In my last post I created a basic overview of what canker sores are, and some of the most understood causes. In this post, I will go into more detail about these causes and briefly describe some ways that may help you to prevent canker sores to begin with.
The most important thing that I have learned over time is that all of these causes are interrelated. I will try to correlate these canker sore causes the best I can. Here goes...
Stress
Stress is certainly a major player when it comes to canker sores. Getting beat up at work and feeling the pressure of an impending deadline? Planning for holiday parties or a family event? Worried about money or an upcoming school exam? I'm betting that you either have canker sores are will have canker sores.
While there isn't much you can do about these daily stresses other than take them as they come. There are some things you can do to help your body to counter them. The following are stress countermeasures that I practice and highly recommend. Each of them will help prevent canker sores. Utilizing all of them combined makes a significant difference.
Stress Countermeasures:
1 - Sleep
Getting adequate sleep is a truly underestimated part of general stress relief and canker sore prevention. Most people in modern culture suffer from some amount of sleep deprivation or deficiency. A typical adult needs seven to nine hours of sleep each night. Young adults and adolescents need even more. If you aren't getting at least seven full rested hours of sleep each (or most) nights, you need to change that habit ASAP.
Don't know how to get more sleep out of your busy lifestyle? Try setting a specific time to go to bed. This seems difficult at first but once you try it, you will wonder why you hadn't done it before. Do you really need to watch the 11:00 news? It will be the same crap as it always is. Do you need to watch the late night entertainment shows? In this age of digital video recording and on demand replay of current TV content, you can watch it later if you must. Make sleep a priority instead.
2 - Exercise
Everyone knows the general health benefits of regular exercise. If you suffer from canker sores, this needs to be a part of your daily prevention habit. Exercise goes hand in hand with sleep. The great thing about exercise is that it also helps you sleep more soundly by lowering your resting heart rate, increasing metabolism, lowering blood pressure, and increasing lung capacity.
Even if you are just doing more walking every day, you will feel a benefit, but the more you do the better you will feel. Personally, I can feel a difference whenever I get lazy and don't spend some time doing some physical activity. This usually happens around the American Thanksgiving/Christmas holiday season. It's easy to slack off a bit, but I always pay the price. Find some ways to walk a little more or do a little more physical activity and your mouth will be much happier for it.
3 - Diet
This is one of those interrelated canker sore causes that I mentioned in my last post. Diet is also one of the most complicated pieces of the canker sore prevention puzzle to understand. Foods that some websites (like WebMD) might tell you are great stress relievers, may also be the cause of your canker sores to begin with.
I will go into more detail about diet when I explain food allergies in a future post. For now, understand that what you eat has a significant effect on the way your body deals with stress.
It is important to eat healthy. Everyone knows this, yet few actually practice good or even reasonable eating habits. I won't pester you to change how you eat (for now anyway), but I will ask you to take note of what you eat in relation to the onset of canker sores. Be aware of any connection that you may find between your eating habits and your body's response to those eating habits.
Photo: Flickr CollegeDegrees360
