A few updates

Hi! Sorry I've been M.i.A for a few weeks - I guess I was busier than I realized!

Anyway

I had an ortho appointment last week so of course I've got to share it with you! I went in all smiles b/c I had gotten used to my braces since the last tightening session. In fact, I think I can even say that my braces were "loose" or at least the wire was. I had become very content with the way my braces were feeling, but I definitely knew it was time to tighten them back up!
I sat in the chair as directed and my Orthodontist (I think we were calling him Dr. X in past posts? well let's call him that again!) and he came over to take a look. He commented on how pleased he was with the movement of my upper teeth. They are not 100% straight yet but they are very close! Then he looked at the bottom train wreck of teeth and started touching them and rambling numbers and other ortho things. He told me that once he can get a thicker/stronger wire in there that I'm going to be amazed at how fast they move and reassured me that they'll be perfect. Then he called for an assistant to come over and he basically just gave her instructions on what to do with me and moved on to the next patient.
The assistant began removing my wires, as usual, then she popped a new top wire in and put clear rubber bands to hold them in place. Next she moved on to my lower teeth, removing the old wire. When she went to put the new wire in O M G! IDK what she did, but it felt like she was trying to rotate one of my bottom front teeth upside down! Holy Shit, it hurt like Hell! I literally thought she was going to pull my tooth right out. I made a noise and she could see the pain on my face so she stopped and asked if I was ok, to which I replied "no, that hurts really bad". She gave me a break, then started again and AGAIN it hurt like hell! She commented that my mouth must be sore and asked how long that tooth has been sore. But my mouth WASN'T sore and that tooth had not been sore at all prior to my appointment! Dr. X even called out to her to just wait and he'd put my new wire in b/c he could see that she was hurting me, but she popped it in before he could get to me and thankfully the pain was gone as soon as she got her hands out of my mouth! Oh yeah, she also knocked a band off one of my back teeth! Ugh! It was glued to the side of my tooth, not the kinda that go all the way around like a ring. But now Dr. X says we'll put a traditional band (like a ring) on that tooth since the other one came off so I left with spacers in the back tooth too. And I do have to say that while spacers made my mouth VERY sore the first time around. i barely even notice the 2 in there now.

So that was my appointment! I go back next week to get the band put on, spacers removed etc.


And for your viewing pleasure, here ar some pics :)

I have to confess that I'm not happy and a little discouraged with my lower teeth right now. While they seem to be moving and you can SEE the spaces between my teeth now (they were totally overlapping before), they're still really crooked and with the new spaces in between they just look like a mess! More of mess than even before! I sure hope they start lining up soon!

PS: Sorry if this post has a negative undertone, it's not meant to be negative. swear! :)

and...just b/c I personally really like to see any progress made, here's a quick collage to document it!

Spacers Repaired!

Yesterday, I stopped by my orthodontist's office to get the spacer that popped out replaced and to get the others checked b/c I am kind of a spazz like that. The visit was extremely fast. I think I spent more time finding parking than I did at the actual visit. I walked in and was the only non staff member there, they immediately had me sit in the patients chair and sent the same assistant woman that initially  put the spacers in over to me. I showed her the spacer that had popped out and she popped a rubber spacer in it's place (it was metal the first time around). Just like that! No elbow grease, no struggle, just popped it right in - no problem! Then I showed her another spacer that seemed loose to me and she quickly pulled it out (no pain or discomfort at all) and popped a new rubber spacer right in.

I honestly couldn't believe how easy the visit was. I thought it would hurt since my teeth had become sore, but it didn't hurt at all. The assistant definitely redeemed herself in my eyes and so I now lean on the good side of the fence.

Today (day 3 of having spacers in) my teeth are still sore. I haven't really been eating much. See my menu below;

Thursday
- Gyro for lunch - VERY unsuccessful! I took a few small painful bites that took me like 20 minutes just to chew and get down. I ended up throwing more than 75% of the gyro away.
- Mashed Potatoes & Mac n' Cheese for dinner - Mashed potatoes were a great choice! Mac n/ cheese was soft enough but it still took some effort to chew. Not as easy as it sound for uber sore teeth.

Friday
- Coffee for breakfast
- Clam Chowder soup for lunch - or maybe I should say clam chowder broth and the potatoes found within. There was no way in hell I could masticate those chewy clams in the soup. At the end of the bowl I had  a pile of all the non liquids found within the soup.
- Dinner - Giant baked potato from BJ's. I basically ate the softest parts and left the skin. Didn't eat the whole thing b/c I got tired of the effort it took to eat it.

Saturday
- Little appetite
- Lasagna for dinner and very soft brownie a la mode for dessert

Sometimes I feel "used' to the discomfort, while sometimes it feel like torture! All in all it's nothing I can't handle. . . just VERY annoying. I mean imagine how annoying it is when you get a tiny seed stuck in your tooth when you eat strawberries or sesame seeds or something! Now imagine liked 10 seeds stuck in 8 crevices! Not fun, right? I actually read that spacers are as thick as pennies so that would be a more accurate thing to imagine ; 4 pennies stuck between your back teeth. Blah!

All will be worth it though and I keep reminding myself of that.

I have wanted straight teeth for such a long time now! My crooked smile has seriously affected my self esteem to an extent and has maybe even held me back in some ways. It's time to quite letting it dictate my life. Time for me to get that crooked smile fixed and be the me that I've always been meant to be!

No pain, no gain!

and . . . if you want more info. on spacers here are some helpful links that I found that can explain spacers a whole lot better than I could...enjoy!

First: Here's what rubber spacers look like (NOT my teeth - two of mine are actually metal bars)

Helpful Links:
http://www.bracesguide.com/duringbraces/duringbraces03.html

http://www.archwired.com/spacers.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthodontic_spacer

Here we go . . .

So after several visits to various orthodontists, I finally settled on one. I'm pretty comfortable with him. He has a Doctorate in dentistry from Harvard University and also studied at UCLA. His yelp reviews are stellar and my friend's kids are patients of his and she loves him! He also has great hours for someone who works full time 9-5 hours like me and his prices are incredible compared to the only other orthodontist I considered seeing. I do admit that I think his staff is not as good as the staff of the other orthodontist that I met with, so I guess I am going to have to see how that all plays out. So far I am on the fence and I'll tell you why;

Yesterday, I completed what I guess you can call step 1 of getting braces. I had spacers put in between my back teeth to make room for the brackets they'll glue on when they put my braces on next week. The orthodontist was great at explaining everything, then he turned me over to the assistant. I'm sure there is a more technical name for her; dental assistant? ortho assistant? Anyway, she shoved some rubber spacers between my upper teeth with a smidge of difficulty. Then she started on my lower teeth and was using some serious elbow grease but couldn't get them in.

"Do you have trouble flossing?"

"No"

"Your teeth are very tight"

Ok? Then she decided to switch to metal spacers instead. With the same amount of oomph that she used to get the first set in, she began to try to shove the metal bars between my teeth. At one point her hand slipped a little and she poked me. I think she got more scared than I did and that in itself made me think twice. After a few more minutes, she finally said we were done. I felt one of the metal ones popping up already and asked her about it. She said if it pops up to just push it back down. Ok? The entire appointment from waiting in the waiting room, asking a million questions, taking pictures and getting spacers only took 30 minutes. My teeth didn't hurt, it only felt annoying b/c things were stuck in my teeth but the ortho warned me that I'd hate him by tomorrow when they got sore. By the time I got home from my appointment, one of my metal spacers had already popped off. Yes, the same one I inquired about before I left the office. I'm not sure if this is normal or if my teeth really are tight or what! It's not  huge deal, just enough to put me on alert. I called the office today and the orthodontist (let's call him Dr. S) told me to come in when I can (tomorrow) and he'll personally replace the spacer that popped off, as well as replace the metal ones with more comfortable rubber ones. So, I have been pacified for now and hope that this is a one time glitch in the soon to be year(s) long plan!

And for the record, I don't hate him today as he warned me that I would . . . but boy do i understand why other patients might! For such tiny little pieces of metal/rubber, they sure do produce a lot of discomfort and soreness! I better get used to it! Next week is braces & within 2 months I'll be getting EIGHT teeth extracted! Eight, man! Four wisdom teeth, two of which are impacted & the teeth next to my canine teeth on both top and bottom (4). So, not looking forward to that...but it will all be worth it when I get that megawatt smile!