Why Does Sugar Make My Teeth Hurt?

Picture this: you're gorging on leftover Halloween candy. You take a bite of a fun-size chocolate bar and instead of sugary goodness, you get a flash of blinding pain in your tooth! What's the deal?

Hosted by: Stefan Chin

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Sources:

[LiveWellChannel]

Sugar is definitely not great for your insides, but it does have some pretty cool healing powers when it comes to external wounds! It absorbs moisture which helps prevent the growth of bacteria - there's records of people using this as far back as 1700 BC.

[codfanatic]

Teeth: Mr Mouth, I don't feel so good..

[AllohaAllohaSnackbar]

6 years of dental school and I missed this. I was probably sleeping when they taught this.

[Brainstorm]

I never had that before. Thank you enamel!

[crochetingcanuck]

Tooth pain is the worst. Last year I had a deep cavity filled. Dentist must have damaged the nerve while cleaning it. I ended up having the worst pain I have ever felt in my life, and I gave birth without drugs! Starting with regular daily throbbing, one day it increased to literally feeling like I was having contractions in my mouth every minute. Couldn't stop screaming. So many pain meds, including perscription ones, didn't work. Turned out the nerve was dying and I ended up having a root canal. So thankful for whoever came up with endodentistry and root canals!

[alexanderswann]

I was wondering what was wrong with the thumbnail then I realized that the teeth were upside down

[tec-jones]

Sensitive teeth? Sorry mouth, it's off to Boot Camp for you.

[savannah]

I’ve had that before and definitely thought it was a cavity...I straight up didn’t believe the dentist when he said I didn’t have any cavities lol

[MrChad-zcbv]

Now I know why black coffee works to get rid of the pain

[madhippy]

This has been a serious problem on my left teeth for about 4 years now. I've seen dentists about it and they could never tell me how I could stop the pain.

[chrzrd.]

It so weird how SciShow uploads a video about what I was thinking in my head the day before!

[ColtaineCrows]

I extremely rarely get some pain when eating chocolate, but even when I've gone in to have it checked they've never found anything wrong. I've even been to several dentists, just in case. My dad gets it too. Never react to cold or hot stuff, or other sweets, just chocolate. It's pretty weird.

[nadines]

My teeth hurt just by listening to the reasons why I have toothaches.

[SOHBlue]

I watched this with my last gummy worm pointed towards the screen... It says "Hi, please save me."

[todayssciencelesson]

In osmosis it’s the solvent (water) that moves from where it has a high concentration to where it has a low concentration. The solutes can’t pass the selectively permeable membrane thus the phrase “solutes suck.” Water moves to dilute the more concentrated solutes where water is less concentrated. Thus around 1:30 when you say osmosis moves from low concentration to high concentration you’ll probably confuse people because they don’t realize that the solutes don’t move only water. Thus water is moving down its concentration gradient (high to low concentration) but at the same time it’s moving to a high area of solutes (thus low to high concentration).

[dacoconutnut]

The Great Pumpkin is punishing you for stealing her candy

[gunz-ahimbo]

I have loved SciShow for years, but I just googled this question because I ate a brownie and it hurt, making me wonder WHY this happens. Your result was the only one that ACTUALLY answered this question rather than trying to sell me toothpaste. Thank you!

[asteri]

i dont normally get pain with sugar in it or for hot and cold things (i put sugar in my coffee and drink soda occasionally) nor is it triggered by hard candies, but if i take a bite of cake, a muffin, cookie, or solid chocolate im in immense pain. though i generally avoid sugary tasting things so its not much of a problem.

it was cool what the reason for the pain was, thank you schishow for explaining it

[broskydoodle]

Anybody who mentions Johnny Johnny will be immediately terminated

[beautifulsuicide]

I ate a whole basket of candy it HURTS RN