into! It’s the sucking action you want to concentrate on. Sugar-free is recommended since sugared candies don’t promote dental health.
Chew Sugar-Free Gum
Like sugar-free candy, sugar-free gum will cause you to produce more saliva. The action of chewing and the candy in your mouth will alleviate the dry feeling. Try flavors like mint and spearmint to make your mouth feel fresher in addition to less dry.
Eliminate or Cut Back on Caffeine
Caffeine tends to be a drying agent overall. Yes, we know caffeine comes in liquids, like coffee, tea or soda, that you may think are fighting dry mouth. However, the caffeine in them tends to dry out your mouth over the course of the day compared to liquids that don’t contain caffeine.
To combat dry mouth, the best strategy is to either replace caffeinated beverages with drinks that don’t contain caffeine at all or are decaffeinated. However, keep in mind that decaffeinated beverages like coffee still have caffeine in them.
Use a Humidifier
Your mouth, after all, is part of your body. Anything that adds more moisture to your environment is going to hydrate your body. For that reason, using a humidifier is also a smart way to remedy dry mouth. Buy a humidifier that will add moisture to the rooms you’re in most of the time. The bedroom is a smart move since most people spent at least eight hours a night there. If you have a home office or spend a lot of time in the living room, they can be ideal places, as well.
Dry mouth can result from many conditions and is annoying and unpleasant to deal with. Fortunately, home remedies are easy to come by. These five tips should be easy to implement and result in more saliva and moisture in your oral cavity, improving your quality of life.
