If your lips are chapped, THIS might be the surprising culprit

Chapped lips are a problem that 100% of humans suffer from. Okay, we might have made that statistic up, but you get it. No matter how often you reapply your lip balm, your lips sometimes just can’t seem to not be chapped, especially when the weather is cold and dry. But guess what. Toothpaste could be behind your perpetually chapped lips, as it turns out. Yes, TOOTHPASTE.

You’ve probably heard that the more you apply lip balm, the more you rely on it. That could be part of the issue , but your toothpaste may also be the culprit.

This revelatory news was stumbled upon by Refinery29 in a Reddit thread discussing how to solve the issue of chapped lips.

Reddit user dannelinflannel began the thread by explaining that switching to a new toothpaste completely cleared up the chapped lip situation. 

"So chapped lips have been the bane of my existence since my childhood. Im talking dry, cracked, peeling lips constantly. I was a chronic chapstick user and nothing I did seemed to make it better...I never in a million years would have guessed my toothpaste was the one to blame. AND my chapstick wasn't helping. So I picked up a travel size Sensodyne Pronamel (because let's face it changing toothpastes is a big decision) and switched to using just a thin layer of Vaseline on my lips twice a day. Oh my god the difference it has made in just a week, and it's the middle of a pretty cold winter here!"

Other Reddit users experienced the same relief after swapping to a toothpaste designed specifically for sensitive teeth. Many people believe that sodium laureth sulfate (SLS), a foaming surfactant in many toothpastes, is to blame.

“The most common signs of toothpaste allergy are mouth swelling, painful canker sores, cracking at the corners of the mouth, the condition known as cheilitis that is marked by dryness, and even gum irritation or an upset stomach," New York dentist, Lana Rozenberg, DDS told Living Healthy.

Switching toothpastes may help, but you’ll need to check the ingredient label to look for common triggers such as SLS. Then by trial and error you should be able to figure out which toothpaste works best for you.

“A study from the University of Oslow, Norway showed that canker sores are often precipitated by exposure to the common foaming ingredient, sodium laurel sulfate,” New York dentist, Gerry Curatola, DDS told Living Healthy.

If a toothpaste is SLS-free, the brand will likely advertise that on the tube. So if your lips are just chronically chapped no matter what you do, it might be worth it to switch up your toothpaste. (But also make sure you’re drinking enough water, because dehydration can also be the culprit!.)