I’m a Coward – You Have Bad Breath

The Humble Tonsil Stone

I’ve had the misfortune of having tonsil stones off and on through my adult life. TL;DR your tonsils are like a little labyrinth with lots of little folds and channels called crypts which make great places for the tonsil stones to form. The stones are a biofilm of an assortment of bacteria and minerals. They stink! Once you know the smell you can pick it out from anywhere. When my wife was pregnant with our second kid she had a super nose and at the hint of one coming on she kicked me out of the bed for a whole week.

It happening in your tonsils is somewhat ironic because your tonsils are part of your lymphatic system, which in turn is part of your immune system, and my body doesn’t eliminate them itself. I suspect in part that it’s the physical morphology of my tonsils that make me baseline more susceptible. Combine that with periods of higher sugar/alcohol consumption or congested mouth breathing and you’ve got the right conditions for these guys to form.

How to Deal With Them

Dealing with them is pretty simple. Prevention is gargling TheraBreath mouthwash which is a very dilute Sodium Hydroxide and Sodium Benzoate solution with is very good at killing that kind of bacteria.

Keeping that routine forever is a chore so they sometimes appear. They either fall out themselves with a cough or gargle. Sometimes it takes a poke with a finger or flushing them out with salt water and a curved tip syringe.

You’re Not Gross For Having Them

I want to be very clear. Everyone will have these at some point in their life. Getting one is not a moral failing or an indictment on your oral hygiene. I would still occasionally get these during the two year period of doing Invisalign which requires you to floss and brush after meal or drink that is not water. They just happen and it’s annoying but it’s nothing to be ashamed of.

I’m a Coward

If there’s nothing to be ashamed of why is it so damn hard to tell someone they have bad breath? I had a former co-worker that is a delightful person and during the few years we worked together it was hard to be in a tight space with them. If you’ve just met someone you don’t want the founding memory of your relationship being you calling them out. On the flip side, a long established relationship where you have the trust to actually say something you don’t want to because it would reveal that you’ve hidden this information from them.

I don’t know the answer to this. When and how do you tell someone something that will undoubtedly hurt their feelings or self-esteem? I’ve had several people give me blunt feedback that was formative and my life would be poorer without it. But it did hurt my feelings at the time. I was just in a place to receive the feedback instead of defensively reject it to protect a bruised ego.

I’ve had better success with feedback of other sorts. And I have tried to normalize and educate about tonsil stones indirectly to normalize the knowledge. You’re not going to find exact answers here. So in a way this is my apology letter for not having the courage to tell people.