Metal Mouth Message Board

Hi all! The ortho had a cancellation and I got in yesterday to get my braces off. Yipee. The scraping was the worse. The ortho was in a hurry to polish them up, so he did some minor reshaping with the front top teeth, but did not so anything else. Is it wrong for me to ask him when I go in next week for my retainer to even out the bottom teeth and smooth out one of the canines? My bottom teeth are a little uneven, one is taller on one side than the other. My canine on one side does not match the other canine, but this is due to wear before braces. I would like to h ave just the taller, pointy one just smoothed a little so its not that pointy. If I take it down too much I will have a space in my smile, but if he does it just a little it will look better. He rounded the corners of my top teeth, but the bottom are pretty squared off.

Is it wrong to expect and ask that he do a little more smoothing on the bottom?

Also, I have what is called the dreaded "black triangle between my two front teeth, will my gums come back into that space? He never shaved any of my teeth, but I am wishing he would have done these a little to avoid that space. The bottom part of those teeth are not touching and have a tiny bit of space, enough where my floss slides right in, but I don't think he can do anything about it now, the permanent retainer is in

I was wondering about the reshaping thing as well. I was going to ask at my lower retainer bonding appointment, but it was cancelled due to snow and ice storm.

If he doesn't do that, I will definately ask my dentist to do it for me. She's a dream dentist! I'll have to pay of course.

I, too, have one lower incisor that is higher than the others due to wear before braces.

I can't help with your black triangle question.... sorry!

i don't think it;s unreasonable to ask him to do all these things you're talking about, you must be paying him a fortune! i believe my ortho charges for reshaping but that was built into my treatment plan. anyway if you don't ask you don't get and i bet you'd rather feel uncomfortable for a min just asking than regretting not asking for what you wanted whilst you had the chance. if you've put a lot of time and effort and money into getting the perfect smile then why stop now?

My ortho took care of most the reshaping on my teeth before the braces came off. As for that 'black triangle' what my ortho did was shave down in between the teeth then used the braces to force the teeth shut. Obviously, however, if your braces are already off he can't do it that way.

New gingival tissue does not grow in to fill in the "black triangle". Sorry!