My journey (expander, then braces)

[Featheryy1221]

You're making tremendous progress! I thought my teeth moved fast but your story is inspiring.

Thanks Kevinr! I saw your pictures and you've had such a substantial amount of progress in only 5.5 months! I guess we're the lucky ones with fast moving teeth. Though admittedly mine didn't move a whole lot this past month, so I'm not bothering putting a photo up. lol.

[Featheryy1221]

So I've been getting comments from people I know lately on how straight my teeth are getting and how nice my smile is looking. Which, for someone that hated their smile for years, it's crazy to hear. I've never believed people when they said before braces that I looked good and that my smile was nice. But now I'm starting to feel a lot more confident, which is great for someone that's had terrible self confidence for years. I decided to see how different my teeth looked from a photo from a couple days ago compared to various stages. It's really amazing to see, and I can't believe how much things have changed already! and I still have like 8 months to go (or more in case my ortho's estimations wrong)!

[NeilH]

They are looking absolutely amazing! Great progress.

[Anna5]

Beautiful, you have made AMAZING progress!! I am so happy that you feel so much more confident now!

[Matilda]

Very, very nice!

[Featheryy1221]

Thanks guys for your kind comments.

Today was an adjustment appointment and it was probably the worst one I've had. After finishing class early this morning, I rushed over to the ortho, almost late to my appointment due to traffic. When I got in, there were no current patients, just a ton of assistants everywhere and a consultation appointment in the other room. I sat down in the chair and my ortho looked at me right away. After telling me to open, and close, and bite, he keeps looking in my mouth puzzled and then he finally checks my record and says to the assistant, "Has she had her wisdom teeth out?" The assistant asks me, to which a reply, "no, I havent." Then my ortho's like, "why haven't you gotten those out? we needed them out like yesterday."

Are you freaking serious right now?!

Because I specifically remember telling them after getting my expander out that I was supposed to get my wisdom teeth out. To which he brushed off like, "we can do that later, whatever." LIKE REALLY. Ugh.

I was literally not expecting his reaction to be like that, so I just reply something like, ".. you told me that I could wait...." Which he ignores and just is like, "well you need them out now. you should have gotten them out months ago. Now your treatment is going to be longer, and I can't band these bottom teeth."

<-- basically me on the inside at this point.

So then he leaves and he gives the assistant instructions. He's like, "have this girl do the ligs after you fit bands." And I'm like, what. I figure out, this girl's his daughter, who has had no orthodontic training from what it sounded like. In fact, she wants to work with animals.

So this girl does my bottom ligs, which took like 20 minutes, not even kidding. Then I have to get bands fitted on my 2nd molars on the top, which hurt like crazy. Then the ortho comes by and checks them and puts them in.

Then the girl with no training has to put ligs on the top too.
Finally after an hour and 10 minutes, my appointment is done. So I go to the front desk to set up my next appointment, and I'm told by the nice assistant that schedules appointments that basically this is the last appointment until I get my wisdom teeth removed. I think she could tell I was overwhelmed because she asked me If I'm in school, to see if that will affect when I get my wisdom teeth out. And then tells me that if I cant do it until thanksgiving break it's okay, and if I need to save up for the wisdom teeth removal, I can talk to them and hold off payments for my braces.

Ugh.

It was awful. I was an emotional mess after leaving. Mainly because I don't want my treatment time to be longer. I want these off. And trying to find a day to get my wisdom teeth out is going to be difficult, because I don't have two days off in a row. Like with my classes they're all spread out, so I'll have to miss one or two of them.

Blah.

Sorry for the ranting guys. I'm not even sure that all this makes sense and I apologize for typos if there were any.

Hope everyone else is having a better time than I am right now.

[oldfart]

Wasn't there a written plan by your ortho that was reviewed with you prior to treatment? Something major like teeth removal should have been part of that.

I can completely understand your frustration.

[Featheryy1221]

Wasn't there a written plan by your ortho that was reviewed with you prior to treatment? Something major like teeth removal should have been part of that.

I can completely understand your frustration.

Yes. He mentioned wisdom teeth removal at my appointment where I got my mold made for my expander last September. He told me I could either get my wisdom teeth out right then before starting treatment, or I could wait to get them out until after my expander was taken out (but before getting braces on). I decided on waiting to get them out until after my expander was taken out, because I had just paid tuition for my school and just paid the initial payment for my braces.
But like I said, he didn't want me to get my wisdom teeth out after I got the expander out and he just said, "we can do that later in your treatment."

So frustrating.


On another note, I ended up calling the oral surgeon today and getting a consultation for October 14th. Whoo-hoo.

[Nozzelnut]

Maybe things are moving a little faster than he anticipated?

Try not to get too frustrated over the small things. It will work out.

[Featheryy1221]

Maybe things are moving a little faster than he anticipated?

Try not to get too frustrated over the small things. It will work out.

Yeah, maybe. I don't know.I think it's because he doesn't seem to always look at patients records. They should have known I still had my wisdom teeth. There should have been a note there and they should have told me last appointment to get them out. He just has so many patients at once and so many offices, I just think he's so busy that he can't keep track.

I'm mostly frustrated because I saw this coming. Lol.

[parsleysage]

Ahhh, I'm so sorry. I can definitely understand why that's frustrating. I remember watching a YouTube braces journey where she said the ortho did IPR between a few teeth then the next appointment was like OMG WHY IS THERE A GAP THERE and she was like... umm... you put it there! And she said in the same appointment that they forgot how she had been wearing her elastics and supposedly had told her the wrong way the time before. Sounds like you had a similar day. Sometimes I think it's due to the business model - banks of 8-10 chairs in the same room and the ortho sees 4-5 patients at a time. I'm sure we all get mixed up.

At any rate, I'd be pissed at the ortho, AND mad about 30+ minutes of adding ligs, too!

You've had wonderful progress so far, and I hope that you can get the wisdom teeth ordeal straightened out soon. Keep us posted!

[Featheryy1221]

Ahhh, I'm so sorry. I can definitely understand why that's frustrating. I remember watching a YouTube braces journey where she said the ortho did IPR between a few teeth then the next appointment was like OMG WHY IS THERE A GAP THERE and she was like... umm... you put it there! And she said in the same appointment that they forgot how she had been wearing her elastics and supposedly had told her the wrong way the time before. Sounds like you had a similar day. Sometimes I think it's due to the business model - banks of 8-10 chairs in the same room and the ortho sees 4-5 patients at a time. I'm sure we all get mixed up.

At any rate, I'd be pissed at the ortho, AND mad about 30+ minutes of adding ligs, too!

You've had wonderful progress so far, and I hope that you can get the wisdom teeth ordeal straightened out soon. Keep us posted!

Exactly. It doesn't help that he has like 5 offices, so I know it's impossible for him to keep track of each patient. They just need to write things down or have a better system in place. Glad I'm not alone in having that experience though.

I was super mad about how long it took to get the ligs changed. lol. They were really lucky I didn't have work after the appointment. The girl said something like, "We should have the patients sign a waiver before I do this, because I have no clue what I'm doing." The ortho assistant and I didn't say anything. Probably because we both thought the same thing. lol.

And thanks, girl! I haven't had much progress lately, but we'll see, they engaged the coil spring on the bottom, so maybe things there will start moving. The wisdom teeth ordeal should work out. Hopefully they'll have a surgery appointment date open very shortly after my consultation. I'm more nervous about it now, because I'm not good with medical things at all (i have anxiety issues) and surgery freaks me out. But it's gotta be done.

[Featheryy1221]

I had my wisdom teeth removal consultation this morning. I was super nervous when I first got there (they took my blood pressure and it was high, as usual with me when it comes to medical things). But once I met my oral surgeon, I calmed down. My surgeon is super nice and knew I was nervous so he was talking to me about school and other things, then started talking about the procedure in between so my anxiety would go down. He explained everything in simple terms and used my x-ray as a visual aid to make sure I got everything. He recommended "laughing gas" first to help keep me calm and then IV sedation. He told me I'd need a few days to recover from surgery but I could probably get back to school after a few days, mainly I couldn't if I was still taking high prescription pain meds.

I scheduled the date for Nov 25 at 11 am.
There was an opening on Nov 18, but it was in the afternoon. Idk. I may switch it later today if I still can. Not really sure though.
I'm pretty bummed that its going to be so close to thanksgiving that I get them out. :/

[Featheryy1221]

Today's goodbye to wisdom teeth day!

Whoo!
Currently feeling anxious about it and am going to have to listen to my calming music and keep positive thoughts and remember people's advice not to worry.
I'm also starving already. Lol.
Here's hoping everything goes smoothly.

[retainerjoe]

hope things go well today, watch out for dry socket