The Incidental Mom-Bonuses of Raw Manuka Honey

Thankfully, I have raw Manuka Honey on hand at all times. (I explain the differences in honey in this previous post.) It comes in handy being a mom. Now, I am a mother and with motherhood comes all sorts of disgusting encounters. You all know them well. I can recall a time on our Facebook page when all of us discussed the many revolting encounters we have had with our children and I had some good belly laughs at your expense. I thought perhaps, I experienced enough grossness for one lifetime already as I explained in the post entitled The Downside of Co-Sleeping, but apparently the Mother of All Grossness was still in store for me and thank God I was well prepared.

This week, I’d been noticing my tooth brush was still wet in the morning for a few days in a row. Now, keep in mind, I walk around half exhausted most days as most moms do. Really smart moms might have caught on a little earlier than me. You might already know where I’m going with this. I had also noticed that when my son has been getting mad at me from time to time, he spends a long time in the bathroom. I went in to check for issues like wrecked make-up or smeared toothpaste, but nothing seemed to point to any foul play at that point. So, for a few days, I  brushed my teeth despite my minor warning signs that something was amiss, because frankly, I was too tired to even think straight. One evening though, I was about to brush my teeth, but stopped myself. “Not tonight,” my little mom helper voice told me, “Not tonight.”

So, I put the dry tooth brush back in the cup. Meanwhile, I noticed that my throat was starting to hurt and my tooth ached. My tonsils were swollen and the gums around my tooth was inflamed. I grabbed my Manuka Honey, took a spoonful of it and used my finger to apply it to my tooth, my tonsils and even the back of my throat. Thankfully, my gag reflexes aren’t that well developed. Then, I went to bed.  I woke up a healed woman. My toothache was gone, my gums were better and my throat felt fine. I was pleased with myself. I reached for my toothbrush, and sure enough… it was wet.

I walked into my son’s room, holding my toothbrush and said nothing. He said, “What?! I didn’t do that to your tooth brush!” I asked him what he didn’t do to it. He told me, “Nothing.” He didn’t even know what I was (not) talking about. Well, after about an hour of my varied mom lie detector methods, I took out the big guns. I explained that there’s lots of things that can happen to a toothbrush. Lots of ways it can get wet. I explained, some of the ways, would only require a cleaning, but some would require that the toothbrush be replaced. He asked me what kinds of things would make a tooth brush only have to be cleaned. I explained I wasn’t going to tell him. He just needed to tell me what happened to it.

He said, “Well, it accidentally got dipped into the toilet a few times.”

That’s one of the things that requires a new toothbrush, in case you were wondering.

Now, I don’t know for sure if brushing my teeth with pee, fecal matter and toilet bowl water actually caused any of the infection in my mouth. I’m just saying, thank God for Manuka honey.