I went in to my ortho's office yesterday for my 2-month retainer checkup. Whenever I wear my retainers, I find that my midline is off. But when I take it off, my bite is back to normal. So my ortho took a look at them and noticed that I am biting into one of the wires, causing my teeth to be "off." So he trimmed a bit of the wires off. Now, my midline is lining up nicely, even with the retainers on.
We sat down for a 10 min chat, which is, by the way, the longest we ever talked...other than the initial consultation. He showed me the Xrays I took back in December. He told me that my lower front roots of my teeth have "shortened." In other words, I had tooth loss (at the roots) during the orthodontic process. He said I lost about 10% on the bottom. And on the top front, I lost about 5%. Great. Just Great. Now I have a chance to have my teeth fall off because my roots are shorter than before = less stable. This was definitely NOT something that I wanted to hear.
Actually I knew that something was wrong a while back because that part of my teeth kept on bleeding everytime I brushed. It's probably because I don't nearly floss enough when I had my braces. My bad. Anyhoo, I asked whether I will continue to lose the roots, and my ortho said no. I don't know about that. Maybe he's just lying, especially seeing how scared I was. Mann, and my stupid dentist didn't even see it and spot that. He's not that great. Sloppy.
My ortho also gave me the before and after photos I took. I'll post them up in the next entry.
Next appointment: June 10, 2008
