tigerfan88

ORIGINALLY WRITTEN IN MARCH 2010:

So Monday was my second consultation with the original ortho I saw back in 2008. I liked him at the time, but couldn't afford to go forward with it. I called the office back a few weeks ago and was given an appointment of March 1st. Waiting so long disappointed me as I had hoped to get the braces done the first week of March.

I went to my appointment not expecting much. I saw the ortho and he basically said he still felt the same way--only a 10% chance of extraction being necessary despite the fact that my teeth are really, really crooked. I expressed the fact that I was ready to move forward, and to my surprise, he told me we could go ahead with putting in separators/spacers that same day.

After going over the payment plan with an assistant (much to my surprise and joy, he stuck with the same quoted price as before, even though it probably was higher now), I had all the initial work done. They did x-rays of my mouth, and then casts of my teeth. That was probably the most disgusting part of it, as the casts tasted like putty and gagged me a few times. Then they put on the separators. They put 7 of the 8 on without any problems and no pain. The 8th one, however, snapped off when they put it on. Let's just say, it wasn't pleasant but I supposed to be expected as my teeth are really crammed in. So they had to "floss" that last one in and all was well.

I am now set to get my braces on March 15, 2010. To say I am massively excited would be a huge understatement. This is literally something I've been looking forward to for years and it's amazing to think that in less than 2 years, I'll finally have the teeth I've wanted.

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I had thought having separators would be relatively easy and painless. Then I came home and read online that they were pretty darn painful. Still, I held out hope that it wouldn't be so bad.

Well, two days later, I can attest to the fact that it is painful......real painful for me. It feels like every single one of my teeth are aching, even those that aren't next to where my separators are. Eating is a chore as anything remotely hard makes the ache that much worse. I've heard people say that they lose weight with separators and braces for the first few days afterwards, and I definitely believe that.

So what am I doing to cope with the pain? Taking some tylenol, avoiding hard foods (and gum, as that's required), and trying not to chew very much. I've switched from eating chips, cookies and things of that nature to eating pudding, yogurt, and other soft foods. It sucks, but that's the price to pay to have good looking teeth.

In my next post, I will be posting before pictures. I'll be posting pictures at a 2 week interval from that point on, so that it'll be easy to see just how big of a difference having braces will make with my teeth.