Total Frustration

[Smileop]

So about just under a year ago my girlfriend decided to take the plunge and get braces a few months after me as she noticed how quickly time was going bye and liked the changes my smile was making. She is super self conscience and wanted Invisalign but the ortho said it wouldn’t be the best idea due to 2 of her molars being slightly twisted. After a long debate and decision making she took the plunge and got some ceramic braces and was quoted about 6-8 months. She only had those 2 molars and just some slight gaps she wanted closed.

Fast forward to now her progress has been incredibly slow and the ortho doesn’t have much reasoning as to why things are moving as slow as they are. She’s increasingly becoming very frustrated because what has hoped to be a quick few month ordeal has now been edging up on a year with what seems to be a lot more work to be done. She has her sisters wedding coming up in January and she is almost completely set on not having braces for the wedding as she’s the maid of honor. She had an appointment a few days that I went to with her and the ortho put a stronger wire in and said let’s see if this can help keep moving things along. He mentioned though that if this wire doesn’t bring much progress in a month that he thinks she should seriously explore the idea of getting all metal braces for the remainder of treatment. So needless to say she’s very emotional and of very few words.

So my question is has anyone ever felt that much frustration? I feel for her as I had a pretty painless encounter

Has anyone been talked into or switched braces types?

Would getting them removed for the wedding be a possibility you think??

Any input or comments would be appreciated as I don’t really know what else to say besides it will all be worth it in the end. Thanks!

[SinkFullOfDinner]

First, I'm sorry to hear about your GF's frustration. Sounds like you're great support!

I had a switch, so I can empathize a bit. My ortho made the argument that we needed to switch from linguals to regular braces (I insisted on ceramic) in order to finish properly. My frustration was with the treatment time dragging out and the switch to visible braces. On the one hand, I can pass along to your GF that my ortho's been able to finish the things he was having trouble with. So, she should rest assured that the hassle and inconvenience and extended treatment time will result in the outcome she and her ortho are aiming for.

On the other hand, I'm not exactly sure what her ortho hopes to accomplish with metal that he can't do with ceramic. Everything I was told is that there isn't really a difference in the result between metal and ceramic. Then again, I'm not an ortho. Braces vs Invisalign I understand. Even lingual vs braces, just based on how tweaks are handled with custom wires. Unless she's having issues with ceramics breaking or popping off and it's impacting the treatment time.

If she has to switch, however, maybe the wedding is a logical transition time. Have the ceramics come off right before, and then go back in afterward to have the new ones put on. Maybe she won't be thrilled with the switch to metal (I definitely was not about the switch to visible), but she'll have a silver lining of having nothing showing for her sister's wedding, and she probably won't have to deal with the metal ones for very long. Plus, you'll have more opportunity to demonstrate what a sensitive guy you are! Good luck to her and you both!

[assertives]

Everyone responds differently to same treatment. Our bodies are just made different. Also, coupled with the fact that ceramics are not as strong as metal, so that could have contributed to the slow progress.

I'm not in the same position as I started out with traditional full metal braces. But I have had friends who had top ceramic and bottom metal and they have mentioned that ceramic is just not as strong as metal, and corrections take longer with ceramics than with metal.

I would say, let the ortho do whatever he needs, she has come so far and suffered this much, the last thing you want is for the braces to be off and the teeth not finished properly. I also think that the wedding could be used as the transition period from ceramics to metal, but do discuss this with the ortho, for going brace free even just for a day when teeth are not ready could result in unwanted movement.

[BrunetteMoment]

Oh no, that sounds very frustrating!

I tried to get Damon clear put on my teeth, but my ortho talked me into the metal because he said the ceramic weren’t as strong and would only prolong my treatment time.

I was however able to get my braces taken off for three weeks for my wedding (He took the top ten and bottom six brackets off, and left the molar brackets on for getting rebraced after the wedding) There was an additional cost, but it was worth it. Might be worth asking her ortho.