lingual braces, 7 months in, midline off-centre

[Msalpha1]

Hello all,

I am in the 7th month of upper and lower lingual braces, to correct two crooked teeth climbing over my upper front teeth. They have been straightened, and my ortho seems ready to remove the braces in a month. However, I have been looking at my smile over the past few months and something didn't look right. I realized yesterday that my midline was off. My smile looks crooked, like the teeth are shifted to the right and they do not line up with my nose any more. They used to line up before and now I am freaking out about it. My doctor is out of the country until June 1st, so I just want to get some peace of mind, that this can be rectified...

I don't know how to post a picture of it, maybe as a new member I cannot do it yet?

1- can an upper midline be easily corrected?
2- my ortho never seems to listen when I bring up any concerns and just tells me it is fine, how can I express myself, so that he will listen without getting defensive?
3- My upper lip seems thinner than before, could this be temporary as my muscles adapt to the new position of my teeth?

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

[Msalpha1]

[quote="Msalpha1"]Hello all,

I am in the 7th month of upper and lower lingual braces, to correct two crooked teeth climbing over my upper front teeth. They have been straightened, and my ortho seems ready to remove the braces in a month. However, I have been looking at my smile over the past few months and something didn't look right. I realized yesterday that my midline was off. My smile looks crooked, like the teeth are shifted to the right and they do not line up with my nose any more. They used to line up before and now I am freaking out about it. My doctor is out of the country until June 1st, so I just want to get some peace of mind, that this can be rectified...

I don't know how to post a picture of it, maybe as a new member I cannot do it yet?

1- can an upper midline be easily corrected?
2- my ortho never seems to listen when I bring up any concerns and just tells me it is fine, how can I express myself, so that he will listen without getting defensive?
3- My upper lip seems thinner than before, could this be temporary as my muscles adapt to the new position of my teeth?

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you. [/quote]

[iob]

Hi - Yes, your midline can be corrected, though I'm not sure if it fits your definition of "easily." Like anything involving moving teeth through bone, it just takes some time and stimulus (your wire, elastics, etc.). As I understand, however, sometimes people can have a tooth size discrepancy on one side or the other that would make lining up the midline result in the alignment/fit/bite of the teeth on the side to line up poorly. In that case, you'd need to address the size discrepancy - either filing or building up select teeth - in order to get both a proper bite AND the midline where you want it.

If forced to choose, I think your bite takes precedence over a mm of midline deviation. My midline is off a bit because of some size discrepancy, but the bite is starting to line up nicely and I'm ok with that. IMO if someone is close enough to critique my midline, they better be coming in for a kiss or they're waaay too close to my face!