Metal Mouth Message Board

Oh did I make a bad mistake early this morning.
I am seeing a chiropractor due to a very bad car accident I was in almost a year ago. For those of you who may not know.. a chiropractor places you on a table and adjusts your spine.. Your back cracks and (for me) it feels really great!

Well today we got to really joking around and laughing, so much so that I forgot to adjust the face cradle before my upper back adjustment. During an upper back adjustment, I lay on my tummy, face in the face cradle and he really PUSHES HARD on my upper back which squashes my face into the face cradle. Usually I remind him to spread the face cradle apart so there is no pressure on my mouth or braces.

It was only a spam-second before he made the adjustment when I realized I was laying, full pressure on my mouth! By then it was too late. *CRUNCH* (the sound was from my mouth not my back!)

All the force seemed to go right to my mouth, crushing my teeth into the face cradle. Two of my brackets popped off and the inside of my mouth was left bleeding from all of my braces being squashed into my lips.

My teeth are hurting! I have an emergency appointment at 3pm today at my Ortho's. I can't believe only two brackets came off with that amount of forces on my mouth. That was a nasty crunching sound, I thought I had lost them all.

My Chiropractor feels absolutely terrible and I told him it wasn't his fault. I'm normally the one to reminds him to spread the face cradle as I'm the only one who needs it adjusted. Today I wasn't' paying attention. So a big reminder to everyone. If you ever go for a massage, or a chiropractor adjustment REMEMBER TO ADJUST THE FACE CRADLE.

My lips are all puffed up... I look like a duck, honestly. I am going to have to drive to the ortho like this...

The two brackets that came off are annoying! They are sliding around on the archwire and clanking around. I wish I could get the doors open myself to take them off.

Eeeek! I guess you won't make that same mistake again! Good thing you were able to get an emergency appointment. Hope all is better soon.

WOW, your description sounded painfull. I cringed just reading it.
Good Luck with everything and hope your back feels ok as well.

Ives

Thank you everyone for the encouragement.
Well they took out my archwire scraped off the "glue" that held those two brackets then rebonded them.....

I think they could have scraped ME off of the ceiling though. The pressure from scraping on those two teeth caused so much pain I was in tears. The technician felt really bad and I felt bad for making her feel bad Fortunately all of the doors opened without any problem and they were able to remove the archwire, rebond those two brackets and reinstall the archwire smoothly.

The doctor gave me a prescription pain med that I will take so I can sleep. He said there wasn't any damage to any other brackets and non of them moved, but that of course my teeth were all pretty loose and my gums irritated. My lips will heal on their own.

Thank you all and remember to be careful of those face cradles. One stupid stupid slip up like I did can really ruin your day. And Karen I have taken your advice and those warm salt water rinses feel so so good. Thank you.

Sounds like you had a very, very bad day. Hope you have many better days to come. At least you had an interesting story to tell the ortho.

Bad backs are very tricky, aren't they? Is the chiropractor helping?

I will keep that in mind. I've been doing phenomenally well in the past year and a half and don't even remember to make my chiropractic appointments unless I need one. That must have been so painful!

I cringed just reading your post. I do hope you're feeling better and was glad to hear that you were able to see your orthodontist today. I hope the pain reliever helped.

Take care and thanks for sharing your story because it is a good reminder to anyone wearing braces that this type of accident can happen to any of us.

ssfw

Ouch, glad things worked out for you after all that and I'm sorry for all that pain! I remember the last time I was at the chiropractor and I swear everything felt good after getting out of there! So I'm sorry you had brackets pop off and hope things heal quickly for you!

SDFD TSchott

chevy: thank you for posting this. i might not have thought about it until too late!

Yes thank you I am doing better. I am thanking goodness for that pain medication he gave me. I slept just fine last night. I put ice on my lips this morning and a lot of the swelling has gone down. Now my teeth are just really sore but it isn't any different from when you get your braces installed or archwires changed. Thanks everyone for the well wishes and I hope my stupidity helps someone in the future.

Betty: Yes the Chiropractor has helped me a lot. I was hit head on, on the highway back in May of last year. It broke 4 of my bones which have all healed, but then I was left with muscle and neck problems. So the Chiro and Massage therapy kind of work together and has made all of the difference in the world. Ive already begun cutting back my appointments for both as they are not needed as much.

My Chiro is a very sweet, caring man, so I am hoping he is feeling better about our little mishap. I think I will bring him some cookies or something.

Ouch, I cringed reading your story.. It's great to hear that you're recovering though. I hope your cuts heal soon - cankersores seem to love me so I definitely know how horrible they feel.