My first brace adjustment appointment

With the exception of the first few days, when I was regularly counting what percentage of my treatment time had passed, the time between having my brace fitted and my first adjustment appointment seems to have flown by.

Once the first ten days had passed I reached the point where, generally, I'm not aware of my braces. Some foods are difficult to eat and I'm keen to rinse my mouth out after eating, so I don't have food visibly stuck to my teeth, but generally it's been a fairly easy journey so far. I have one molar with a pointy edge, which can cause me some issues by banging on the bracket on my lower molar, but that's normally only for a day once every ten days or so, my teeth seem to learn quite quickly and shuffle so they're no longer knocking together.

I've not suffered anything like as much with mouth ulcers as I expected to. I wore wax virtually constantly on one back bracket as the wire was catching my cheek, I had one ulcer on the other side of my mouth next to the back bracket, and a couple on my bottom lip. However, Bonjela Complete Plus seems to be a magic fix. I apply it once and by the time it wears off, my mouth seems okay.

I've also had little reaction to my braces. I'd told some of my colleagues in advance, but when I turned up to work wearing them for the first time, they couldn't see them unless I bared my teeth. I guess they were expecting something much more noticable. I've had a couple of clients clearly spot there was something different about my mouth and I catch them looking at my mouth whenever I look away, but, apart from friends and family, no-one has mentioned them. I've been in a shop or the hairdresser a couple of times and been served by another brace wearer, but again, it goes unmentioned. I'm glad I didn't go for the more expensive option of hidden lingual braces, when no-one seems to comment on my ceramic ones which are on full display!

Anyway, my adjustment appointment was six weeks to the day after my brace was fitted. I'd been hoping that my bite would be corrected by this appointment, but it seems I was slightly over optimistic. My right upper incisor has managed to come over hte top of my lower tooth, but the left incisor is still tucked behind.

The appointment itself took about quarter of an hour. We started by talking about how things had gone, and what changes I was aware of. The orthodontist had my initial pictures on a screen so he could compare the 'then' and 'now'. He was pleased that they were moving so quickly and that half of my crossbite had been rectified. He was confident that the other side would also be resolved by my next appointment. I then had my wires, powerchains and ligatures changed. It was a little uncomfortable, with just one tooth that was a bit sore when he changed things over. He was keen to straighten out my two lower central incisors as I was clearly struggling to clean in between those, he gave them a good clean for me whilst my wires were off and hoped that they would be straight by the next appointment to make cleaning easier. It was nice to leave with clean, white wires and ligatures again. I'd not been too careful about what I ate, and seemed to have mostly got away with it, but the curry I'd had on one occasion had certainly left its mark on my ligatures!

My teeth are already looking much straighter, it's nice to be able to track the changes, and once my bite is corrected, it'll be a case of more minor adjustments to get them looking right cosmetically. Roll on my next appointment in six weeks when my crossbite should be a thing of the past!

  
Click here to read about my initial brace fitting appointment 

Click here to read about my next adjustment and see my progress