Metal Mouth Message Board

I got my bottom braces on five months after the top. The reason was to open up my bite a bit so that my top teeth didn't hit the bottom brackets. However, the office treatment coordinator went over the treatment plan with me before I started. I understood what was going to happen, when, and why. Any...

I've never heard of root canals being dangerous. Painful, yes. But not dangerous. I had a root canal about 25 years ago and it turned out to be a non-event. My dentist strongly believes that dentistry should never be painful so he well and truly froze the site. As I remember it, I even went for a ru...

It's not unusual at all. I started with a push coil on the bottom to make room for one of my incisors. After about six weeks I went from having crowded teeth to looking like a hillbilly. :D it only took two or three weeks on the second wire to sort most of it out. If you're really worried about, tal...

No one said anything to me when I got my braces on and no one said anything when I got them off. I don't care. I got braces for me, not them.

I lost, on average, a pound a month. Some months I lost two. Some months I didn't lose any. It was pretty slow. I used to joke that I was losing weight because of all the food caught in my brackets. :lol: The truth is that my eating habits changed. First, it was harder to chew, so I ate slower. Eati...

I spend about 45 minutes a day cleaning. The longest is when I floss. Brushing and flossing take about 25 minutes. I don't spend any additional time cooking. My husband eats what I eat, snacks (i.e. popcorn) not withstanding. When I got braces, I started making soups from scratch. It's really easy a...

The best advice I've received on this forum is to tie the floss to the floss threader. It makes flossing so much faster and a lot less frustrating. I wish I could give credit to whoever posted it but I really don't remember. I've seen the advice twice. The first time was back in 2013, shortly before...

Have you tried a sonic toothbrush? I switched to one about six months after getting braces. I could tell after a couple of weeks that it was better and my dental hygenist notices too.

I'm scheduled to get my braces off in less than two weeks and I haven't been advised to get my teeth cleaned before hand. I can't imagine having so much plaque and tartar that it would mess up the molds, especially with the amount of brushing we orthodontic patients do. I'm really looking forward to...

I'm scheduled to get my braces removed at the end of August and will have all kinds of spaces and black triangles. Unfortunately, there's nothing my orthodontist can do about it. We have to leave it to my denist. My problem is that I'm extremely asymetric. Most people are to a small degree but I hav...

I'm in the finishing stage now. My orthodontist's goal for the next few weeks is to over-correct the depth of my bite because, once the braces come off, teeth will settle somewhat. Maybe that's what's going on with you. Your ortho wants the height of the corrected teeth to be a bit higher than the o...

They do become more managable over time. The first week was the worst for me but it took months before they didn't bother me at all.

I found taking a couple of ibuprofen about a half an hour before bed helped a lot.

It only took four days to finalize the cost and treatment plan but it was four months before I got my braces on. The combination of scheduling extractions, summer vacations (dentist, orthodontist, and me), and a very busy ortho practice contributed to the delay.

I've been in braces for 20.5 months and wearing elastics for 8.5. My sentence was for 24+, with emphasis on the +. I'm a week and a half away from my next appointment and can say with certainty we won't be booking a removal date. My bite on the right side is not as good as I would like. It's getting...

Metal, no! Latex, yes!

Have you been taking a lot of acetaminophen for the pain? That can cause a metalic taste.