Metal Mouth Message Board

Hi Matt My daughter is 12, wears headgear 24/7 and is now totally used to it. She built up the time, as you are doing, and first wore it overnight on a weekend (so if she was tired from any problems in the night she could sleep late to recover!!) She takes it out for meals and when playing sports et...

Hi Shelby. No, she`s OK about it. The orthodontist MADE the gap, before she didn`t have one at all, and she knew that a gap would appear. But things move on quickly, and now her teeth have spaced out better and the gap doesn`t seem too big. There is new space for her eye teeth to come down which wil...

I agree, the earlier the better to check all is OK. My daughter is 11, and had lost space in her mouth due to loosing baby teeth early. She had a palate expander in for 3 weeks and now has a "spider" device, lip bumper and headgear. She is an absolute star about wearing it all, and the res...

I´m going to try and past a picture of her expander - here goes...


Hope you can make it out! (I`m new to this - can you tell?? )

My daughter has just had her expander removed. She only wore it for 3 weeks and in that time her front two teeth seperated and made a 7 mm gap - big enough for her to insert her finger in the space - it was amazing. But I am not sure if it was a Hyrax or RPE (sp?) expander or not. It was like a clea...

So far, I have only posted questions about my daughter, but I also have a son in treatment too. He is 8 yrs, and seems to have a more straightforward treatment plan. He has a lip bumper on his bottom teeth, and alternates with a bumper on top, and headgear for 13 hrs at night. My question is this - ...

My daughter is 11 and has just had an expander fitted on top and a lip bumper on the bottom. She is coping really well. We found the spacers caused a little discomfort, she had them for a week before the lip bumper went in. So far, she has had no pain with the expander at all, I turn the key 1 time ...

After a few months lurking around the board, I can finally report that we have started active treatment today with my daughter. Until now it`s been impressions, x-rays, models etc, so I haven`t had much to report. Today she has had spacers put in, but only on her bottom teeth. Next week the spacers ...

I must admit - I was expecting replies along the lines of´"buy your girl a nice soft goose down pillow" or "stock up on chocolate flavoured Hagen Daas to numb the mouth!!" lol Larissa, you obviously feel very stongly about these removable devices - thanks for your detailed comme...

Thanks taking the time to pass on your comments - but now I´m even more confused !!! Headgear seems a great alternative to pulling out 4 health new teeth, and all the doctors I´ve had contact with say it`s a very effective method. If it is so much easier and less painful with the devices you menti...

My daughter is soon to be the proud wearer of headgear to pull her teeth backwards and make room for others to come through. We are excited about this, because the other option was to extract 4 permenant teeth - but thanks to the great advice from Dr. Rick & Helen on this site, we sought a 2nd o...

Hi Emma Thanks for the photos, they have given me an idea of what I sould ask the dentist. It may still be necessary to extract the 4 teeth, but I would like to check out every other option first, and now I can ask about this. I was so happy to find this site, other parents can help and advise each ...

How does the expander work? Is it like an over the head-gear system??My daughter is 11 and we have been told that the only option to make room for new teeth is to extract 4 teeth (1 in each cornerish). I feel this is extreme, and was interested to hear of your sons expander. Thanks for your help, I`...