My teeth say a lot about me — and my family’s life during the Great Depression

September 17, 2024 Canuck

This First Person column is written by Liz Harrison, who lives in Grande Prairie, Alta. For more information about First Person stories, see the FAQ.

“Grandma! Grandma! Take your teeth out!”

My siblings and I would beg to see this trick every time we visited Grandma Rachel. She’d oblige us, and we’d watch her mouth cave in and her set of false teeth slide out, quick as a flash. I’d feel equally weak-kneed and impressed as she slurped her dentures back in.

As a young adult, I was fortunate to live in the same city as Grandma Rachel while attending the local college. I loved hearing her stories and getting to know her and my family history. That’s when I learned that she’d had all of her teeth pulled as a teenager.

For Grandma, tooth-pulling was a freedom of sorts — a quick, kind and generous gift instead of a lifetime of further slow and painful decay. Her teeth were weak and crumbling — a byproduct of growing up in a city during the Great Depression of the 1930s and the resulting patchy childhood nutrition.

Dentures were an investment in her future.

My own dental health has been a life-long challenge. My parents faithfully brought my siblings and me for dental check ups throughout childhood, but I began to need fillings in my late teens. This was in part my own fault: I was mistakenly convinced that not brushing my teeth was better because it left their natural protective coating intact.

My teeth were crooked and crowded. That, and my poor hygiene habits hit hardest just as I aged out of the remaining dental coverage I’d had from my parents at 21.

I was lucky to meet the kindest of dentists, who allowed me to access a sliding scale for the work I needed. Still, I spent thousands of dollars out of pocket to have my many cavities filled, a root canal and crown, and two wisdom teeth removed.

A woman leans on a small couch while sitting on a green backdrop. — Harrison says she faces a lifetime of maintenance due to her genetics and lack of early dental health hygiene. (Cori Rae Photography)

On the other side of my family tree is Grandma Margaret, who also grew up during the 1930s, but lived as a farm kid instead of in a city.

She grew up with wholesome and plentiful nutrition. Her family grew enough to also support men riding the rails looking for work and passing through. Grandma Margaret’s father would offer a meal and a night in the hayloft in exchange for chopped wood or completed farm chores — a fair trade that the family thought preserved everyone’s dignity and pride.

I also lived in the same city as Grandma Margaret for a year while attending a trades program. She was diligent about her oral care. She’d always say, “I’m just going to clean my teeth” before we’d head out for lunch or errands. Even as her bones weakened from osteoporosis, she kept all her teeth until the end, through good oral care on the outside and good nutrition on the inside.

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I have been privileged to be able to have Invisalign as a now-insured older adult and I faithfully brush twice a day. I even floss pretty regularly, but the damage is done, and I face a lifetime of maintenance ahead due to my genetics, family history and lack of early understanding.

I first considered this genetic link through the experiences of my parents. My Dad has his mother’s (my Grandma Margaret’s), exceptional dental health, even though he hasn’t always been an exceptional brusher (more like me and my protective coating theory). While my Mom has been a dedicated brusher and flosser yet struggled with the same crowding and cavities I have also experienced.

Insurance is part of my professional compensation these days, but I still often exceed those limits and have portions to pay for out of pocket. Even with all this care and prevention, I face a lifetime of maintenance due to my night clenching, deteriorating fillings, and crown upkeep.

I’ve worked hard to achieve that fortunate position of being insured for dental care. Having worked in private business and as a government employee, I’ve had vastly different levels of coverage. My oral health has been supported with my government contract far beyond what I experienced as a small private or large corporate business employee where I had little to no coverage.

For a long time in my family, it has been a privilege to be able to afford to take care of our teeth: a privilege we have not always been able to enjoy.

I know many families are struggling with good nutrition and good oral care today. I know how privileged and blessed I am to have the coverage I do, and I know how difficult the path can be to accessing this privilege. Hopefully in the coming years, many more Canadian families will experience legacies of good oral health.

In the access I’ve had to education, the career and financial opportunities I’ve had as a woman today, and, yes, in my ability to care for my dental health, I am certainly living my ancestors’ wildest dreams. I hope in my lifetime to see these dreams and privileges shared by the many, instead of the few. As my grandmas would say, teeth are important for your whole life.

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