Through my last couple adjustments I've questioned the associated pain (or in this case lack thereof) that comes with an adjustment. This is my third adjustment since getting the lower braces back on in Jan. Every time I am bracing for the soreness that I got with my adjustments with my first ortho, and it never happens. After yesterdays adjustment I do feel slight soreness, but it's really negligible and absolutely nothing compared to the hell I went through after some of the adjustments through the first round of ortho. During the adjustment yesterday I commented that I leave the office pleasantly surprised and have experienced no significant pain yet. My pain was so bad the first time around that I couldn't even let my teeth rest together, let alone think about eating. I was even taking vicodin and it didn't do anything for me. The doc and the assistant gave me a "that's not right" look and mentioned, "well, we try not to hurt our patients here." Sweet. Glad to know. So, I am still not sure if this is the way it was supposed to be the first time around, or if it's the fact that this ortho is moving things purposefully slow and therefor I am not getting the pain of major/quick movements. I am leaning towards the fact that it probably wasn't supposed to be that much of a severe ouchy the first time around and was a red flag that my teeth were being moved too hard and too fast.
I am finally upgraded to a thicker wire that actually moves the teeth. The last two wires were the thin/bendy ones that can't even be cut flush at the last bracket and instead have to be bent and looped at the end. This wire is cut flush at the back, which I love. I hated that loop that hung out the back. Just more area for food to get stuck and it's harder to clean. They put my power chain back on and I think tightened it up across the space that needs to be closed up front. I swear I think I see it's already a little smaller, but it's such a small change that I have to question if I am really seeing it or not. I am so used to waking up the next day and seeing a huge change in my teeth. Another red flag. I am pretty sure you aren't supposed to walk out of the ortho's office and within hours notice a space opening up or closing significantly. This was from a post last year when my ortho put in a spring to put a space between my two front teeth so he could work on the bonding in between. The one picture is right after the spring got put on, and the other one is just 6 or 8 hours later:
I am finally upgraded to a thicker wire that actually moves the teeth. The last two wires were the thin/bendy ones that can't even be cut flush at the last bracket and instead have to be bent and looped at the end. This wire is cut flush at the back, which I love. I hated that loop that hung out the back. Just more area for food to get stuck and it's harder to clean. They put my power chain back on and I think tightened it up across the space that needs to be closed up front. I swear I think I see it's already a little smaller, but it's such a small change that I have to question if I am really seeing it or not. I am so used to waking up the next day and seeing a huge change in my teeth. Another red flag. I am pretty sure you aren't supposed to walk out of the ortho's office and within hours notice a space opening up or closing significantly. This was from a post last year when my ortho put in a spring to put a space between my two front teeth so he could work on the bonding in between. The one picture is right after the spring got put on, and the other one is just 6 or 8 hours later:
And then this was probably just 24-48 hours after with the gap in full force:
This is definitely NOT the speed that the gap I have now is closing. If it closed at the speed things opened/closed with my old ortho, it would have been closed a long time ago. But again, that is probably too fast. No wonder why my front teeth took on so much damage and have severe root resorption. And I still am not even sure why he had to open this huge gap and do the work that he did in the first place. He basically did this just to refinish the bonding on my front teeth. Just one of the things I don't understand and regret now that it caused so much damage to my front teeth. Anyway, I always left my first ortho's office just thinking my teeth moved REALLY fast and not that he was cranking down on them abnormally hard. The assistants used to tell me that too, that my teeth moved really fast. After every adjustment I was in there the next day or a couple days later getting the back of my wires snipped because my teeth would shift so quickly that the wire would start shifting and the excess poke out the back. I can feel a smidge poking out the back after yesterdays adjustment, but its negligible. Again, probably was a red flag before. I am definitely looking forward to not having to stop in to the orthodontists office as much to get things snipped. Looking forward to finally seeing this space close. Hopefully I can get an updated estimate on surgery when we start to see progress with the gap. The doc did quickly mention something about "we'll see what happens with this and when we can get the upper braces on," or something along those lines, but I didn't prod for more information on that. I don't want to be the patient who annoys the doc with "are we there yet? When is XX going to be?" I mentioned it in another post, but I have a sneaky suspicion I am going to be surgery ready before Jan 2016. I've even tentatively scheduled it on my work calendar for Dec 2015...and I wonder if it could be as soon as November. Hopefully not as soon as Oct as I have some trips planned that month. Not really the holiday present I wanted, but I'll take it to just finally get through this and hopefully be done with everything sooner rather than later.
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