Happy Valentine's Day! Let's Talk About Your Kids' Candy

All those little candy hearts your child gets at school for Valentine's Day are mildly frightening for some parents — and some dentists! But with a little bit of attention, it's OK to allow your kid to enjoy his/her Valentine's Day candies without ruining their future oral health. Here are a few tips from Drs. Johnson and Risbrudt:

• Dole Out the Candy Sparingly: You should be in control of when your child has access to candy, and you should be careful of how much they eat at a time. Not only can 'boom and bust' candy eating result in a fussy kid, but you might also be setting them up for insulin resistance and its concurrent obesity and risk of diabetes.


• There's A Reason Behind 'Dessert': The classical wisdom of eating real food first and dessert afterwards has a lot of value. Eating sweets just after a meal does a couple of things. First, your saliva is still flowing easily and will have an easier time cleaning the teeth of extra sugars. Second, the sugar will mix with the meal in your child's gut and thus you won't get the same kind of blood-sugar spike and resultant 'high' you get if you give them candy in the middle of the afternoon.


• Watch the Ingredients: It's a strange time we live in, when 'sugar' is considered to be one of the least offensive ingredients on a candy's list, but it's true. If you have the ability to steer your child away from fructose (including agave, which is actually higher in fructose than HFCS), do so — but that said, if you're following the first two guidelines and you can't avoid it, a little corn syrup or Red #40 isn't going to have a noticeable effect on your average kid. The important part is your awareness and attention — that way if something does set your child off, you'll at least have a notion of what it may be.

Happy Valentine's Day — enjoy yourself!