Metal Mouth Message Board

I will be wearing what the Ortho calls "spaghetti elastics" starting in August for twelve weeks where, from what I understand, rubber bands will be intertwined throughout my whole mouth connecting both upper and lower teeth. Apparently this is the last stage of treatment, and sounds complicated. Any advice from those who are familiar with what I'm talking about would be helpful....

Twelve weeks, Mr Kadash??

Sounds similar to what my ortho calls a 'squeeze' but thankfully he only puts the bands in place on debanding eve.

Looking at Brandy's pics (thanks Meryaten) they look like similar processes.

The 'squeeze' thingy is done the afternoon before debanding. The office advised me to eat my evening meal before my appointment where Dr W removes the wires, places elastics over every upper bracket to a corresponding lower one (doing something tricky to sort out my midline @ the same time). They advise you can talk but only through clenched teeth, and the bands cannot be removed until I'm debanded the next morning. The idea of not being able to remove them makes me feel a little claustrophobic but at least it's only for 16 hrs or so (making me wonder how much effect they can really have , but he's the boss).

Compared to your twelve week sentence I count myself lucky, but at least you'll have control in that if you're freaking out or need to eat, go to a meeting, etc, you can removed the bands and replace when convenient.

I can't advise how it feels yet but am due for debanding soon so will post again then.

Good luck