My Suffering With Braces
Disclaimer
This is a list of downsides and/or negative side effects I've experienced during my orthodontic treatment of traditional braces. This is not a list of every downside that you can possibly experience during braces treatment, it's only a list of what I've personally experienced.Disclaimer
If you'd like to learn more about the science of your teeth:
Understanding my treatment
As it currently stands, I'm doing about a two year treatment plan. I'm about 3 or so months into my treatment, maybe a bit more. In my treatment, we're using traditional metal braces with elastics. I currently get my wire tightened about every 3 weeks. I have/had an overbite with crowding and abnormal eruptions of both of the K9 teeth. Visible crowding was worse on the bottom teeth. I had two premolars extracted for this treatment, to pull down the K9 teeth into place, but have not had any other teeth extracted and I don't believe I will have any more extracted from what we've discussed. I have all of my adult teeth besides those two premolars, which means my wisdom teeth are still in tact. I have a narrow upper arch, AKA my maxilla is narrow. My lower arch is also narrow. If the braces treatment does not make enough change in regards of spacing in my mouth, I may get further surgery to fix those issues. I pay out of pocket for this treatment and it's about $3,000 USD. I've spent maybe $200 USD for at-home products.Issue One: Don't Go to a Specialist
This might sound counter-intuitive, and in a way it is. Visit an experienced orthodontics office, but do not go to an orthodontics office where their primary specialty is doing braces. They're not going to help you with ANYTHING else. Yeah, they're really good at doing braces, but it's not worth it long term. I went to an office where their primary and only focus is braces, and they wouldn't extract my teeth, they wouldn't prescribe any pain meds, they won't clean the teeth between treatments, scheduling to get the wire taken off temporarily is more of a pain, etc. Go to a dentist office that has an orthodontics specialist in house. Please.Issue Two: Teeth Extraction is Weird
The tooth extraction itself doesn't hurt too much, as I'm sure you'd be told. It's true, the actual act of the tooth extraction is not very painful. If your teeth are super crowded, at most it'd feel a bit tight and kind of weird when they wiggle it, but it should not hurt. What feels really weird and/or I may even describe as painful is the injections they use prior to the tooth extraction.They inject it into your gums and into the arch, which is a very unique and weird experience. If you have never had it done, it's a bit hard to describe - But it's what you expect. You feel a sharp piece of needle slide into your arch and then you feel a sudden pressure when they inject whatever it was that was inside of the needle into your arch. And they do this several times depending how many teeth that's going to be extracted. In my case, they also rubbed a topical cream of sorts onto my gums as well. Which tingled at first but otherwise was fine.
I was not told about the injections prior - I was told I'd be numbed, but I was not told how I'd be numbed. When I got teeth pulled last, I was a child and they used some kind of gas. The injections took me a bit by surprise, but it makes sense if you think about it. I'd rather have that good shit then the weak shit, y'know? If you have a phobia of needles or anything else, you should talk to your dentist and see if there's an alternative. It does hurt to get them done, but not insanely so. It's mainly uncomfortable with how they prop your mouth open and how they wiggle inside of your mouth. I feel like it's worth it to get the injections.
Another thing is, I was told bleeding should stop after a few hours. For me it lasted closer to 6 hours. Maybe even 8. I had to sleep with a towel on my cheek so the blood would go onto the towel instead of my bedding. Gross, but true. I'm not on any medicine that causes blood thinning or anything, so I'm not sure why I bled for so long. I got a lot of gauze from the store and I kept replacing it. The gums also hurt and become sensitive for about the next 24 hours of the teeth extractions. I did not have gum disease at the time of extraction, so if you do have gum disease of any kind, the healing process might hurt a bit more or last longer.
If you're getting your premolars extracted like I did, one thing I was not aware of is how weird your sinuses are going to feel for a while afterwards. It almost feels like something is 'wrong' with your face at first. It's a pressure thing, if I had to take a guess. It makes sense once you think about it, but nobody told me I was going to experience this when I was getting them extracted. At first, I thought something might've gone wrong just from how unexpected it was, but when I looked into it, it seems like a common occurrence.
Issue Three: The Pain Didn't Go Away
One thing everyone who's ever had braces will tell you - the pain will eventually go away. In my case, that's only kind of true. Most people say that when you first get braces put on, the pain will go away in a few days. For me, it lasted closer to a week. It hurt so bad that I had to be on soft foods for the entire week, and that was before my teeth were extracted.I actually do have a high pain tolerance - not in the sense I don't feel pain easily, but my response to pain requires me to enter a high pain threshold before I respond to it. I'm not sure if it's because it's a unique type of pain that it caused me to struggle a lot longer than I would've otherwise, or what. But just because you tolerate pain easily, it does not mean you'd tolerate this kind of pain. I attempted to rawdog it for a few days and I just couldn't.
What I ended up doing was going to my local drug store (In this case it was CVS) and I got an oral anesthetic. It was labelled as Benzocaine 20%. It was in a tiny glass bottle and I used q-tips to rub the medicine across the gums. This liquid helped me SO much during the first week of pain. I suggest it heavily.
The pain did eventually die down, but I still experience pain randomly. Some nights are worse than others. I guess it's when the teeth shift slightly. It's not a constant pain 24/7, but once I get a sharp pain, it normally lasts for hours for about two days. Eating normally hurts real bad during this random spike of pain, so I always have soft food for the days I'm feeling like a wuss. So even when the pain is gone, expect it to come back occasionally.
Issue Four: Your Bracket Will Break
slide my front teeth across the item in question (e.g., corn on the cob, etc). I'm very careful to eat with my actual teeth and not onto the brackets, and I try to chew slightly open (when I'm at home of course, I chew with my mouth closed in public) to prevent my teeth slamming into my lower brackets.
It didn't matter how careful I was, my bracket kept breaking. At first I didn't understand why, but I later realized it was happening in my sleep. I did not realize I grind my teeth in my sleep until I got braces. Because of my overbite, my teeth never overlapped, and so I had no visual indication of grinding (like worn down teeth). At first I tried to do a mold-able/boiled mouth guard that I got from Walgreens, and then I was told by my orthodontics not to do that. She said to avoid boiled guards at all costs. I then went to Walmart and got an adjustable one. This one actually works pretty good for my needs. I haven't had any issues with it and I've been using it for about a week or two now. It's the 'SleepRight Ultra Comfort Dental Guard.
It's frustrating to have your bracket keep popping off even though you're being careful about it. So assume by default that at one point in your treatment, it will eventually pop off. You can't account for everything that's going to happen, so admit the defeat now. I'm fairly early in my treatment, so it popping off is more of an inconvenience at the moment.
Issue Five: Chipped Teeth
You will probably chip your teeth. I had perfectly smooth teeth, and then during treatment I noticed I had a chipped front tooth. I have no idea how or when this happened. I didn't even notice. This actually upset me greatly, because the whole point of the treatment was to make my teeth look better and now my teeth are being dinged with ugly ass dents and chips. I actually had to calm down from how upset I got when I first saw it in the mirror one morning. It was not a dramatic or super noticeable chip, but when you compared it to the rest of my perfectly smooth teeth, it felt super noticeable to me.There's not much I'm going to do to fix it until after my treatment is completed. I'm going to have to look into bonding and see if that's an option.
I have to make it clear just how careful I am and how I did not even notice this happened. I only noticed it when I was brushing my teeth because I check my braces and teeth every morning. I sincerely don't know what I could say that would prevent this from happening in the future, because I don't even know when or how this happened. I assumed it happened while I was eating.
Issue Six: A Slave
You will be a slave to your braces. In my opinion, at least. I had good oral hygiene before braces, but now I spend a huge amount of time maintaining my oral hygiene. It's very easy to give in and be lazy, but I go one day not brushing before bed and I notice it very easily the next morning. You're meant to brush your teeth after every meal, but I just noticed this wasn't super sustainable for my situation. So I use a Waterpik after every meal/snack and I will brush my teeth before bed and in the morning. I'm going to break down my routine.- Morning & Before Bed:
- 1. Waterpik the gums between your teeth, inside of the gum-line, underneath the wires, on the sides of the brackets, and on the front of the brackets.
- 2. Use mouthwash afterwards and then spit it out after swishing it around for 60 seconds. I use alcohol free mouthwash because I'm a pussy.
- 3. Brush your gums -> your gum-line -> behind the brackets on the bottom (angled upwards towards the bracket) -> the bottom of your teeth -> brush on top of the wire directly -> the top of your teeth -> behind the brackets on top (angle the toothbrush towards the bracket). Then brush behind your teeth -> the gum-line from behind -> The top of the teeth itself where you chew. Afterwards I then brush the roof of my mouth -> the space underneath my tongue and underneath the tongue itself -> the sides of my tongue -> the top of my tongue -> the back of my tongue.
- Brush your teeth with a bristle that is not soft (Medium / hard). If you use a soft bristle, it will unironically do nothing. It doesn't matter if you think you got the perfect technique, it won't work. I tried. Only use soft bristle for when you first got them so your gums won't hate you, but afterwards, no soft bristles.
- I brush my top teeth for two minutes and then the bottom teeth for two minutes. I set a timer for this.
- After Food / During The Day:
- 1. Waterpik the gums between your teeth, inside of the gum-line, underneath the wires, on the sides of the brackets, and on the front of the brackets. Make sure you dislodge any food you have.
- 2. Use mouthwash afterwards and then spit it out after swishing it around for 60 seconds.
- I use bottled water whenever possible, I will sometimes use tap water if I have no choice but this is rarely the case. I swish water around in my mouth for 60 seconds and then spit it into the grass outside.
- I also carry around a toothpick to dislodge stubborn food.
- I also own a travel toothbrush in my car and I have a spare one at home in case I need to put it into a travel bag.
The products I use are:
- Waterpik Ultra Water Flosser with 10 Settings, 6 Tips,
- Any brand manual toothbrush that is either medium or hard bristles,
- Any brand traditional string floss and a floss threader,
- Any brand brace dental picks (not fond of them to be honest, but I still own a pack),
- Any brand interdental picks,
- CVS Health Dental Tool Kit,
- Any Crest Pro Health toothpaste,
- Any brand alcohol free dye free mouthwash,
- Any brand travel toothbrush and case, keep one in the car and one at home,
- Any brand toothbrush cap (to protect the toothbrush when I'm not using it - daily use),
- CVS Health Oral Anesthetic, Benzocaine 20%,
- CVS Health Dentist Strength Temporary Lost Filling,
- SleepRight Ultra Comfort Dental Guard.
Issue Seven: It's Not Over
And this shit will take years to complete.I do think the end result will be worth it, but if you want quick and easy results, this is might not be the treatment for you. It depends on your individual treatment plan, obviously, but it's still something to keep in mind. People made it seem like braces are 'easy', and while they're definitely not 'hard', you still dedicate a lot of your time and money to them.
If someone were to ask me if I think the braces have been worth it so far, I would say yes. I already see the results and I'm already happy with what I see so far. I think the 'downsides' are not as dramatic as I made it out to be, but it's still note worthy.
Even when the braces come off, I will have to wear a retainer for... well, forever, I guess. It's not a big deal and I actually like the idea of the removable retainer, but it's something to be aware of if you're not aware already. I was surprised at how many people did not know braces does not create forever results.
