Dissatisfaction with braces after one year

[PursueToTheEnd]

* After my first appointment, whenever I tried to chew, the metals struck the teeth so that eating was extremely painful and I could hardly chew at all. Frighteningly, the height of the surface of the metal surpassed that of the teeth so that the metal made contact with the teeth above or below it
* As a result, the farthest molars (all four of them) are double the height of other teeth
* After few weeks, after the second or third appointment, I felt the front teeth clashing right after the re-wiring.
* Possibly because when an assistant took the wire out of the LFT (Lower Front teeth), they did it too hard and the LFT were pulled up from their normal position or forwards so that the teeth' is too much pointed towards the front?

* Or, since before I had it fixed, my front teeth were squashed inward because of lack of space, when it is straightened out, there is not enough space so that it clashes.
* Or perhaps because I have a jaw defect
* When I look at myself sideways my jaw looks weird — too attached to the neck, not visible
* my chin is fat
* Even before I had braces whenever I laughed or smiled while having my head down my lower teeth would protrude and would look ugly
* it seems my jaw is too long compared to the upper set of teeth?
* When I let my mouth be in a position in a comfortable position my LFT and UFT (Upper Front Teeth)' ends touch each other
* When I bite, currently the mouth misaligns sideways a bit and LFT makes contact with UFT in an uncomfortable way, so that when I'm looking down I usually stick my tongue in between so that contact is avoided
* When I artificially move my jaw sideways to move it where it's supposed to be, it is
* I was worried, because I read about a case where one's upper front teeth became very thin due to constant clashing and had to be replaced

* When I notified a dental assistant, A, she put blue substance (BS) on my molar to make gap between my teeth
* I think I felt the clashing right after the 2nd appointment
* Perhaps because the LFT were pulled upward when the A
* Then sometime later, right after I drank a cup of hot chocolate, my teeth start clashing again (probably because the hot chocolate melted a substancial part of the blue substance)
* At another appointment, another dental hygienist, B, without telling me in advance, removed the blue substance, and in the process damaged the surface of my molars. The surfaces of my molars hurt for a while, and still do a little when I deliberately poke with my fingernails.
* This was contrary action to what A told me—that the BS would wear out on its own eventually; instead of making it go away naturally, B damaged my teeth in the process of removing the BS.
* I told B that my teeth are clashing again
* she replied something to the effect of 'we want your teeth to align naturally' [without the aid of the blue substance]
* But my front teeth are still clashing after quite some time
* I told my doctor on December check-up that my front teeth are clashing and she said that maybe the rearrangement (readjustment? what's it called when you get new set of wires at each new appointment?) made my mouth shift, to which I replied, "It's not from today, it's always clashed." And after the doctor told me to bite down she checked and said she sees nothing wrong, and said something to the effect of "Maybe because we changed the wires today your teeth needs to shift" But the LFT barely touches the UFT when I bite down, but when I don't bite down, the lower set of teeth protrudes a bit forward The bottom front teeth hitting the mid-way of of the back of the upper front teeth; before, it touched the very top of the back of the upper front teeth)
* I think a way to fix this problem would be to add some teeth matter to the molars so that there is more gap between the upper and lower set of teeths.
* Another way to fix this might be to somehow shift back the jaw but that seems impossible to me
* Another way to fix this problem would be to somehow pull back the jaw. I can withdraw my jaw in which case there is no clashing but it's hard to keep have it withdrawn; it naturally protrudes forward. I thought this might be because my chin is kind of fat, or my jaw is too long (a natural defect of the body perhaps) so that the fat pushes my jaw forward, especially when my head is inclined downward as they almost always is because I am looking at the computer or iPhone.
* And if I reduce the fat perhaps I could fix it, but that seems too far off.
* Otherwise the only other way I think this problem could be fixed is have my whole upper set of teeth move forward
* Or I could just give up and always leave a little gap in between my teeth to avoid discomforting fit of the front teeth as well as the clashing thereof when speaking.
* I've trained myself to pronounce things in a such a way that my front teeth don't clash, it makes my pronunciation slightly artificial though.
* This makes me mad because now I have a speech defect as a result of the braces.
* Other things that I am mad about the braces experience is that when the dental assistants get the wire out, they seriously do it so hard that my lower front teeth feel like they are going to come out. Does everyone feel this? What if this permanently loosens my teeth?
* Also teeth 31 and 18 has deep cave in them, perhaps because B paved too much when removing the blue substance, as well as the cross-bite making frequent clashes between the molars while my teeth were shifting. So my molar on the outer part (facing the cheeks) are very short while the inner surface (facing the tongue) are tallest portion of the molar. I've had teeth grinding problem even before having braces and I probably still do, aggravating the loss of teeth matter. Because of such limited surface space on the outside of the molar, the wire station (what's it called) barely have a spot to be fixed to it; the lower portion where you can put rubber bands is too close to the gum. I feel that I need to have some teeth matter grafted to my molars.
* My front teeth are clashing.
* I've had teeth grinding habits and the wearing down of the teeth got worse after wearing braces. Is it possible to build up the teeth again to its normal state by natural re-mineralization?

[jambo532]

Wow that seems like a lot. I have to be honest with you though, my molars still don't touch almost a year and a half in. We are working on pulling my jaw forward now then he says we will pull the molars down. My teeth still hit too in the front. I think this is all just a natural process of braces. They are not always comfortable or pleasant at all. As for your chin being fat and your jaw being long, I don't know if there is anything an ortho can do to fix this. Maybe your jaw just seems long because it is pulled forward. Anyways, I hope all goes well for you. I would talk to your ortho and let him know your concerns.
www.allbraced.blogspot.com

[VA5]

I haven't even read your post to be honest. What I wanted to tell you is that one year is not enough time to be making so may critiques on your teeth. Braces is a process and you have to wait until the very end to see where your teeth are going to be. One of my regrets during this process is being such a pain in the A** with my ortho over all the concerns i had over my teeth, I was simply being impatient and probably a really pain of a patient.

[Chicagogal]

Wow, that Is a LOT you feel is wrong. Probably more than anyone on this board can address in whole (I think it's ok to vent here, but that's a lot to digest).

I've learned a few things in my 1 year (think you can make certain judgements after that time period, but not final judgements):
1) If you decide you look terrible in braces, then you will look terrible in braces, because it's very apparent that you feel that way. I spent the first several months like that and it was miserable. I was choosing to feel unhappy about the process.

2) BE a pain in the rear patient if you need to. Do what your ortho says, but feel free to bring up issues and ASK about everything they're doing and why. You're paying a lot of money, you deserve good customer service. It sounds like you've let a lot of these concerns pile up and are getting overwhelmed.

3) There's a difference between discomfort of changes and major issues. Teeth clash, mouth sores appear. You should have an ortho that will at least let you call and ask about things that feel very wrong, even if you don't go in.

4) If you feel like you're really being mistreated, you do have the right to attempt to get another opinion midway through treatment. Most other orthos will be wary of your case, but you can probably find one to at least check you out (and if not, does your dentist have an opinion on all this?)

[PursueToTheEnd]

Thanks Chicagogal, I had the thought of writing an email with pictures etc to the ortho and other orthos around the area but been procrastinating unfortunately.

[PursueToTheEnd]

It's also meant to be read in outline to be easier; the outline format wasn't preserved when copy&pasted on here.
You can see the outline version (with updated contents) here:
docs.google [dot] com/document/pub?id=1r72PLylK9yyNSdrGNR5rNJ5zlkX88WB86cpkdcbAcic

[PursueToTheEnd]

I used BBCode converter:

• After my first appointment, whenever I tried to chew, the metals struck the teeth so that eating was extremely painful and I could hardly chew at all. Frighteningly, the height of the surface of the metal surpassed that of the teeth so that the metal made contact with the teeth above or below it, because I have naturally small teeth. What a pity. There should be smaller sized the-metal-that-attaches-to-the-teeth.
  • Combined with my habit of teeth grinding at night, and a mistake that an assistant made as you will see below, my second to last molars are half the size of farthest molars (all four of them).
  • After few weeks, after the second or third appointment, I felt the front teeth clashing right after the re-wiring.
    • Possibly because when an assistant took the wire out of the LFT (Lower Front teeth), they did it too hard and the LFT were pulled up from their normal position or slanted forwards so that the teeth is too much pointed towards the front?
      • Is this normal? (The pulling super-hard of the the LFT when taking the wires off)
      • Or, since before I had it fixed, my front teeth were squashed inward because of lack of space, when it is straightened out, there is not enough space so that it clashes.
      • Or perhaps because I have a jaw defect
        • When I look at myself sideways my jaw looks weird ― too attached to the neck, not visible
        • my chin is fat
        • Even before I had braces whenever I laughed or smiled while having my head down my lower teeth would protrude and would look ugly
        • it seems my jaw is too long compared to the upper set of teeth?
  • When I let my mouth be in a position in a comfortable position my LFT and UFT (Upper Front Teeth)' ends touch each other
    • When I bite, currently the mouth misaligns sideways a bit and LFT makes contact with UFT in an uncomfortable way, so that when I'm looking down I usually stick my tongue in between so that contact is avoided or the jaw is protruded naturally so that the contact is avoided
• I was worried, because I read about a case where one's upper front teeth became very thin due to constant clashing and had to be replaced
• When I notified the dental assistant, A, right after the new alignment which caused the front teeth discomfort, she put blue substance (BS) on my molar to make gap between my teeth
  • I felt the clashing right after the 2nd appointment
    • Perhaps because the LFT were pulled upward when the A
• Then sometime later, right after I drank a cup of hot chocolate, my teeth start clashing again (probably because the hot chocolate melted a substantial part of the blue substance)
• At the next appointment (3rd appointment), another dental hygienist, B, without telling me in advance, removed the blue substance, and in the process damaged the surface of my molars. The surfaces of my molars hurt for a while, and still do a little when I poke with my fingernails.
• This was contrary action to what A told me―that the BS would wear out on its own eventually; instead of making it go away naturally, B damaged my teeth in the process of removing the BS.
• I told B that my teeth are clashing again
• she replied something to the effect of 'we want your teeth to align naturally' [without the aid of the blue substance]
• But my front teeth are still clashing. I think it got a little better, but still it’s still uncomfortable.
• I told my doctor on December check-up that my front teeth are clashing and she said that maybe the rearrangement (readjustment? what's it called when you get new set of wires at each new appointment?) made my mouth shift, to which I replied, "It's not from today, it's always clashed." And after the doctor told me to bite down she checked and said she sees nothing wrong, and said something to the effect of "Maybe because we changed the wires today your teeth needs to shift" But the LFT barely touches the UFT when I bite down, but when I don't bite down, the lower set of teeth protrudes a bit forward The bottom front teeth hitting the mid-way of of the back of the upper front teeth; before, it touched the very top of the back of the upper front teeth)
• I think a way to fix this problem would be to add some teeth matter to the molars so that there is more gap between the upper and lower set of teeths.
• Another way to fix this might be to somehow shift back the jaw but that seems impossible to me.
• Another way to fix this problem would be to somehow pull back the jaw. I can withdraw my jaw in which case there is no clashing but it's hard to keep have it withdrawn; it naturally protrudes forward. I thought this might be because my chin is kind of fat, or my jaw is too long (a natural defect of the body perhaps) so that the fat pushes my jaw forward, especially when my head is inclined downward as they almost always is because I am looking at the computer or iPhone.
• And if I reduce the fat perhaps I could fix it, but that seems too far off.
• Otherwise the only other way I think this problem could be fixed is have my whole upper set of teeth move forward
• Or I could just give up and always leave a little gap in between my teeth to avoid discomforting fit of the front teeth as well as the clashing thereof when speaking.
  • I've trained myself to pronounce things in a such a way that my front teeth don't clash, it makes my pronunciation slightly artificial though.
    • This makes me mad because now I have a speech defect as a result of the braces.
• Other things that I am mad about the braces experience is that when the dental assistants get the wire out, they seriously do it so hard that my lower front teeth feel like they are going to come out. Does everyone feel this? What if this permanently loosens my teeth?
• Also teeth 31 and 18 has deep cave in them, perhaps because B paved too much when removing the blue substance, as well as the cross-bite making frequent clashes between the molars while my teeth were shifting. So my molar on the outer part (facing the cheeks) are very short while the inner surface (facing the tongue) are tallest portion of the molar. I've had teeth grinding problem even before having braces and I probably still do, aggravating the loss of teeth matter. Because of such limited surface space on the outside of the molar, the wire station (what's it called) barely have a spot to be fixed to it; the lower portion where you can put rubber bands is too close to the gum. I feel that I need to have some teeth matter grafted to my molars.
• My front teeth are clashing.
• I've had teeth grinding habits and the wearing down of the teeth got worse after wearing braces. Is it possible to build up the teeth again to its normal state by natural re-mineralization?

[bookfairy]

Wow, that Is a LOT you feel is wrong. Probably more than anyone on this board can address in whole (I think it's ok to vent here, but that's a lot to digest).

I've learned a few things in my 1 year (think you can make certain judgements after that time period, but not final judgements):
1) If you decide you look terrible in braces, then you will look terrible in braces, because it's very apparent that you feel that way. I spent the first several months like that and it was miserable. I was choosing to feel unhappy about the process.

2) BE a pain in the rear patient if you need to. Do what your ortho says, but feel free to bring up issues and ASK about everything they're doing and why. You're paying a lot of money, you deserve good customer service. It sounds like you've let a lot of these concerns pile up and are getting overwhelmed.

3) There's a difference between discomfort of changes and major issues. Teeth clash, mouth sores appear. You should have an ortho that will at least let you call and ask about things that feel very wrong, even if you don't go in.

4) If you feel like you're really being mistreated, you do have the right to attempt to get another opinion midway through treatment. Most other orthos will be wary of your case, but you can probably find one to at least check you out (and if not, does your dentist have an opinion on all this?)

You wrote this so tactfully, I have to give you a compliment! Very nicely written - and 100% true!