I am officially.... HALF NAKED!
It's a long story, but pics follow, so feel free to cheat!
I've also put this in the main forum.
Here's the rundown:
My appointment was for 8:30am
and going in, I wasn't really nervous, excited, or anything. It felt like any regular appointment. I get to the office a little early and got sent right back. ALL the chairs were full, as well as the records room, so they were having quite a busy day! I chatted with the asst for a while asking her about prices for replacement retainers, etc. It took my ortho a while to make his way over to me (he was banding someone), and as he was walking over he says, "So, are you happy?" and I said, "I'll be happier if you take the lowers off today too!"
He did the bite open thing and said, "Nope, come back next week for the lowers, but today only the uppers." I figured well, I'll take what I can get!
Then began the debanding process! The asst took this tool and popped each bracket off, then tugged the whole thing out of my mouth; brackets still attached to the wire and everything. Very weird looking! She placed it on her tray and I said, "That was IT???" and she smiled and said the fun part comes with taking the glue off! She started scraping and scraping and scraping.... I admit I'm not crazy about the scraping! It doesn't hurt, it just SOUNDS horrible! Another asst came by and she took my molar bands off. I expected those to be harder, but it was really simple. She grabbed the cleat with a tool, wiggled it, then grabbed the bracket portion on the other side, tugged it, and it slipped right off. No pain, just a little pressure, and that was it. Of course, my mouth was full of glue, but a quick rinse took care of that. Then on to more scraping.... and then the polish. The polish was fine, but I ended up SOAKED! They use a power-dental-tool and have to spray water on the area as they polish, and the water sprays everywhere; maybe I should have skipped my AM shower.... With the polish done came the molds. I was nervous because I've heard such horrible things about the molds, and I'd never had them done before. To be honest, it wasn't that bad. The material they use sets up REALLY quick (about 30 or 45 sec), and the whole thing came out with no problems. Another quick rinse and I was on my way out the door with instructions to come back for my retainer in an hour.
At this point, I STILL haven't seen my teeth! They never gave me a mirror, and there aren't any around the office; weird, huh? So I make it out to the car and take a peek in the rearview. My first thought? They're HUGE!
I know everyone says that, and I know why, but it still shocked me. I also thought they looked a little yellowed, but my ortho told me he was going to give me a bleach treatment to take care of that. It was very weird to look at myself. Honestly, I didn't look like me! The whole way home I kept looking in the rearview and my little pocket mirror just getting used to my new smile. Now, several hours later it's grown on me, but I'm still getting used to it, lol!
An hour later I went back to the office and got my retainer (essix). I popped it in and said, "Wow, that's tight!" The asst told me it's supposed to feel tight, so we're on the right track! She told me about how to care for it, and also how to use the bleaching stuff. Apparently my trays can be used as bleaching trays, and my ortho supplies patients with a little syringe full of bleach gel. All I do is put it in the tray, put the tray in my mouth, go to bed, and wake up with white teeth! Cool, huh? AND, I get five treatments out of one tube - even better. My ortho came over to check the retainer and asked the asst to put a bend in my lower wire to tweek my right cuspid just a bit more. After that, I was on the road again!
Now here's the weird thing; I'm only supposed to wear my retainer at night! I have no period of full-time wear, isn't that strange? I trust my ortho, but it's just weird this is the case since it seems everyone here goes full-time for 6-12 months.... I suppose if I notice some shifting I'll step it up and wear it during the day too!
So here's the moment you've all been waiting for, and kudos if you bothered to read my whole story, as it's quite long! Here's a pic of my new smile (forvige the yellowness)! I promise I'll post more pics next week when the lowers come off!
Left is one month in; right is today.
For some reason in the pic they look like they are off-center, but I swear, they aren't! I took the pic really quickly, so I probably wasn't looking head-on at the camera. Or maybe it's just me thinking they look off-center. Whatever. I'm pretty dern happy and doin' the half-naked happy dance!
My lowers will be naked next Thursday at 9:30am; so expect a FULLY-NAKED happy dance next week, as well as more pics!
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Awesome News Jillian! Your teeth look fantastic! 
So going in today I knew the bottoms were staying put. I don't mind too much; at this point I'm used to them, and it's actually weird to eat and NOT be sucking stuff from my top brackets....
