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Can Chewing on Your Lips Harm Your Dental Health?

Posted on 10/20/2019 by Emerson Todd Rowley, DMD
Can Chewing on Your Lips Harm Your Dental Health?There are many occasions when you may bite your lip. It can happen when you are eating, it can happen if you trip, it can happen for many reasons. Usually, unless it was the result of an accident, the lip heals by itself and you no longer have to worry about it.

However, there are people who chronically bite their lip much like people bite their nails. They do it when they are anxious or when they are worried or bored. There are many reasons they do it. If you bite your lip a lot you could run into problems with your dental health.

What Can Happen?
The first thing you should be aware of is that if you only bite your lip occasionally it will heal itself and you should have no further problems. However, if you bite your lip repeatedly, and in addition, you bite the inside of your lip, you could be asking for trouble.

Your lips heal just like any other part of your body. It takes a little time but for the most part, heals without incident. The problem with biting your lip as a nervous habit is that you are repeatedly biting your lip. Before the last sore heals you are introducing another sore. Worse than that, the new sore may disrupt the healing of the previous sore. This could make the first sore take longer to heal, leaves it open longer for bacterial growth and could cause it to get infected.

Aside from the fact that chronic lip-biting looks bad and can leave your lips perennially swollen, If your lips get infected, there is a higher chance that the infection can spread to other parts of your body. If for no other reason it is important that you find the reason that you bite your lips and get help stopping the practice.
If you need help, contact us.
Tualatin Family & Cosmetic Dentistry

(503) 878-7474
8555 SW Tualatin Rd, Tualatin, OR