Metal Mouth Message Board

I have a problem and if anyone has advice please feel free to post it.
I will apologize in advance to the long post, just have a lot to get in to get the full effect.

On Monday I notice one of my molar bands that is attached to my expander was a little loose, called ortho and they scheduled an appt. for Tuesday afternoon. When I got there yesterday afternoon they did confirm that one of the four molar bands had come loose but to fix it all four bands and the expander would have to come off so they could be recemented. The asst. started right away. (It was a little scary hearing that crunch sound when the cement comes away from the tooth...almost sounds like your teeth are crumbling.) All four came off pretty easy, the asst removed my expander and told me to go rinse the excess glue out of my mouth. When I tilted my head up I felt what I thought was my tooth falling loose in my mouth. I reached in and pulled out one of the bands that is supposed to be welded to the expander. The asst eyes almost popped out of her head, she said, "Uh oh, I don't think that was supposed to happen".

The ortho put my broken expander in to try to line it up, took an impression, and took the expander back the the lab tech to see if she could re-weld it together. The welds wouldn't line up because my expander was bent pretty bad. I was then fitted with some new bands, had another impression made, the bands were removed, spacers were put in AGAIN and now I'm scheduled to go back in today for have the new expander re-banded. And because my expander bands also double as the very back bands that hold the end of the archwire in I had to go home wireless. So now here is the problem, my teeth and gums hurt so bad that I was in tears this morning trying to brush my teeth and I have to go back in this afternoon to get my expander put back on but I'm so scared it's going to hurt so much I won't be able to handle it. Also my teeth have shifted due to the spacers since I didn't have my archwire in to hold my teeth in place.

What do I do??? I have taken OTC pain relievers with no relief in sight. I don't know of anything to prepare me for this afternoon. If anyone can help please let me know.

Amburly,
I am so sorry to hear about your problem. I would call my ortho and see if he/she can call in something for pain that you can take before you have the expander put back on. If not, call your medical doctor or dentist. I would even resort to going to a walk in clinic and pleading my case if you are having that much pain already. I'm sure one of them would give you something to get you through this afternoon. If you called your dr or dentist with a severe toothache they would give you pain meds to help until the tooth is fixed so I do not know why one of them wouldn't give you something for this pain.

I'd call now. That's their job.

Good luck today.
C.

Very good idea, I tried getting through to my regular family doctor during my lunch but the line stayed busy...I'll keep trying though. Thank you

Oh you poor thing! Do try and get some prescription painkillers. Beg, steal...... Actually something non-prescription that may help a teeny little bit is the numbing mouthwash you can buy at the chemist/pharmacy.....

But in any case I'm praying you get your meds before the appointment. And that your ortho has some great anaesthetic.

mel

how long into expansion were you, the pain may be rapid relapse if you were midway through it.

--garetnb

Well I went to my ortho appt yesterday and it was so weird because usually I am so excited to go but yesterday that was not the case. I told the asst as soon as I got there that my teeth were very sore and tender from the day before so I took an OTC pain reliever(dentist wasn't in yesterday and physician was completely covered up too so no prescription) before I came in but ask if she could please be as gentle as possible. She assured me that she would because she had seen what I had to go through even though she wasn't the asst who actually worked on my teeth the day before. I have to say that it wasn't half as bad as I expected it to be. Actually once the put the expander in to see if it fit before the glued it the pain sort of faded away. I guess when my expander was taken out on Tuesday the pressure was relieved suddenly causing some major discomfort.

I did unfortunately lose some expansion over night and some teeth did shift but at least my teeth feel okay today. Not near as sore as yesterday. And I did get a new wire on top and my spring on the bottom reactivated so that makes what I went through a little better.

garetnb - I have been expanding every three days for almost 2 months now. That's about 16 turns so far.

OUCH Amber, I'm so sorry this has been such a pain. I myself am dreading my adjustment on Monday. Because so far the last two adjustments the ortho has pulled off the molarbands with expander. It hurt like H-LL because there was so much cement.My molars were very loose and he stretched the expander and put more cement and put the expander back on.
Teeth canshift pretty fast if the archwire is removed. My lower archwire was removed and my teeth shifted in like a week.
I can only tell you to try your best to relax and I am taking my own advice and will do the same on Monday. I hate the thought of having them pull off the molarbands/expander. Hoping he does something else ! Like change the ligs and send me home lol.


Gennel

I know exactly what you mean. When I first started this journey almost 2 months ago I longed to have an exciting adjustment...now I just want them to change the ligs or maybe even the wire and then send me on my way for another 6 weeks. Hopefully I won't have anymore "emergency appt" between now and Feb 28th(my prospect 3rd adj).

Good luck on Monday!!! I'll have my fingers crossed for you. Here's to no expander removal.