Every mom tries to do what’s best for her child. Which is why Mom Victoria Frazer was so confused when her daughter had six fillings by the age of nine.
Her daughter, Matilda, is just one of Victoria’s children. Victoria follows Annabel Karmel’s parenting advice for children’s diets.
“We followed what Annabel Karmel said,” says Victoria, “and gave them dried fruit to snack on instead of salty crisps, and gave them those little packet snacks with pureed fruit from Ella’s Kitchen. I’d tut at mothers when I saw their youngsters in buggies clutching bags of Haribo sweets. Instead, I’d bpop a little box of raisins in Matilda’s hand.
“In the summer, we’d freeze real fruit juice into ice-lollies, and give them fruit to snack on. The mothers at the baby yoga classes would all swap tips like this. But now I realize all those foods are loaded with sugar, which is, according to my dentist, what has led to the decay.”
She’s taken her children to the dentist every six months since they were young. Matilda had her first filling when she was six years old.
“I burst into tears. I felt so guilty,” says Victoria.
Her 11-year-old son, Harry, followed suit. He has four fillings, two of them in his adult teeth.
High-sugar foods wan damage teeth in a couple of main ways.
The first is acid erosion, in which acid from fruit and juice softens the enamel on the teeth. If teeth are brushed within a half an hour of eating these acidic foods, one could unwittingly scrub off their enamel.
Sugar itself breaks down in the mouth, attacking teeth in much the same way that acid does.
Now, Victoria has banned fruit-based snacks. They can eat fruit, but only at meal times. Luckily, most of their fillings aren’t in their adult teeth, so these children may be able to save themselves from more dental work.
