Well it’s been slightly longer than a week really but of course there’s no movement in my teeth anyway so there’s no great before and after photos to compare! I admit that my cheeks are getting used to things more and I only use the wax on the front parts where my lips rub on the brackets all day when i’m talking. I’m back at work again so I’m talking to clients all day and I do get sore.

Basically no-one cares. I don’t mention it to my clients even though i’m still lisping because I figure that they can just assume that’s my normal voice and if they already know me from multiple appointments then most of them don’t care anyway. I learnt ages ago that people are not really looking at you- they are far to busy worrying about themselves. People spend HOURS choosing glasses and worrying about if people are going to like the gold sides or the silver ones but I know for a fact that people don’t notice anyway!! When people have been wearing glasses for 20 yrs and they finally go home in contact lenses they are disheartened to discover that their friends and family haven’t noticed that they don’t have their glasses on! Of course if you have something really obvious going on like teeth missing, a wildly roving lazy eye, or a badly see-through underwear moment then people will make note, but glasses and braces don’t feature on the radar of most. My set up at the moment is not obvious anyway as I have yet to have the ‘train-track’ sections put on but I have not been remotely self conscious  about smiling or laughing and having my metal mouth noticed- because 90% of the time it won’t be! The only people who do notice are those who have been there before and those people are always happy as larry to sympathise with you and share some stories.

So Smile On my braced friends 🙂

Well the Rack has been on for a few days now and to be honest it’s not tooooo bad! My gums are still suffering a bit but the wax helps that a lot and i’ve even stopped putting wax on some of the brackets as my cheeks are starting to get used to things. My speech is as bad as ever and I still sound like Daffy Duck so i’m not sure how i’m going to get used to that- I just can’t get my tongue to find a place to make the ‘st’ sounds and the brackets on the side of the Rack make my mouth unable to purse to make the ‘Ch’ sound.

By far the worst part is that I cannot eat. My molars don’t connect so I can’t chew anything and if I try to then that’s when the brackets really do cut into me. I can’t use wax for that as it comes off and I end up chewing it. I LOVE food! Not that I have a big appetite or anything but I love cooking and trying new flavours and tastes. I can’t stand to have the same meal more than once in a row and what makes me more of  a freak is that I actually don’t like sweet things, I have no interest in sugary things at all. It’s really hard to find soft food that you can eat without chewing and it’s nearly impossible to find soft snacks that are not sweet. Everyone tells you to eat smoothies or yogurt or ice-cream but I actually don’t like any of those things! (And sure enough I’m not overweight either but that’s another topic and you can troll me later ) So my nutritional intake is based on soup at the moment. Rice is fine with sauce and noodles/pasta is ok as long as everything  is in tiny pieces. I made the mistake of eating Pad Thai the other night with long rice noodles and ended up choking as  half a long noodle went down my throat and the other half was still in my mouth and i couldn’t chew it into smaller bits! So all foods are now eaten with a knife and fork and pre- cut into baby food sized bites.

Food is just a bit of a chore now. Where as i’ve always enjoyed cooking and take pride in  creating things from scratch and not using processed foods I now find i’m just eating whatever I can find that is easy and stops me feeling hungry. I’ve totally stopped snacking at all because I can’t be bothered with the hassle and the bits stuck in my mouth and having to clean everything out again. I notice my pantry is full of stuff that I can’t be bothered with. My boyfriend is having to deal with day after day of pasta and rice dishes- though I did donate my chocolate advent calendar and all christmas goodies to him so he has seen an upside!

If you need to go on a diet but find your willpower lacking; get braces! Even if you can eat something by the time you’ve cut it up, taken 30 secs per mouthful to smoosh it all up in your mouth and swallow it your food has gone cold and everyone else has left the table and you’ve lost the will to bother!

This hurts. It’s uncomfortable, painful, frustrating, tiresome, cumbersome, (very) expensive, embarrassing, comical and time consuming. So why put yourself through it?

Some things just need doing. We all have things that are not working that great for us, especially a we get older and realise that Father Christmas is not going to deliver everything we want on the 25th. Weight problems, financial problems, mental issues and job concerns are big problems for a lot of adults in the Western world but fixing these things and making changes that will last a lifetime does not come in a quick-fix kit.

If you want to lose weight then it’s going to take a whole lifestyle change to do it. It will take real effort to change the habits, it will be hard work, often miserable and take discipline. No-one wants to get up from the couch and run 20km!

If your finances are in a mess you will have to give up the habits you have and accept you are going to have some hard times for a while- who wants to put that money towards the debt rather than something shiny and fun?

We all whine about something and wish things were different but if you keep doing the same thing then you get the same results right? So change.

But who likes change??!

Change involves pain, in some cases physical, like these stupid things on my teeth, or it might be financial pain- you are going to have to pay to fix it! Or it might be emotional pain; divorce or changing your diet habits take a big mental shift. Often it is all 3. It is going to be really hard work at first, and it will seem utterly pointless or hopeless a lot of the time. You will want to quit and throw in the towel, find a way to take the pain away, make it all not happen and think ‘stuff it’ it’s not that big a deal. Sticking it out is hard work and a lot of people are fearful of the change, the pain and even coping with the results when they do start to show scare people. Heaps of people are so scared of change that even when they do start to see results they actually choose to go back to their old habits because they have to leave their comfort zone and that’s too much for others around them to accept.

So I’m doing this because I want to change. I’ve been bitching about my back and neck pain for years so i’m fixing it. So i’m not going to whine anymore and i’m going to fix it.

It’s actually that simple. It you like the sound of your own voice and love being a drama queen about your problems, go ahead stick with what you are doing but if you actually want to fix things then man-up/suck it up and put up with the hard bits and one day it it will become so easy that you won’t even notice.

I’m loving using the Forums for people with braces, laughing at the great videos on youtube from those with braces and the before and after pics of those who post. It keeps me realising that things will be easier eventually, heaps of people are in the same situation, and what i’m doing to myself is still a good thing and worth doing.

When the Spacers were in I found them more irritating than the metal appliance and I realised that it was because of my attitude. The spacers were always a short term fix, in my mouth for a defined length of time and there was a date already set aside to have them removed. So they seemed to bug me more as I was counting the days down until they were out and I felt them every day and subconsciously knew I didn’t have to get used to them. Now the main appliance is in then I have a different focus. It hurts MUCH more, takes up much more space, wrecks my food intake, trashes my gums and makes me look like a psychopath as I can’t smile properly when my lips get stuck on the brackets but inside my head I still accept this more than the spacers. I know this is actually going to do something, it’s the part in the aeroplane when you are actually moving across the planet, and since there is no actual end date then I know that I have no choice but to accept my new reality and get my mouth around it and used to it.

Right now I hate it but I know somewhere deep ( 50′ under right now ) down in my soul that it will get better and I won’t even notice while i’m making the change!

For those who are in the same situation; I’ll let you know how long that takes!!

Today was Not Fun. I had a fully booked client list and knew that speaking was going to be a problem, so I waxed up and tried my best to pretend it was all not happening. The main problem was the lisp- I had no idea so many of my regular ‘work words’ have a sssss sound in them! After trying to say “astigmatism” for the 211th time that day by the time the last client asked me to repeat it I just wrote it down on a card and said “google it!”

It’s bad enough having a plummy English accent in a foreign country but now I have a speech impediment as well.  I didn’t answer the phone all day- the clients would have mistaken me for an overseas call centre!

After a few hours I was getting the hang of where to put my tongue to achieve the best combination of sounds but after eating at lunch and then speaking all day my cheeks were so chopped up from the movement that my lisp got worse again as I tried to keep from hurting myself more.

After work I had drinks and dinner with a few friends and that helped. I ended up putting lots of ice into my wine glass and the combination of alcohol and ice was actually quite pleasant and I forgot about the whole thing for a while. That was until we went for dinner. My friends very nicely allowed me to chose the restaurant due to my teeth pain so I decided on Thai food since at least I could have a curry sauce and rice! The food was great as always but it was such a miserable experience with everything getting stuck everywhere as well as the wax coming off the brackets and exposing my sore cheeks to the spices in the food. My previously braced friend turned to me with an air of understanding and asked ” Have you cried while eating yet?” and I was seriously considering it as an option about that point but reminded myself that I did this to myself and it was a bit of a First World Problem and at least I had food on my plate at all!

Going to bed at the end of the day was certainly the best bit, just knowing that I can spend 8 hours unconscious while my cheeks have a chance to recuperate and I don’t have to think about the appliance at all.

Tomorrow I have a day off so am planning to spend it in silence and eat smoothies.

I don’t really notice it as long as i’m not talking, eating, smiling, swallowing, sneezing, coughing, drinking, moving around or trying to sleep.

My teeth now don’t meet at the back very well so eating is a very slow process of cutting up the food to tiny bits and then kinda chomping up and down with my jaws to smoosh it into mush so i can swallow it. It just takes time but since my teeth haven’t started moving yet my jaws are not painful so I can still eat something! The worse part is my gums; they are just getting shredded from rubbing on the brackets. The wax helps a lot with general activities but when I eat it comes off and I end up chewing lumps of wax and the brackets become exposed. I’m just waiting for the time when my mouth toughens up and it’s not so raw but that will take a few weeks yet.

Speaking is a bit odd but again the wax helps my lips slide over the brackets better and I’m learning how to produce sounds again but I have to go back to work today and i’m dreading it. I’ve heard that practice makes perfect so by the end of the day I might be understandable but my gums will be in pieces. I’m looking forward to the wine after work already.

I’m basically still at the ‘new’ stage and nothing has really kicked in yet but I know that it’s all coming soon. It just all feels HUGE in my mouth but when I look in the mirror it’s not to bad, just looks like i’ve got gummy teeth at the side as i’ve loaded up the metal with wax.

Today was the beginning of my new teeth and I had an early appointment so i could just get things over and done with! I was more interested in getting the spacers out than anything else. I felt like the spacers were the “stopover” on international flights. While of course flying is uncomfortable, frustrating and the food is hard going at least you know when you are actually immobile in the seat the actual plane is going somewhere- you can watch the little animated flight path or see things moving very slowly out of the window but the stopover is a time waster. It’s just as frustrating and uncomfortable as the plane but you are going no-where. And that’s how felt about the Spacers!

My ortho struggled to even get the Spacers out as my teeth are so jammed in even the movement they had created was minimal. The taste was utterly gross. 2 weeks of unflossed food. I was heaving just at that.

He showed me the Appliance and did tell me what it was called but i’ve failed to remember since then but I just call it “The Rack” since it has a little screw system that he will turn and force my teeth apart. 

The whole process was not too bad. It was no scalp massage but it wasn’t actually painful, just pressure and sucking and sticking and slightly hammering (?) the thing into place. The worst part was when he cut the large wire from the centre of the appliance. He used a tiny angle grinder and he mentioned to his assistant that it would cut gums, teeth, and skin pretty fast so just always keep an eye on things. When he finished and the wire broke off i did whisper to him that I could have done without hearing that bit of information!

So it was in, and I was given another appointment time in 6 weeks to turn the Rack and was sent on my merry way as I had already paid upfront last time, with the receptionist promising me that it would feel totally normal in a week or two and since she was also wearing the same appliance I felt comforted by that.

Since it’s only a week to Christmas and I already had a car park space I went and did some shopping. Which was totally fine until I realised that I had no idea how to talk! Australia, and more so in regional areas, generally is a talkative nation and the Uk custom of pretending that shop assistants don’t exist and keeping your eyes facing the floor is considered very poor form. So every shop was a new round of “Hello/How you going ( bad grammar we know but that’s how it is!) /G’day/Can I help you? And all expecting an answer. So I stuttered and lisped and spat my way through various encounters and realised that tomorrow I have 8 hours of clients and I could barely utter a simple ” Fine thanks”

Time to practice and talk to the cat all afternoon. I’m sure she’ll understand.

Well, i’ve had the spacers in for 2 weeks now and i’ve managed to not have a tantrum and rip them all out with pliers and so they are still surviving between my teeth. There’s no pain anymore, so I assume my teeth have moved and found their now ‘home’ for now but they are just still deeply frustrating when eating; I just never feel like i’ve finished my food.

Tomorrow begins the journey for my new face, and the expansion plate goes in. I’ve taken lots of ‘before’ photographs which I will use to compare the changes week by week but I won’t ever look in the mirror and see quite the same face again. Which in many ways i’m happy about since the whole point of this process is to change my jawline so that I can breathe better and bite better and give me my chin back, but I’ve had this face for 45 yrs now and it’s a bit odd to know that it will never be the same again. Love it or hate it your face is yours and yours only!

So I officially say “Goodbye” to my old face and I hope I like the new one!

I will post photos as I go along but out of context I just look like some random fair haired middle aged person with a gummy smile! ( if you look close enough you can see the spacers in there!)

The original ‘before’ photo.

It does feel like time has slowed down waiting for these 2 weeks to pass and get back to the dentist to have my plate fitted. I just want to get it started! I’m getting used to the spacers now, they really only bug me after i’ve finished my food and i’m constantly thinking i’ve still something  stuck in my teeth. I think that’s a sensation i’m going to have to get used to for the next 2 years…..

One thing I have observed is how many other people i’ve noticed in Braces! I work in a public job and see and talk to people all day but this week i’ve really noticed everyone’s teeth! I never took much notice of teeth before unless they were obviously missing or someone had lipstick colouring them but this week i’ve become some sort of Jaw Monitor. It’s actually been quite distracting but I’m really seeing how many people have terrible teeth!! I’ve also noticed all the people about with braces, and how many adults are actually going through this process. There’s quite a few, but they tend to be quietly keeping their mouth shut!

It does make me feel better that i’m actually doing something proactive about my teeth now, and I can see when i’m dealing with clients how the shape of the face and posture of the neck is attributed to their jawline and teeth placement and I want to offer them my orthodontist’s card!

Bring on the Braces…

I’ve got used to them a bit, and the pain has lessened when i’m eating, though i’m still only on the spag bol or pasta type dishes. I’ve told most people I meet what is going on with my mouth in case they mistake the black inserts for poor dental hygiene!

They are on the bottom teeth too but I figured one picture was enough!

It’s been better today. I’ve just avoided foods that need chewing and most of the time I try to find ways to occupy my brain so that I don’t think about my teeth. I do get waves of claustrophobia with having something filling my mouth and have a moment when I can feel panic rising and I want to rip everything out but it doesn’t last long and I can breathe through that.

I am hungry but the idea of chewing anything just puts me off eating. I can see this would be an excellent weight loss program if that was something you needed to use!

I believe that the pain will subside in a few days and am hoping that the rest of these 2 weeks will just get easier and I will forget all about them. I hope so- this is only the first tiny step in a very long process and if it’s like this the whole way I wonder about not losing my temper at some point! Though I’ll certainly lose weight….