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| This is the stuff I am reviewing: FFS don't buy it at Walmart because Walmart is evil. Image given courtesy of BzzAgent for me to use in my review. |
Note: I received this Crest® Pro-Health Advanced Mouthwash + Extra Whitening (BLAH BLAH BLAH) for free via BzzAgent in exchange for an honest review.
I drink too much coffee. This is a fact. Also I have a lot of fillings in my head as a result of late nights as an undergraduate spent sucking down Mountain Dew big gulps from the 7-11 while I wrote papers on the symbolism of erotic Greek and Roman art, or comparing the faux travelogues of Marco Polo in both the original text and Italo Calvino's brilliant rewrite Invisible Cities. I would tokka-tokka deep into the night on my Brother word processor (I am old so STFU) and pass out sometime after 4 am into a pile of drool-besmirched photocopies of microfiche from the MLA database (like I said, I am old). So naturally...cavities. So many cavities. I brushed my teefs in the morning when I woke, but by then the damage was done. So, coffee plus mouth full of fillings of all-sorts, plus red wine and diet soda...my teeth are not movie star white. And the truth is I don't especially care. I mean they don't look like a mouthful of gravel, or untoothy so...but sometimes I'm all, "I WANT A MOUTHFUL OF TEETH THAT BLIND MOTHERBZZRS! I WANT THEM TO BURN SOMEONE'S RETINAS!!!" Mostly just because I think that would be funny. I have a good smile though.
My guess would be that I am somewhere in the middle left of the dental shade chart below.
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| "VITA shade guide" by Matthew Ferguson 57 |
At least I don't have butterteeth? See exhibit "Lion with Butterteeth" below.
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| Dayum, Lion! Those are pretty buttery! |
Nor do I have goblin teeth. Or shark teeth. Or goblin shark teeth. Although I would forgo teeth whitening (and probably brushing) all together if I could have those...I like sharks. And they have little teeth cleaner fish...so that's cool.
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| Goblin Sharks are AWESOME!! |
They're pretty straight despite the fact that I never had braces. All in all I am pretty lucky. So, apathy established I tried this free stuff anyhoos.
I don't know that the Crest® Pro-Health Advanced Mouthwash + Extra Whitening (BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH...how much copy is on this bottle) did much, but it didn't hurt. My teeth don't feel weird, or sensitive, or fragile. In the past when I tried teeth whitening strips my teeth felt a little weird for a few days afterwards. That doesn't happen here. It does, however, taste the same gross taste as the teeth whitening strips. Bleh. It's a vaguely hydrogen peroxide taste, like the stuff they make you swish all the time when you get your tongue pierced. (I can't find a photo of myself with a tongue piercing right now, so you get none.) There is literally no mintiness, or any of that lovely Listerine pain (oh, it hurts so good...make it hurt). It's really mild, which makes me suspicious of what it is actually doing. Maybe nothing? Maybe something? Maybe I need to keep at it?
All in all, did it whiten my teeth? I dunno. They didn't get any worse though. So, after talking to a pal who really likes the teeth whitener, and has had it done professionally, we theorized that this stuff would be GREAT for maintanence. I don't especially feel like my teeth have gotten whiter, but maybe they're helping to stave off further coffee-mainlining discoloration? It might be great for keeping your chompers sparkly. Personally, I'm just hoping the fluoride will give my poor, sad teeth some protection against future damage...that's where my concern lies, not in shiny-shiny blindingness.
Conclusion: S'alright. Unoffensive, but I have no idea if it is working. And if someone wants something zingy or breath-freshening, then I would think they'd have to use two mouthwashes. The taste is tolerable, but I don't have any way to factor that it's doing what it says it's doing. I do trust the brand a bit I suppose...I pretty much always buy Crest toothpaste, so I'll see.
Bonus Babble about Veneers (totally related): Sometimes movie stars get veneers that are too big for their mouths and it makes their faces weird. Sometimes they get veneers that are the right size for their mouth but they look like chiclets. Sometimes they don't look like oversized chiclets, but they do look super fake. Sometimes they don't look like super-fake, oversized, chiclets...probably. The truth is I hate veneers in many ways. I understand that some people really do need reconstructive things done to their teeth. Everyone should feel confident in their smile and sometimes those veneers are the key. I am all for that, but I think that a lot of famous folk take it too far. It's also okay to be imperfect, to have the little flaws that make us unique and lovely. When we see the same smile, the same nose, the same "cosmetic enhancements" over and over again as part of some definition of "beauty" then it sends a bad message about what beauty is. It has many forms. We need to resist a single, narrow definition of beauty, or we'll forget what it is.
Works Cited (all my pics are fair use and public domain...AND cited correctly in MLA #nerd):
Ferguson 57. ""VITA shade guide." Photograph. Wikimedia Commons. Wikimedia Foundation, 1 Sept. 2015. Web. 31 Oct. 2015.
BrokenInaglory. "Female Lion." Photograph. Wikimedia Commons. Wikimedia Foundation, 1 Jan. 2006. Web. 31 Oct. 2015.
Hussakof L. "A new goblin shark, Scapanorhynchus jordani, from Japan." Bulletin of the AMNH 26, 257-262. Etching. January 1909. Wikimedia Commons. Wikimedia Foundation, 13 August 2010. Web. 31 Oct. 2015.
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