tpa

[tonyb]

I just had a tpa put in my mouth and the wires placed in the brackets. The tpa is very annoying and painful. I can't swallow and everything gets stuck there. I can hardly chew any soft food. Is there any help for my mouth?

[nenak11]

I also have a TPA and it took me awhile to get used too. Right after I got it my ortho suggested to go ahead and eat before my teeth get sore so I did. I grab some noodles from a Thai restaurant and boy that was a horrible idea, I took a couple bites and the trash it went. I talked funny for a couple weeks and still to this day I have some letters like R and D that is difficult to pronounce. It's been 5 weeks and it doesn't feel like I'm chewing on razors but I can definitely notice that it is still up there. Give it 2 or 3 weeks..

[ellieb]

There is a TPA in the back of my appliance. Just eat small bites and stay away from anything long, fibrous, or stringy. It gets better!

[pellepee]

I don't have a TPA but a quad-helix expander. I have had it for 5 months now.

It was about a month before I stopped realising the expander was there constantly... I don't really remember it is there until I eat something a bit more, err... 'difficult'. I also managed for four whole days in the first month to line the entire thing with wax to give my tongue a rest from the pressure. It certainly helped, and I used a hell of a lot of wax to do it (and salivated like I had rabies) but man... it allowed my tongue to heal and hasn't had any irritation since. It was difficult to place I can assure you but stick at it (we are talking about 20 mins to get it on!) because it will give you some great relief. I guess don't sleep on your back if you are going to go to bed with that much wax though? Just in case! I only ever re-applied if it fell off; I even ate with it on because my tongue had ulcers that bad. So yes, I did have grungy wax at times but you gotta do what you gotta do!