Braces Are Ruining My Face

[Allison]

I am a 29 year old woman who has had braces on (lingual upper, lower buccal) since late August. I got my bottom braces on first, then about a month later the top. I noticed fairly soon after that my face began to change negatively. My cheeks and temples have sunken in, my face has thinned considerably and appears long and narrow, I’ve developed jowls, among other changes I’m unhappy with. The whole thing has aged me considerably. When I brought this up with my orthodontist, he said this was not due to the braces because we only moved my teeth back a very small amount.

My orthodontist mentioned he is open to coming up with a new plan to make me happy, and that he can move my teeth forward a bit instead of continuing to push them back.

I am wondering if I should go through with a new plan to try and reverse the changes with braces or if I should just get my braces off early instead to stop things becoming worse.

My teeth weren’t even bad to begin with I wish I’d never done this.

[Lissalissak]

I’m so sorry, I’ve had braces negatively impact my face and it’s traumatic. How many millimeters back did your teeth go? You didn’t have extractions or IPR did you? I had about 1mm of IPR on my bottom teeth and my chin looks totally different now. I don’t know how this is possible. I’m done with treatment and I noticed right after the Invisalign buttons were removed so now I have to decide whether to have more treatment or live with it. I think I’m going to have to do something about it:

[Allison]

Thanks for your reply, and I’m sorry this is happening to you as well.

I met with my orthodontist a few weeks ago and he said they moved my teeth back a couple millimeters, but I asked again at my appointment yesterday and he said a fraction of a millimeter, so honestly I have no idea.

No extractions thankfully. Also he said he plans to do IPR but I said I won’t allow it.

It’s so frustrating how they don’t know what causes this so were left to figure it out ourselves. I just got the first set of custom wires on yesterday (been in stock wires only so far) and immediately regretted it, so requested the soonest possible appointment to potentially remove my braces entirely (soonest they can get me in is 3 weeks from now.) I’m hoping no new changes occur between now and then.

How long ago did you get yours off? And have you noticed any improvement since your treatment ended? I’m hoping my face will begin to return to normal once the braces are removed but I’m worried what’s done is done.

[Lissalissak]

In my experience a couple of millimeters is significant enough to make a big difference. If that I’m fact happened maybe you should give them a chance to correct it or find another ortho who will? I understand the desire to just get them removed though, but I’d hate for you to live with the negative outcome permanently when it could be fixed.

I had my Invisalign off a year ago, my chin looks extremely long since they retracted my teeth. I tried to go backwards on my Invisalign trays but it’s not really working and my ortho is adamant that she won’t move my bottom teeth forward. She says it would be malpractice. I know Dr. Hang in SoCal will do it for me but that probably means bringing my upper teeth forward more and I don’t know if my face can handle that.

Overall I have huge regrets about this.

[Humdan]

Sometimes it's best to leave things as they are if your ok with it.

[djspeece]

This seems to be fairly common as reported on this board, and I'd guess as an RN it's not directly due to the braces, but rather to transient changes in your bite and chewing patterns -- i.e., your "muscles of mastication" have atrophied (gotten smaller) over time because you are not chewing as hard, or possibly as often. In addition, it's possible that your dietary preferences have changed, and you may have lost some weight. I noticed some subtle changes as well, which promptly went back to normal once I was debraced. Best of luck to you!