Mewing: The DIY Technique That Corrects Your Teeth And Bite

In recent years, there’s been a sudden craze of a holistic method that can straighten your teeth and reshape your profile without the help of the typical orthodontic solutions. All you had to do was simply position your tongue in a certain way and with a little bit of patience, voila! You’d have straighter teeth than you previously had.

Surely, this sounds too good to be true. Also known as “mewing,” this technique has caused a lot of controversies whether it truly does what it claims to do. If you’ve been thinking of realigning your teeth, let’s see whether mewing is all you ever need to do.

All About Mewing

At the heart of mewing is a technique that attempts to utilise your facial muscles to reshape your facial structure by repositioning your tongue into a new resting place. It works around the notion of replicating the interaction between your muscles, jaw and teeth that occur during normal development, so as to create a more attractive configuration of elements.

When your facial elements have yet to set in and are still developing, the act of chewing is a mechanical gesture that activates all these elements into operation. During the act, each element will set out to engage in a complex interaction which will help to stimulate development; for instance, tongue pushing outward that will slowly develop into a dental arch. Even when you’re not physically chewing or engaging in any mechanical process, each of these elements will continue to interact with each other, allowing for adequate jaw development.

Unfortunately, partly due to the environmental changes that have successfully altered our breathing and a diet that leans heavily on processed foods, the position of our tongue has also changed as a result. This naturally alludes to the change in our facial development. Mewing, thus, attempts to correct this by making individuals aware of their tongue position and encouraging a habit to fix it.

Whilst it’s been made popular by Dr John Mew and Dr Michael Mew, this technique is not new. In fact, this technique is closely related to a method called orofacial myofunctional therapy that helps to treat disorders of the muscles and functions of the face and mouth.

How To Mew

To properly mew, you’ll first need to relax your tongue and flatten it against the roof of your mouth, including the back of the tongue – it’s as simple as that. For those who haven’t been positioning their tongue as such, this may need some getting used to. However, with time, your muscles will remember where to place your tongue and it’ll be second nature.

Does Mewing Truly Work?

Surely, this DIY technique is simply too good to be true. Whilst it’s a popular trend that has garnered a collective that swears by this technique, mewing doesn’t actually have any scientific evidence that it produces results. Moreover, Dr Mew never did a randomised clinical trial to demonstrate its effectiveness, something that is expected when pushing for an effective solution to the masses.

Instead of concrete academic findings, the only pieces of evidence seem to come from anecdotal experiences and testimonials. Along with numerous before and after pictures, videos circulating in social media networks and Youtube have propagated the technique. Do remember that such anecdotal experiences can be biased and the circulating images can be doctored. Moreover, shadows, lighting and angles make a huge difference in the way the jaw can appear. Such evidence is deemed to be unreliable as they’re not backed by scientific evidence that has been collected in regulated conditions.

Whilst not inherently dangerous, there isn’t any evidence to back the claims that mewing actually works. You can try this technique for years and still find little to no results.

Instead of relying on a rather dubious technique, let professionals help you correct the function and appearance of your teeth! If you’re suffering from dental pains or have cosmetic concerns, the dentists at Luminous Dental have the technical know-how and skills to fix them. With proven orthodontic approaches such as Damon braces and Invisalign, you’d be able to correct any misalignment issues, improving your overall appearance all whilst protecting the health of both your teeth and bite. The best part? It’s guaranteed to work and you’ll have a definite time duration to refer to!

Instead of banking on a technique that may or may not work, let the dentistry professionals at Luminous Dental bring out the radiant smile in you!