Metal Mouth Message Board

DECEMBER 13TH 2005

I went in last week for an adjustment, and have just managed to find time to post now! The ortho said that things are coming along well for me, and that he is very excited about this new procedure that he is using on me. I can't believe it's been 8 months already!

My upper right molars are flaring out a bunch, so he is trying to bring them back in line in order to line up my bite. I also got a new (big rectangular!) wire on the bottom. I was in pain for a couple of days! I've really noticed my lower arch getting wider over the past couple of months. It's pretty exciting! I also got green and red ligs for the holidays

Here are some pics:

Top:



Here is a pic of the bottom when I first started out:



And here is a pic of the bottom now (after 8 months):



And here are my new ligs!

your teeth are looking so great! Congratulations! Its so inspirational! I really like those red and green CHristmas ligs! Hope I get some great progress like that soon!

-Hannah




Top braces: 4/28/04
Bottom braces: 11/16/05

Jaws... your teeth look beautiful now! Why do you have lig ties on all upper teeth in the pics though. Good luck and you look great!

Wow Jaws,

you are really getting there. Congratulations !!!
Your teeth and arches look just awesome !
And your pics are always very nice too. Very well done !

I did notice for a while now that your upper molars do flare out, probably
because of that lingual arch. I didn't dare to ask you before, as I saw
how happy you are about your progress. But I wanted too, because I
experienced the same, but in my case because of a TPA I had for about 6
months. How is your ortho going to correct this ?

Thanks for all of the comments everyone!

p7atrick--I'm not sure if I understand your question. I'm not sure why I have lig ties on all my upper teeth--that is just always the way that my ortho has done it! I have never had a power chain or wire ties or anything like that.

Clo--Thanks for your input! Yes, I have noticed for a few months now that my molars flare out. I think my ortho was trying to make room for everything by flaring things out, and now he is trying to pull it all back in. In order to bring the molars back in, he has been taking out my upper lingual arch, adjusting it's shape, and putting it back in. He told me that he is bending the lingual arch in such a way that it will torque the roots of my molars back in. I'm not quite sure that I understand how this is being accomplished, but he's done good things for me so far, so I think I'll just wait and see what happens! Has your ortho talked about how he/she plans to correct the molar flaring that you got from your TPA?

I admire your boldness in using holiday colors for the ligatures - they look great. On Tuesday I'll get the regular brackets installed and the archwire. At first I suspect I'll go only for the silver ligs to match the metal braces. But later on in treatment I want to try purple and pink and then maybe even wilder colors.

Hi Jaws,

Has your ortho talked about how she plans to correct the molar flaring that you got from your TPA ?

Nah ... are you sure you wanna know how she did it for me ? Well ok
then, there are some pics of my teeth in this thread :

viewtopic.php?t=7394

As a secondary result of having all those elastics, there was a force that
corrected the flaring out of my (pre)molars. That went well for my uppers.
But now I have the opposite issue on my lowers, they are slanting inwards
too much ... But I have bigger issues right now, as a bite that won't
close for example ... I was joking when I wondered if you really wanted
to know, as I really hope you won't need to wear such nasty elastics
configuration yourself ... Mind you, it is indeed possible to correct this
by adjusting the archwire itself. I think by torquing (eh, hope I have this
right, I mean rotating the wire around its length axis) the rectangular wire.
Anyway, best of luck !
I'll be watching your 'un-flaring process' ...

Holy Christmas ligs! Your teeth look great Jaws!!! I really like those ligs too. Your teeth are really moving along. Hope everything continues to go well for you!

Wow Clo--that is a crazy elastic configuration! I will definitely keep you up to date on my 'un-flaring' process. I always tend to doubt my ortho's ability to do things, and then a few months later I end up seeing results! So, right now I am in a 'doubting' period, where I feel like my upper teeth are never going to 'unflare'...but we will see what happens!

And thanks HollyDontSpend for the comments on my ligs! It's nice to see that you still frequent this site even though you don't have braces anymore! I hope my teeth end up looking as nice as yours!

JANUARY 5TH 2006

Hi Everyone,

I had my 9th adjustment done yesterday, and since school hasn't started for me yet, I have time to post right afterwards! The adjustment itself wasn't overly eventful, but I received some interesting news!

First of all, they are still trying to correct the flaring of my upper molars on one side. The ortho adjusted my lingual arch some more to try and torque those teeth inwards (if you look at the pics you will see that my upper lingual arch is further away from my teeth on one side than the other. By being further away from my teeth, I think it is supposed to pull those teeth inward and un-flare them). Then the assistant changed my ligs and I was done!

However, I asked the assistant what comes after they have un-flared those molars, and she said that I would basically be done! She said that it could take a few months to do these finishing touches, but that I could potentially be done the braces by April or May! That would be 5 or 6 months ahead of the initial time estimate (they originally told me a year and a half, and getting them off in April would be exactly one year). So, I'm not going to hold my breath, because anything can happen, but it's still exciting to think that I could be done earlier than expected!

They also told me that my next adjustment will be fairly involved. They are going to grind the molar putty off of my 2nd last molars, and put it back onto my very back molars. Then they are going to have me wear elastics from my bottom 2nd last molars to my top 2nd last molars (straight up and down) in order to pull my bottom 2nd last molars upwards and fix my deep bite. By doing this, my 2nd last molars on the bottom will be higher up than before, so my mouth won't close as deeply. Hopefully that makes sense! Also at my next adjustment they want to put some kind of 'kink' in my upper wire on one side to help un-flare the molars.

I'm excited for my next adjustment to see what happens!

Here are some pics:

TOP (I don't think that my top molars have un-flared very much since my last adjustment, so hopefully they will start moving along soon!):



BOTTOM:



New Turquoise Ligs!

Jaws that's a great news!!! super!:-)

I start to think whether it would be possible for me to finish a bit earlier as well...oh well I guess I have to keep my self on the wave and see what will come...

BTW a nice colours

Jaws your smile is looking beautiful! Congratulations!

Sounds like your in for one heck of an appt. there! Good luck with that!

Just curious, but what does it mean that your molars are flared? I'm quite confused.

I really like your ligs! I wish my ortho had that color!

-Hannah




Top braces: 4/28/04
Bottom braces: 11/16/05
Next Adjustment 1/11/06

Thanks everyone for the comments!

hannah164--by my molars being flared outwards I mean that instead of my teeth being shaped like a nice, symmetrical arch, my molars on one side are tipped outwards. So, when I bite down, most of my teeth line up, but on that one side my upper molars tilt out slightly, so they don't meet up with my bottom ones. Hopefully that makes sense!

I'm glad that you like my colours! My boyfriend says that from far away it looks like I ate a blue candy and stained my teeth

Jaws,

Your teeth look beautiful! I can't wait until my teeth straighten up, too. I love your turqoise ligs! My ortho doesn't have that color either. Good luck at your next adjustment!

Jen

I really love those turquoise ligs!