If your child is in any stage of orthodontic treatment, this is a place to connect with other parents in your situation. Please note: this is a forum for adults only -- kids may not post here!
By popular demand, welcome to this new forum! I'll be joining it myself soon, because my young daugther is about to get a palate expander to correct her cross bite!
You may wonder why I specifically state that I don't want children to post. It's not that I don't love kids, but as we all know, kids have a different view of the web than adults. I hope to find a good kids forum for your children. And if I can't find one, I will probably create one. I won't be doing this soon, because I am having surgery on my shoulder and my typing skills will be out of commission for several weeks. But it's on my list!
In the mean time, grab a cuppa joe and talk to other parents about orthodontics and your kids. I just wanna know one thing: who was Barney's orthodontist? That dinosaur has the straightest teeth I've ever seen!
I'm the owner/admin of this site. Had ceramic uppers, metal lowers ~3 years in my early 40's. Now in Hawley retainers at night!
Both my kids are getting started on the journey w/ braces within the next several months... They seem to have exact opposite problems- daughter needs the palete expander & needs to correct her over bite. Son needs to wait a bit longer (going thru puberty, like, RIGHT NOW ) until his lower jaw growth slows down- he has an underbite. It's kinda wild that his teeth are shaped like mine & my daughter's teeth are shaped like her dad's- I never noticed this with my own parents because my dad's teeth are "capped" and my mom's had dentures since she had me- at 27..yes-dentures !
hi all,
both my daughter and myself are beginning our journey with braces at the same time! just like when she she hits puberty, i'll be hitting menopause, but that won't be fun....just thinking about it makes me quake in my boots!
anyhow, she's got a strong crossbite (underbite) (so do i ) and she needs an upper expander and 'head gear' or a 'mask' ...this is all part of her Phase I treatment.
she wants to go to her friend's daddy (an ortho) and NO ONE ELSE...so we haven't got any other consults but i'm sure he'll do a good job...i have to go with who she's comfortable with and he's it....don't know if he's the best ortho (doubt it--bec. he's just opened his own private business and does family dentistry AND orthodontics) but i'm confident he'll be good enough.
if any of you have comments about underbite (crossbites) and upper expanders for 6 year olds, please let me know. i need the info~!
thanks,
dogbreath (note: the tiger on my avatar is my lovely 6 y/o daughter~)
My daughter is a bit older than yours; she turned 8 in November. She's had expanders for 2 1/2 months, and the top was finished turning a few weeks ago. She has an overbite and overjet rather than underbite, but maybe some of this will help.
The whole expansion process has been a lot easier than I thought. She had some pain when they put it in (from biting down to push the bands onto the teeth), but really none at all from the expansion. There were a couple times when her gums got swollen and irritated, but warm saltwater rinses took care of that very quickly.
It's supposed to be easier the younger you are, so hopefully your daughter will have a stress-free expansion. I wish you the best!
I'm grateful to find this board and have been reading a ton of posts over the last two days My daughter was just placed in a palate expander last Thursday. It's been a little rough this first week....she has a very sensitive gag reflex, didn't actually swallow the whole first day. I finally got some ice cream down her last Friday evening. She will not eat anything of substance. I forced her to eat mashed potatoes yesterday. She also became constipated, so we had to fight that battle as well. I'm just hopeful I made the right decision. She's lost 4 lbs and really doesn't have it to lose as she's very tall for her age. I have to say I've been doubting our decision a little. We're turning the expander and pain hasn't been an issue at all. It's that she panics anytime anything gets caught in her expander...that's why she won't eat. We attempted mac and cheese and a small piece of pasta wound up in the expander and she completely lost it. I'm purchasing a waterpik this w/e. Please tell me things will improve. Any advice or encouragement is greatly appreciated.
ArchWired.com and its message board are intended for adults and older teens. Of course, younger teens may participate as long as they conduct themselves in the proper manner.
I'm the owner/admin of this site. Had ceramic uppers, metal lowers ~3 years in my early 40's. Now in Hawley retainers at night!
) until his lower jaw growth slows down- he has an underbite. It's kinda wild that his teeth are shaped like mine & my daughter's teeth are shaped like her dad's- I never noticed this with my own parents because my dad's teeth are "capped" and my mom's had dentures since she had me- at 27..yes-dentures 
!
