Sugar is a delicious substance, and it’s hard to avoid eating it, especially for children. However, if your child consumes high amounts of sugar, their smile could be in grave danger. Sugar promotes tooth decay development. So, to help your child have a cavity-free smile, our dentist, Dr. Nicole Holmes, encourages you to limit your child’s sugar intake.
To help you do so, our dental team encourages you to first provide more food that has less sugar. This could be an easy goal if you stick to the basics: meats, fruits, and vegetables. These foods don’t have high amounts of sugar and they even help the teeth. So, try to provide these foods instead of sugary foods. It might help to eliminate the sugary treats from your pantry and refrigerator.
Second, make healthier snacks. This doesn’t mean you should go cold turkey on the sugar when it comes to snacks, desserts, and treats. It just means you should try to make them a little healthier. You can do so by substituting the sugar for another ingredient, like nectar or honey, or even using less sugar than what the recipe calls for.
Third, give your child sugar on occasion rather than whenever they want it, which might be more difficult than it sounds. However, if you start small, you could achieve this goal. Just work on giving your child one sugary treat every other day instead of every day. Or you could even cut it down to one sugary treat a week if you’re feeling brave.
If you have questions about how to help your child limit their sugar consumption, please contact Holmes Dental at 970-221-2499 at your earliest convenience. Our dental team in Fort Collins, Colorado, is more than happy to help you!
