Metal Mouth Message Board

Hi everyone,

I got braced in early February, but the brackets were not added to my back molars until last week Wednesday. Since then, the top back molars have rubbed against my inner cheeks, which has caused me a fair amount of pain and annoyance. Using dental wax as helped, but so far my inner cheeks haven't hardened up enough to better deal with the new brackets.

For people who have brackets on their very back teeth, how long did it take you to get used to them? Should I be more patient and continue to use dental wax, or is it worth bugging my orthodontist?

Thanks!

More patient, use wax. I didn't get far back molars brackets until well into my treatment and they're just on the bottom. Took a while to get used to them, and even now I'll still have a day here and there that I'll need wax. They're just so close to the back jaw muscles that it's almost impossible for them not be irritating at least some of the time.

You have to get used to them. After a time it will be no Problem.

I found that it took several weeks for my cheeks to "toughen up" but it gradually got better over that period of time. Like the others have said, use wax frequently. One tip that I discovered was that more wax globbed onto a bracket is not necessarily better -- larger pieces are more easily swept away -- so experiment so see how much wax is "enough" and not "too much." Best of luck to you!