What You Expect Isn't Always What You Get

September 26th, 2007- Today was retainer pick up day. :) I belong to a website called Archwired.com and I have been admiring the retainers of other people, expecting that mine would be similar in style. I was surprised. My top retainer has a bite plane built in to open my bite a tad more and it has a special spring in it too. There are small bends in the wire to do some minor adjustments, too. I was most surprised by the clear acrylic covering the front of the wire. My bottom retainer just sort of sits over my front 6 teeth. There is no anchor to the molars because they need to settle. I go back in 2 months and the doc was mumbling something about making new essix retainers for daytime. All in all, it was a great visit, and now I have the cool sparkly purple retainer with a cat on it...lol.

Before and After

Just a brief photo comparison. I will post more photos when the ortho takes his for the records. I will also post pictures of my retainers. :)

An Early Birthday Surprise

Monday, September 10, 2007- 31 Months.... I was scheduled today to get my wires cut and bite block taken out in preparation for getting my braces off on the 26th. So, I thought it was going to be a normal appointment. The doc came over to see me and he started cutting, or so I thought, until one of my brackets fell into my lap and I said "Liss bwachet few owt." (His fingers were in my mouth...lol. :) ) Then I realized that all of my brackets had come off. I suddenly felt slimy. To my surprise, the braces came off today, two weeks early! He said there is some minor tweaking to be done, but retainers will do that.

After the braces came off, the tech had to get the glue off, so she took out the drill and started polishing away. After that, I got to brush my teeth for the first time as a normal person since February of 2005. I smiled in the mirror and I thought my teeth looked huge. I was also relieved that there were no white marks on them- a reward for good hygiene for 2 1/2 years. My gums are rather tender though. Several of my brackets were jammed pretty close to the gumline, so I was not surprised that they looked a little inflamed and sore. The doc says that will go away in a week or two with good brushing.

After brushing, I sat through 4 impressions- Two top and two bottom. I am getting essix retainers for daytime and hawleys for night time. For those of you who don't know what they are... essix are clear like invisilign trays... hawleys are the typical retainers with the metal bar over the teeth. The impressions weren't so bad this time around. I didn't feel like I was going to gag. I raised a concern to the doc today about my playing the clarinet and having to wait two and a half weeks for my retainers. Playing puts a lot of pressure on the teeth. He is going to make temporary retainers for me and I pick them up on Wednesday. :)

So, after we were all done, the doc presented me with a bottle of champagne, gum and a certificate of completion...lol. That was pretty cool. My next appointment is on Wednesday to pick up my temporary retainers and then I go on the day was I was supposed to be debanded to pick up my real retainers. I am very happy and excited. :)