I Tried The Best Teeth Whitening Strips And Now My Teeth Are All Pearly Whites

I’ve never been confident with how my teeth look. 

They’re not yellow, but they aren’t as white as I’d like them to be. Often, when I’m comparing them to other people’s teeth, I’ll notice that mine are a shade darker or yellower than most. I know – it’s a first-world problem, but it’s one that can easily be solved. 

And also, who cares? No one is looking at me as hard as I’m looking at myself. No one is analyzing the whiteness of my teeth. And frankly, if they are, I really hope they’re satisfied that that’s how they want to spend their free time. 

But even though the whiteness of my teeth doesn’t matter to me too much, I’m always looking for ways to improve my appearance and challenge myself to invest in self-care. So, this week (this month, really), I invested some time and energy into a self-care practice I often disregard.

My Teeth

For some reason, my teeth have always been a sore spot for me. I remember sobbing when I got braces. I remember hiding my mouth when I had gum surgery. And if I ever went on a date with something in my teeth, the man wouldn’t see me again because I would be too embarrassed. While some of that self-consciousness has gone away, I still don’t love my teeth.

I’ve had surgery on my mouth, an on-again-off-again relationship with my retainer (do I seriously have to wear this thing still?), and now, an ongoing relationship with Crest whitening strips. 

My sister is eight years older than I am, so my early memories of her are laced with her discovery of beauty products. One of the memories that stands out the most is how often she would walk around the house with whitening strips in her mouth. Because my sister was so much older and ‘cooler’ than I was, I wanted whitening strips more than anything because she had whitening strips. 

I think I started using them in high school, sparsely. My teeth never stayed as white as they were after the day-of usage, but I still swore by them. 

This week, I’m challenging both my older sister and my high school self and going back to falling in love with Crest whitening strips all over again.

Crest White Strips Review

I love acts of self-care that require little to no effort from me. There are so many in-depth routines that I go through every day. While I enjoy them and know they’re all good for me, I love a low-maintenance, high payoff act of self-care, and Crest whitening strips are just that. 

I’ve been whitening my teeth since high school. Every dance I went to, play I was in, or event where I wanted to look my best was preceded by a Crest whitening strip. 

But I never used them often. I would use a strip once for every event — usually on the day of — then forget about them. Granted, as a kid, the $40 box seemed to be the height of luxury, and I couldn’t afford to do it every day. But Crest suggests you use their strips every day for two weeks to get the best results – I never knew that! 

So, it’s time for me to say goodbye to yellow teeth and hello to easy self-care this week!

My Week

I know that Crest suggested one use every day for two weeks to get the best result, but I did decided to use the strips every other day. My teeth are very sensitive, and the bleach on the strips always leaves them feeling a little weak. That being said, I loved using the strips frequently and might have finally found out what all the hype was about. 

This month was really special to me. I said previously that I loved to whiten my teeth before big events, and the month of May held multiple significant events. 

I started this challenge early because I knew I was getting engaged soon. I didn’t know what day or what time, so every day for a week, I got dressed up and put on my whitening strips. In a time that was chaotic and unplanned, it was nice to know that every day I would put on the strips and sit peacefully for thirty minutes. At least, that was the goal, but they usually went in as I ran all over kingdom come to get ready for this proposal. 

I also really enjoyed that this week’s Markey Tries It wasn’t necessarily a challenge. I wasn’t getting on a treadmill or waking up before the sun. I was putting bleach on my teeth and allowing everything to just ‘be’ for a bit. It was a perfect mental health booster.

When I finally got proposed to at the end of the week, my teeth had been whitened multiple times and I even noticed it in all of my pictures. 

The fun news about this challenge is that it didn’t stop after one event. While I’d like to say that I continued to whiten my teeth for self-care’s sake and I didn’t necessarily need to, that’s not true. A few days after my proposal, my fiancé and I headed to Virginia where I was a bridesmaid in a wedding. 

While we were all getting ready at the house, I was sitting around in my hair rollers and whitening strips on the day of. Honestly? One of the smartest decisions I’ve made. I looked slightly insane, but I also had an excuse to take some time for self-care in the morning and steal some quiet moments. 

My Results

I’m honestly not too sure about the lasting effect the whitening strips had on my teeth. In the end, my teeth are worn down a bit from over 15 years of drinking three cups of coffee a day, millions of cups of black tea, red wine, and everything else bad you can do for your teeth.

But the lasting result was that, throughout the chaos of getting ready and trying to look my best for these (somewhat) stressful events, I was also able to take thirty minutes out of my day and just focus on myself and my self-care. 

I don’t know if Crest whitening strips are the most successful whitening technology out there, but I also don’t care. In the end, they make me set aside time for myself and require very little maintenance. They’re in and they’re out — that’s it. But that small amount of time boosted my mood and transformed my mornings. And for that, I will never stop using them.

Have you used Crest whitening strips? What’s your favorite teeth whitening method? Comment below!

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