Frustrated with slow progress
Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2015 9:32 am
Hi everyone, I'm new to the group and this is my first post.
My daughter G, is 14 years old and we have been on her dental journey almost three years with very, very, very slow progress. Being a 14 year old girl, now in high school her smile is a significant struggle.
We were informed she is missing her lateral incisors (both) and one wisdom tooth (who cares about him). We were told we need implants for the lateral incisors around her college age so she will be done growing. She had one oral surgery to expose and chain her cuspids 12/13 and this was the start of her orthodontic treatment. Well fast forward to Jan of 2015 we were told her primary teeth were not falling out and that she would need to have the remaining nine extracted! March of this year we had 12 removed surgically (we went ahead and had her three wisdom teeth removed while she was under).
We recently went in for an adjustment and were told there has been little to no movement. My daughter only has her two front teeth at the top and pretty much all gums until her last two molars. The bottom is somewhat better in that she has five in the front then nothing until her molars.
This has been such a painful process in all the ways that count and I'm sure you all know the feeling. I am at a loss as to what to do. Her orthodontist says she should be able to have a strong enough wire to add some placement teeth (fake) to help fill the gaps by Christmas time but I am so afraid she will be disappointed. And how many of those can you have anyway? I am just so tired of seeing her cry and giving advice to stay strong and this will all be better in the end..and frankly I don't know what and when the end of this journey will come.
I would love to hear any advice, suggestions you are willing to share.
Just for reference here are her xrays (oldest to newest LtoR)-I couldn't get it to show up in the post so let me know what I may be doing wrong.
http://i1035.photobucket.com/albums/a44 ... 1zo1xx.jpg
My daughter G, is 14 years old and we have been on her dental journey almost three years with very, very, very slow progress. Being a 14 year old girl, now in high school her smile is a significant struggle.
We were informed she is missing her lateral incisors (both) and one wisdom tooth (who cares about him). We were told we need implants for the lateral incisors around her college age so she will be done growing. She had one oral surgery to expose and chain her cuspids 12/13 and this was the start of her orthodontic treatment. Well fast forward to Jan of 2015 we were told her primary teeth were not falling out and that she would need to have the remaining nine extracted! March of this year we had 12 removed surgically (we went ahead and had her three wisdom teeth removed while she was under).
We recently went in for an adjustment and were told there has been little to no movement. My daughter only has her two front teeth at the top and pretty much all gums until her last two molars. The bottom is somewhat better in that she has five in the front then nothing until her molars.
This has been such a painful process in all the ways that count and I'm sure you all know the feeling. I am at a loss as to what to do. Her orthodontist says she should be able to have a strong enough wire to add some placement teeth (fake) to help fill the gaps by Christmas time but I am so afraid she will be disappointed. And how many of those can you have anyway? I am just so tired of seeing her cry and giving advice to stay strong and this will all be better in the end..and frankly I don't know what and when the end of this journey will come.
I would love to hear any advice, suggestions you are willing to share.
Just for reference here are her xrays (oldest to newest LtoR)-I couldn't get it to show up in the post so let me know what I may be doing wrong.
http://i1035.photobucket.com/albums/a44 ... 1zo1xx.jpg
