Bad week

It has been a bad week for me since my 2nd adjustment. My mouth wall tissues are inflammed, so whenever I bite or chew or even talk, my teeth trap the tissues in-between. It feels almost like biting on your tongue, but 10x worse because the area is already inflammed. Talk about adding salt to the wound. The rear brackets are not only scraping the walls of my mouth, they are really painful on the gums. My gums where the rear brackets are so sensitive. They are all red and inflammed as well. I think the nurse might have pushed the brackets too far into my gums. I'm going to wait 1 more week and go back to the ortho if the swelling continues.

As you can imagine, it was really painful to eat during the past week, which is such a shame because it was Thanksgiving and I had about 3 dinners to go to. I still have a hard time chewing today. I've changed my diet back to softer foods such as soups, tofu, napa cabbage, and potatoes. I think I will have to go through those food for one more week, or so I hope.

2nd Adjustment

I went in bright and early today at 8am for my 2nd adjustment. The spacers didn't bother me as much as it did the last time. The spacers went off in no time, and I had to do those back molar bracket fittings. The nurse associates this procedure as finding a shoe among hundreds that fits without first knowing the shoe size. A couple of tries, but she found it. The worst part was having to "bite-close" and to force those brackets into the molars. I don't have a proper bite to begin with, so you can just imagine how hard it was to bite-close those brackets into the back molars. My teeth got so sore! They still are! I can barely chew on anything today. The rear brackets are also scraping against my teeth so I need to use wax.

My ortho fitted me with even thicker archwires. I was surprised when he said that the past 2 wires I had were only "training" wires. Now, it's more like the real thing. He told me that the good news is that my teeth moved a lot, and the bad news is that my teeth moved a lot. He said it while he was checking on my teeth. With my mouth open, I wasn't able to respond. I'm not really sure what that all mean, now that I come to think of it. I hope it's not all bad. I did notice that my lower teeth now look slanted. Is that the way it should be? My ortho already told me that my teeth will look worse than they do before, due to the fact that he is correcting my teeth based on what's going to happen in surgery.

My next adjustment is not going to be until January 20th! 9 weeks from now! My ortho said that the archwire will need 9 weeks to adjust because it's thicker. He also told me that from now on, my adjustments will be further apart because the thicker wires will need more time to adjust. I will eventually need 7 more wires. I got "bone" colored ligs this time. According to the nurse, this is the best color without major staining. I sure hope she's right. My next adjustment is 9 weeks later! The tooth-colored one that I got last time didn't work.

Pre-2nd Adjustment

I went to the Ortho today to put in spacers for my rear molars. On Monday, I will have 4 more rear brackets, in addition to the 4 I already have. The spacers are just what I remembered them to be, annoying. They don't hurt as much this time because I only have 4 this time, instead of 8 last time. They still feel like food stuck in between my teeth. It's hard holding back from flossing them out. I also got some sores on my upper right lips today. I'm not sure why that happened.

One thing I don't like about having braces is all those ortho appointments I need to go to. If I'm a kid going to school, I would love it. Having an ortho appointment would mean a legal excuse to skip classes. But now that I'm working and being as busy as I am, having to leave early or come in late to work become a nuisance. I make the appointment usually 6 weeks before the actual appointment and with my luck, I always seem to pick the day that end up being the busiest day of the month. Yeah. I try to plan around my known scheduled deadlines, but something always come up in between. Like today, I had to excuse myself from a meeting mid-way because I had to leave early for my appointment. I felt embarrassed.

Happy 2nd month!

I've reached my 2 month mark. I know there is a lot more months to go, but it's still a milestone for me. For the most part, I'm 90% used to my braces now. My teeth and gums are no longer sore. I am able to bite into certain food that I would have never attempted to a month ago. So there's definitely progress there. Speaking of progress, I don't notice much difference between my Oct 25 picture and where I am today. Doesn't seem like anything has changed. I guess my definition of change is the straightening of the archwire. But since it was already relatively straight on Oct 25, there isn't a whole lot of more straightening to do. Not that I know this for sure, but I think my next step is to change my bite and the way my upper and lower teeth "fit together." I'm impatient when it comes to these things. I wish everything can go faster.

By the way, I've already lost 6 pounds since I had my braces. I guess you could say 6 pounds less in 2 months. A lot of it has to do with my diet. I've been cautious of what I eat...not because certain foods are more "fattening," but because I tend to gear towards "easy-to-chew" foods, which means lots and lots of tofu. I love tofu, so I guess it all works out. I rarely drink coffee now because it stains my clear ligs. Instead I drink tea. So at the end of the day, I am eating and drinking a lot healthier, although not necessarily all by choice. I would love to eat pizzas and fried chicken wings, but because the massive amount of work I need to do to cut them up, etc I just give it up altogether.

Spacers on Friday .. Yuck.

Endless Sores

When I first got braces on, the metals scraped against the inside walls of my mouth day and night. Knowing that our body is usually very good at adjusting to changes, I tried hard not use any wax because I wanted my mouth to adapt and "immune" to the braces. I want my mouth to quickly develop the stronger tisses to withstand the pain. So, the sores came and went. But I just learned that you can never be done getting sores as long as you have braces on. I got my new adjustment last week and this week, I've already experienced multiple sores inside my mouth, in "new" spots. I guess when your brackets move, they scrape against new areas of the mouth. It's actually quite annoying. So, even if you think that your mouth is equipped to battle sores, it isn't. You'll never be done.