5mths in - ortho suggest extraction but I'm against the idea

[VA5]

HI Gracey,
I can pm you later w/pics.

Honestly, you do have a lot of teeth and they are large enough that getting extractions would not be a big deal to me if I were you. Also, keep in mind that w/braces .. they will straighten your teeth and push them out even more. If you rely on IPR only, your teeth will probably be very close to where they were from teh beginning (protrusion wise), just straighter. I realize this now, after getting extractions and trying to achieve the same effect. My teeth were really really straight looking. I did not need braces to straighten my teeth. However.. everybody has some rotation, tipping, etc.. in their mouth that braces will correct extraction or not. When braces correct these kinds of things, they only push the teeth out more. So, I believe if I went the Ipr route (it was an option that I presented before getting braced), all it would have done for me was allowed more room for my teeth to get completely straight, but it wouldn't have allowed any room for pushing them back.

Looking at your pics, I would say that's all that would happen if you just get ipr. I'm not trying to push you to get extractions, however it is just something to consider while making your decision. Hope this helps!!!

I will pm you later.. right now super busy but I will do that later

[gracey82]

Thanks VA5. I'm looking forwards to your pics since you said we have similar case ! Since you mentioned your teeth is very straight to begin with, hence getting IPR wouldnt get what you want to achieve. Mine is different case I guess. My teeth are protrusive and not straight, it was tilted outward. My initial idea of getting braces is just to get these teeth stay where they are but have them straightened.

Well, just want to report back after consultation with my orthon. I asked about profile change, face change. She said she cannot predict and tell me the exact profile/face change , lip change or how many mm that they will move because she said she cant predict what gonna happen one year down the road ( wonder how some of the other orthons here able to tell the exact measurements). Well that doesnt put me at ease. She said that the only thing she can tell me is that I wont have the big smile (cox I think I look quite toothy when I smile due to my big and protrutive teeth). Most important the change of side profile because I wont able to tell much different from the front, according to her. Its the side profile that will change.

When asked about the non-extractions route? She said yes, if you dont want any profile changes, your case can be avoided with extractions. She will just do abit of IPR and there, but not going to have profile change.And since I have big teeth on my upper, she said I have lots of enamel on that and would be fine doing IPR on upper but have to be careful on the bottom.

I think I'm going to go for non-extraction approach. I been sleeping on that decision so long that I think my life is much simpler with having to make such big decision lol. I know I can probably get a better side profile, but Im willing to take a compromise results than loosing 4 teeth. I know its not big of a deal as 90% of the ppl out there get extractions, but I just feel so wrong to have healthy teeth extracted, and I think I can live with the not so perfect profile. I want to save my 4 teeth

[gracey82]

Oh and I think after IPR and shaping of some teeth, with some mm pushed in, teeth being straight and all , I think I wont look toothy anymore with smaller teeth !

[khrystal1968]

Good idea. Don't extract. I should have done IPR too. I kind of liked my "protrusive" uppers, it was just the bottom four that gave me a problem, they were hurting my lip. I felt there was nothing wrong with my profile, and I never mentioned to my former ortho that I wanted a profile change. I was told there would be no significant change, yeah right. While I do like my new ortho, and he does mean well, he may not be what I am looking for, and I may need to move on. My arches need widening, which is what one doctor said should have been done. I literally bite my tongue with my second bicuspids when I eat, and my tongue feels cramped. I would love to find an ortho who will widen and give me the opportunity to place implants. If it has to be done with surgery, fine. I'll do the surgery then. Yanking out premolars and cranking the teeth back should not be the only option. Granted, it has worked on many people on here, and I congratulate them. It's just not for me. Or you.

[VA5]

Oh and I think after IPR and shaping of some teeth, with some mm pushed in, teeth being straight and all , I think I wont look toothy anymore with smaller teeth !

That was my exact thinking too, before I went into all of this. But as I said.. my teeth weren't crooked or overlapped very much at all.. but there was a little bit (miniscule, really, you couldn't tell by looking at my before pics which i still need to pm to you.. sorry i'm really disorganized, lol). And getting ipr would have done nothing for my teeth except for to straighten them out. I was thinking too, well at least they will look smaller too. But now that I got them extracted, I can see exactly how much my teeth were crooked b/c there was so much movement from that alone that ipr would have done nothing to improve the profile or the big teeth syndrome, lol.

I'm curious to know how your teeth turn out w/ipr though.. just to see what i could have done too. i'm actually still interested in ipr towards the end of my ortho, just so i can have slightly smaller teeth. but my ortho says the amount of ipr she can do is so small that it won't really make my teeth "smaller". my understanding is that bigger teeth don't necessarily mean there is more area on the tooth that can be shaved. i could be very wrong though and if a doctor here knows otherwise i'd be interested to hear about that too

[VA5]

Good idea. Don't extract. I should have done IPR too. I kind of liked my "protrusive" uppers, it was just the bottom four that gave me a problem, they were hurting my lip. I felt there was nothing wrong with my profile, and I never mentioned to my former ortho that I wanted a profile change. I was told there would be no significant change, yeah right. While I do like my new ortho, and he does mean well, he may not be what I am looking for, and I may need to move on. My arches need widening, which is what one doctor said should have been done. I literally bite my tongue with my second bicuspids when I eat, and my tongue feels cramped. I would love to find an ortho who will widen and give me the opportunity to place implants. If it has to be done with surgery, fine. I'll do the surgery then. Yanking out premolars and cranking the teeth back should not be the only option. Granted, it has worked on many people on here, and I congratulate them. It's just not for me. Or you.

I'm interested to say why you say extractions isn't for gracey?

In all honestly, looking at gracey's teeth and profile, I think she'll do really well with extraction. I think it's only an opinion though. And preference of Gracey's.

I don't know what your profile looked like before, but I know others who have protrusive profiles who really don't like that aspect of their smile. For people with protrusive mouths/teeth, and who have a lot of teeth and can spare the extractions, I personally feel that extractions isi the way to go.

I don't know enough of your story.. did you get extractions for protrusive teeth/protrusive profile?

[VA5]

Oh, I need to clarify too Gracey, that my teeth tilt outward too. Even though they are "straight" .. I really just meant to say they aren't overlapping like crazy or anything, bite is great, etc. However they flared out. They didn't go straight up and down. I think that Ipr will do very little to achieve the straight up and down look. It will allow the teeth to spread out and not have any overlapping or rotation. To resolve the tipping (outward in your case), I don't think it'll do a thing for that after the ipr is said and done. This is just my opinion based on a comparison of my teeth and yours and what I have seen with my teeth movement. A year into this and I have seen a lot of movement that were the result of the extractions, that I am fairly certain i would not have seen with only ipr.. just not enough space would have been made for that. My ortho still has yet to retract my teeth, so the only movement that has been made is for rotations and slight overlaps. I have space left for the retraction when she is ready to do that (hopefully soon).

Anyways, I hope that makes sense! I wanted to clarify b/c i re-read your post and realize that I think i wasn't clear earlier when i said "straight teeth". i had no significant overlapping or rotation issues, but the teeth definitely tipped outward (flared teeth) and the ipr would have only addressed the overlapping and rotation, but probably not the outward tipping.

[khrystal1968]

Good idea. Don't extract. I should have done IPR too. I kind of liked my "protrusive" uppers, it was just the bottom four that gave me a problem, they were hurting my lip. I felt there was nothing wrong with my profile, and I never mentioned to my former ortho that I wanted a profile change. I was told there would be no significant change, yeah right. While I do like my new ortho, and he does mean well, he may not be what I am looking for, and I may need to move on. My arches need widening, which is what one doctor said should have been done. I literally bite my tongue with my second bicuspids when I eat, and my tongue feels cramped. I would love to find an ortho who will widen and give me the opportunity to place implants. If it has to be done with surgery, fine. I'll do the surgery then. Yanking out premolars and cranking the teeth back should not be the only option. Granted, it has worked on many people on here, and I congratulate them. It's just not for me. Or you.

I'm interested to say why you say extractions isn't for gracey?

In all honestly, looking at gracey's teeth and profile, I think she'll do really well with extraction. I think it's only an opinion though. And preference of Gracey's.

I don't know what your profile looked like before, but I know others who have protrusive profiles who really don't like that aspect of their smile. For people with protrusive mouths/teeth, and who have a lot of teeth and can spare the extractions, I personally feel that extractions isi the way to go.

I don't know enough of your story.. did you get extractions for protrusive teeth/protrusive profile?

My profile was not protrusive at all, in my opinion. I have full lips, and a small bump on my bottom lip. I did not want to lose them but I have no choice now. My profile is concave, nose and all. I have a nose that kinda slants upward so it will look stupid with a long upper thinned out lip in my opinion. My profile has alot to do with my ethnicity. As far as extractions go for Gracey, it's up to her, but I think she has made up her mind.

[gracey82]

haha VA5, yes, after so much of similiarities between our teeth you are talking about, I'm eager to see your before and after extractions pics!!
Well , same like yours, my teeth wasnt overlapping at all, or rotated and stuffs, has minor cross bite on my right side. Though they say extraction would caused the arch to become smaller, I beg to differ. It is only make sense the arch is smaller because u have 2 teeth less.
Even in this case Dr Rick has posted last time, I have noticed the arch become smaller.

http://www.dent.niigata-u.ac.jp/ortho/h ... Bimax.html

What I'm trying to say is if you look at some people with wide smile, you can see the whole set of teeth lining up across the mouth when they smile. But I have noticed ppl who gone thru extraction and braces, when they small, there are black holes at the corner of the smile. Isnt that cauased by extraction?

Talking about it, I wonder if I would need expansion on my lower, since if you see the pics on my braces journey, the back molar and first molar are pushed inside. Dont know how they are going to be pushed outside and aligned itself since the back molar is not included in the braces process, if you know what I mean.

When i was looking some of the arch of a normal ppl, I notice my arch is slightly narrower. Cant really draw and illustrate, but a normal set of teeth will have a very nice U shape arch, whereas mine is narrower at the curve, little more to V shape than the U shape. Expansion helps? As oppose to the first orthon, my second orthon doesnt agree on expansion.

[khrystal1968]

I noticed in that video that girl had an extremely protrusive mouth to begin with. Mine was never nearly that bad. That was some extreme protrusion, in which exts. were probably necessary.

[VA5]

Good idea. Don't extract. I should have done IPR too. I kind of liked my "protrusive" uppers, it was just the bottom four that gave me a problem, they were hurting my lip. I felt there was nothing wrong with my profile, and I never mentioned to my former ortho that I wanted a profile change. I was told there would be no significant change, yeah right. While I do like my new ortho, and he does mean well, he may not be what I am looking for, and I may need to move on. My arches need widening, which is what one doctor said should have been done. I literally bite my tongue with my second bicuspids when I eat, and my tongue feels cramped. I would love to find an ortho who will widen and give me the opportunity to place implants. If it has to be done with surgery, fine. I'll do the surgery then. Yanking out premolars and cranking the teeth back should not be the only option. Granted, it has worked on many people on here, and I congratulate them. It's just not for me. Or you.

I'm interested to say why you say extractions isn't for gracey?

In all honestly, looking at gracey's teeth and profile, I think she'll do really well with extraction. I think it's only an opinion though. And preference of Gracey's.

I don't know what your profile looked like before, but I know others who have protrusive profiles who really don't like that aspect of their smile. For people with protrusive mouths/teeth, and who have a lot of teeth and can spare the extractions, I personally feel that extractions isi the way to go.

I don't know enough of your story.. did you get extractions for protrusive teeth/protrusive profile?

My profile was not protrusive at all, in my opinion. I have full lips, and a small bump on my bottom lip. I did not want to lose them but I have no choice now. My profile is concave, nose and all. I have a nose that kinda slants upward so it will look stupid with a long upper thinned out lip in my opinion. My profile has alot to do with my ethnicity. As far as extractions go for Gracey, it's up to her, but I think she has made up her mind.

so just curious, did the extractions make y our profile concave or was it like that beforehand? if so, then that is interesting they extracted. do you mind my asking why they extracted?

[VA5]

haha VA5, yes, after so much of similiarities between our teeth you are talking about, I'm eager to see your before and after extractions pics!!
Well , same like yours, my teeth wasnt overlapping at all, or rotated and stuffs, has minor cross bite on my right side. Though they say extraction would caused the arch to become smaller, I beg to differ. It is only make sense the arch is smaller because u have 2 teeth less.
Even in this case Dr Rick has posted last time, I have noticed the arch become smaller.

http://www.dent.niigata-u.ac.jp/ortho/h ... Bimax.html

What I'm trying to say is if you look at some people with wide smile, you can see the whole set of teeth lining up across the mouth when they smile. But I have noticed ppl who gone thru extraction and braces, when they small, there are black holes at the corner of the smile. Isnt that cauased by extraction?

Talking about it, I wonder if I would need expansion on my lower, since if you see the pics on my braces journey, the back molar and first molar are pushed inside. Dont know how they are going to be pushed outside and aligned itself since the back molar is not included in the braces process, if you know what I mean.

When i was looking some of the arch of a normal ppl, I notice my arch is slightly narrower. Cant really draw and illustrate, but a normal set of teeth will have a very nice U shape arch, whereas mine is narrower at the curve, little more to V shape than the U shape. Expansion helps? As oppose to the first orthon, my second orthon doesnt agree on expansion.

hm, i don't think it's caused by extraction. i think some orthos are very conscious of not letting the arch cave in too much. mine is like that, so i hope mine isn't too much smaller although i don't mind it being a little smaller. i just don't like how when i smiled before, i was WAY too toothy. you know how tiger woods smiles and he has (well not sure about now, lol.. might have lost some teeth recently) what appears to be too many teeth for his mouth? kind of like that. i like toothy smiles but mine flared out just enough for me to feel self conscious of it whenever i smiled. i always liked other people's smiles that were big but not like .. whoah, you've got a lot of big teeth in there. you know?

so, my ortho is being careful about my arch, but at the same time i can see that it is getting a little more rounded. that's what i really want.. an arch that is more rounded, and i want the teeth to tip inwards more than outwards, which might make tha arch appear a little smaller but it's okay with me b/c my mouth/teeth were so in-your-face before. if that makes any sense.

and like i said, i don't think it has to be extractions that cause that. if the ortho is careful about it, they can make sure to retract your teeth in the front (which really is mostly just tipping it inwards, they can't really move your jaw line, you know.. without surgery anyways) w/o the other teeth caving in.

just make sure your ortho is really aware of your fears and i'm sure it'll be fine!!!

i realize i need to take pics of my before pics (the ones my ortho gave me) and i will email those to you later.

[khrystal1968]

OOOOPS! SORRY! I meant to say convex. My bad. Well, I certainly don't want it to become concave afterwards.

[VA5]

OOOOPS! SORRY! I meant to say convex. My bad. Well, I certainly don't want it to become concave afterwards.

So your profile was/is convex.. meaning it curves outward.. ie, it protrudes? I'm just trying to understand your situation, etc. It's great to be able to talk to others here who are going through similar things!!!

[khrystal1968]

It curves outward, yes. It is hard to explain...It is as if my nose and lips point outward. I have kind of an unusual nose in my opinion...I have what my family calls the "Roman nose". I really don't consider my lips protrusive, they are full. I guess the ortho didn't see it that way. They are getting a bit thinner tho.


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