Self aligning/ligating braces journey

About a month ago, my mom randomly asked if I wanted to do braces. And yes ! I do!

Mine wasn't toooo bad. My boyfriend kept saying that my teeth are almost straight, only from the front though. I also cannot stand that single buck tooth on the top row and the crookedness on the bottom! 

Look how forward they are !!!

I have horse teeth ! T.T

After doing some searching, of course my favourite option was the Clear aligners, like Clearpath or invisalign. I mean who really prefers traditional braces if given the choice? It's so brutal looking and the brackets(?) will only further protrude my already horse-like front tooth. And imagine all the food that you have to remove from it after each meal. Gross. 

And since my mom is someone who goes to Malaysia rather frequently, she suggested we go to their dentist instead. After doing some, not alot, of research, I found this clinic in JB. Made an appointment with them on 5th Apr. Let's see how this will go ! I'm so excited! 

5th April: Dentist told me straight up that my teeth is too big for clearpath. Huuhuuu! He suggested Damon braces, braces that self-ligating one that will adjust with some sliding mechanism. He suggested I put 4 mini screws inside my gum as well, eek! On top of that, my X-ray revealed 4 wisdom tooth that is still hidden within my gums and needs to be allowed to come out or extracted to prevent infections/decay. DAMN THE WISDOM TEETH! Because of them, my estimated braces duration increased from 8months to 2.5 years. 

So my wisdom teeth (in yellow) mostly hidden. And the 4 teeth (X) that will be extracted to allow the growth of my wisdom teeth, 

Made another appointment on 17th April to do scaling and put on the braces. Im scared! 

16Apr: Excited and nervous for tomorrow! Crossing my fingers, will update again! 

17Apr 16 [Day 0]

     

First they did scaling and polishing for me and my teeth is super clean! The procedure was quite uncomfortable though. Then they took my teeth impression.

This is my brackets. Initially thought it's Damon system, but apparently not. Ah wells, similar system. 

They put this blue gel on my teeth, then got me to rinse it off. This one tasted really sour.

Now putting the brackets. 

Bracket up and cement inside, now I have to wait for 1.5 hour.

They put the cement (the chewing gum looking thing on my bottom row) and now when I bite down, all I feel its the cement. The new position of my jaw is quite foreign and uncomfortable. It's the same weird feeling when someone scratches metal cutleries across a porcelain plate. 

Still getting used to the look , haha so weird!

Wire up. At marybrown and can only eat porridge because the doctor say " You cannot chew, eat like a baby (for the next 3 months) ". So I bought a lot of baby cereal to snack on.

^And I can't chew because when I bite down (on the cement), none of my teeth is touching, So I can't grind any food and have to survive on liquidy food for the next 3 months. 

I better lose some weight. 46.8kg now. My next appointment is in 2 months, 26June. 

19 April 16 [Day 2]

Left (before), Right (After)

Alignment: Only 2 days after, I see a difference in my teeth! Not much, but there is. Especially the bottom row, my two front teeth is actually aligned, after 2 days ! I can feel my top protruding teeth slightly moved back as well. 

Pain: no pain like my friends who had traditional braces describe it to be (someone punched your teeth), I just feel tightness, which isn't that bad. Started drooling when I sleep tho :X

Food: I cannot eat anything that requires chewing, so I'm eating blended porridge, baby cereal, yoghurt, mashed banana for the past two days. Mostly baby cereal.

25 Apr 16 [Day 6]

Pain: I'm starting to get ulcers, not too bad, just one or two max, but it's annoying. 

Food: Started on soft food today! So glad I can eat. Problem is I am not chewing as much, I swallow food particles bigger, because I don't want to chew for too long. There's also alot of food stuck. It's super gross. Feel the need to gargle after each mouth. 

30 Apr 16 [Day 13]

Alignment: Slight movement, but I'm not expecting to move alot anymore since there's really not much space left honestly. 

Pain: My single front buck tooth hurtssss, but thankfully it only hurts when it's touched, so I'm leaving it alone. Wonder if it was because I tugged too hard while biting on a gummy.

Food: Getting more used to the food stucking situation. Every food I eat, 10% gets stuck in my mouth, it is very gross. Now I bring my listerine/toothbrush/toothpaste/interdental brush everywhere I go. 

Others: Also ! One end of my wire pop out, it didn't hurt, I only noticed it when i feeling my mouth for stuck food after brushing and it felt too loose. Checked and it came out. Asked a few of my friends and they said it's very common and I just have to push it back myself. which I did.

11 May 16 [Day 24]

16 May 16 [Day 29]

Okay, I wanted to rant about something about my teeth that wasn't very serious. BUT something happened and now I REALLY have something to blog about. 

So the rant is... Now that my protruding tooth is pretty aligned, I noticed that one side is slightly longer than my other front tooth. And everytime I close my mouth too fast, my bottom teeth will hit the single longer tooth and since it's still in the moving process, it is pretty sensitive. Sends tingling sensation up my gum everytime!! Ouchhh

And today! One of my worst fear came true. Brushed my teeth and the last bracket dropped out. EW. 

The wire is poking my gum, put cotton wool in to help cushion it because the wax they gave wasn't helping.... Made an appointment on thurs to get it fixed. Gosh it's not even a month yet!.

18 May16 [Day 31]

So enough is enough and I decided to clip the excess wire off. It's been rubbing against my cheek non stop and I saw it poked a hole into my mucous membrane, there's a teeny punctured bleeding hole. 

Cut off a good 7mm wire off the end, No longer pokes. 

Now for picture updates.

Very happy with the progress! I will be perfectly happy taking out my braces right now, LOL.

No more protruding horse teeth! And I love how my single protruding front tooth cannot be seen now from the other side. 

Face shape... not much difference except for the fact that I now smile like I have constipation. And I no longer have a "resting" smile that I used to like :( . 

19 May 16 [Day 32]

Got my loose bracket replaced and it is the WORST DECISION EVERRR. My dentist decided to replace my last bracket with a Molar Band (a.k.a Medieval torture device). 

The band itself is okay, but the two hook things (cleats) behind hurts like a bitch. Looks like hook but feels like spikes on my tongue. IT HURTS SO BAD! And the worst thing is that it doesn't even serve any purpose for me because I'm getting that teeth remove in 3 weeks, and the only reason they put this is because my bracket fell off. Argh. 

The wax does not work! I was so desperate to cushion it, I tried cotton wool, tissue paper, kitchen towel and the most ridiculous one was my Samsung silicone earpiece bud. The earpiece bud actually works quite well during rest! But once I start eating, it falls out. And it kind of stinks after awhile in the mouth... so BOO. 

5 June 16  [Day 49] TOOTH EXTRACTION

Was very nervous going to the dentist, and he recommended to extract 2 teeth but I told him I wanted to extract 4 at one go, to get it done and over with. Each teeth cost about 150-200rm, depending on how hard it was extracting it out. 

What they did.

They first put a some gel on my gum, then the local anesthesia. THAT SHIT HURTS. Especially the roof palette ones. Like seriously brace yourself for that. But after that, everything's good. You wait for 10mins, then everything goes numb. And your worries are over.

Your lips will feel like the weirdest piece of soft flesh on your mouth. At one point I kept trying to spit out something that was in mouth but it turns out to be my roof palette. The tooth extraction itself shouldn't hurt at all. It didn't hurt for mine. Just pressure, pulling and pressing. I didn't even know when my teeth is out. He was like "Done!" 

My dentist was really cool, he even let me snapchat my teeth midway!

NOTE: Eat a good meal before.The tooth extraction doesn't hurt but if you're like me, who gets headache easily whenever there's "trauma" (roller coaster rides/ crying/ sun), just pop the painkiller in, because my head was throbbing like crazy. My mouth didn't hurt as bad as my headache at any point. It was just sore. 

Picture of all my teeth before throwing them away.

Wound at Day 5 after extraction. 

I was super paranoid about getting food stuck in the "holes". For the first probably 15 days, I would rinse rinse rinse rinse after every meal and made sure there is no food inside (because there will be). Then listerine afterwards. The last thing you want is an infection on those already sore wounds. 

Wound at Day 43 after extraction. 

Yay! Gone through everything without an infection and the wounds are pretty much healed. Food still gets stuck there occasionally, but its easier to get it out. 

17 July 16 [Day 91] Orthodontic mini-screws

In my case, it is to pull my teeth backward instead of forward.

                                                                  

Went in to the dentist thinking they're going to to just do a check-up, but Noooo. Apparently they are putting screws in my gum. It's actually better when I have no mental preparation and just go and get it done. 

They will put local anesthesia in, NO ROOF PALETTE ones, yay! It didn't hurt that bad. Once the anesthesia kicks in, there isn't much to feel during the "screwing part". The tightness only comes once they put the rubber bands. Feels like the same tightness after putting braces.  

I was told NOT to brush the screws, and just use my shower head to "wash" it to remove debris, but I haven't done that because my mouth is still sore. Just been listerine-ing it after food. Speaking of food, food gets stuck TWICE as much now in between the rubber bands. 

4 screws with 4 rubber bands attached to it. 

And there's my screw. Day 2 hurts as much as having braces on for the first time, not too bad. 

11 Nov 16 [Day 209 of braces] First sign of wisdom teeth 

After months of waiting my wisdom tooth decided to finally pop out! 

[Bottom Right]

I kept feeling like there's dirt on my gum. Came home and brushed the area vigorously but it just refuse to come out. Finally decide to poke it with my finger and OMG it's calcified!! It's my tooth growing out! 

[Bottom Left]

Out of curiously, I checked the left gum as well and I could see the teeth underneath a thin layer of gum, it was super visible when I pressed on it! 

25 Nov [Day 222 of braces] Orthodontic mini-screws update

It's been more than 4 months since I've gotten the mini-screw and rubber bands to push in my protruding horse teeth and I want to do an update on its progress. 

Had to change/tighten the rubber bands every 6 weeks, thus, so far, I had only changed/tightened them twice. 

Before and after mini-screws

The distance between my upper and lower jaw has increased (shown by the red line) and I think that gives a better profile. Although the difference is very slight, I'm glad that there IS difference and my side profile will not be as flat. 

4/Jan [Day 262 of braces] Wisdom teeth update

[Bottom right]

[Bottom Left]

11 Jan 17 [Day 269 of braces]Orthodontic mini-screws update 2

About six months of having orthodontic screws in. Seeing this made me really glad I chose to do braces/ screws. My profile doesn't look as flat/squashed anymore. The screws pulled my lower jaw in, and it made my nose look higher now that my chin is pulled back. And now I have a little "pout", when last time, I had a bit of what looks like an under bite.

Also, the dentist said that this will be the last time I'm changing rubber bands! Woot woot~ I'm graduating from mini-screws!     

Now I just have to let my wisdom teeth grow all in. I'll write another separate post on the growing teeth once I officially no longer have to change anymore of my jaw. 

14 May 17 [Day 393 of braces] Another orthodontic screw

Went for our usual appointment. 

Dentist: Very nice! Just need to push in a *lil* bit in and next time we can remove the cement, let's hope we can get this (braces) done by this year 

YES! Music to my years. But he did screw another orthodontic screw 1 cm away from my old screw... WHY T.T.  Btw they really just use a screw driver to manually screw the "nail" in, but of course it doesn't hurt because they'll give you local anaesthesia. It still gives me headache every time though. 

The dentist had also placed a bracket on my wisdom teeth and aligned them together. 

2 July 17 [Day 393 of braces] Changing to thickest wire

Dr Ashawi changed to the thickest wire and replaced my old rubber band with a new one, but rubber band is kept at the same "tightness" as the previous one. He said I had maintained my gums well because there's not infection of orthodontic screws which makes his job easier. 

Also he say he'll file down the cement on the next trip. 

12 Nov 17 [Day 575 of braces] Last appointment !

Dr Ashawi removed the block of cement. 

"I promise to remove your braces by end of the year right? Next time round you come , we will remove it" 

Woohoo~ Can't wait to remove it, one week before X'mas too ! 

22 Nov 17 [Day 592 of braces] Current update

[Side View]

No more underbite! 

[Front view] 

No more horse teeth. My friends were also saying my face is now less squarish.

17 Dec 17 [Day 610 of braces] Removing my braces !!!

Total: 1 year, 8 months

 No more braces ! 

Here's a before and after braces (and before and after creating a higher double eyelid with tape).

I have no time to write on my experience as Im currently doing my dissertation right now, but

http://dayre.me/Thewintersecret/fNWNe4sKDX

is a link to my Dayre entry on the day I removed my braces. I will basically be transferring the same info once Im free.