Progress reversed - ask for an early appointment?

[Heartofdarkness]

My ortho is moving my midline one tooth at the time, with powerchain. At my last appointment we finally started moving one of the front teeth, next time it's the other front tooth and so on.

So, after adding the tooth the powerchain it started moving right away. After 3 days I had a thin gap where I could fit a finger nail. Then it stopped, and reversed! Now it looks like 2 appointments ago and all the progress from months back is gone. It's almost 3 weeks until next appointment. Should I ask for an earlier date? I really don't want to add another 1 or 2 months to my treatment.

[AvalonD]

When in doubt, always ask for an earlier appointment! Most of the time your ortho is going to thank you- whats the worst that could happen? After all, you're the one paying an incredulous amount of money for their services. If you want to ensure that your progress is on schedule then feel free to be proactive when necessary.
If your next appointment was a week away I would probably suggest just waiting but, three weeks of lost progress/reversed progress is a long time.

Best of luck!
-Ava

[Heartofdarkness]

When in doubt, always ask for an earlier appointment! Most of the time your ortho is going to thank you- whats the worst that could happen? After all, you're the one paying an incredulous amount of money for their services. If you want to ensure that your progress is on schedule then feel free to be proactive when necessary.
If your next appointment was a week away I would probably suggest just waiting but, three weeks of lost progress/reversed progress is a long time.

Best of luck!
-Ava

Thank you. I was thinking maybe they don't like patients messing with the appointments or something! I will call them today. Next week there is a stupid winter holiday when all the schools are closed, and so is my ortho, so I hope they can find a free spot for me this week.

[Heartofdarkness]

I gave them a call and after me whining for a while she scheduled me for a short visit tomorrow. I think she at first thought it had just stalled, and I told her I'm suddenly 2 months back in my treatment... I hope they can just use a stronger powerchain or something. Do you think they will give me elastics?

[Heartofdarkness]

So I just read my braces diary (yes I keep one) and I'm 3 months back in progress. I'm panicking. This will NOT be done for summer as my ortho said before all this set-back started. What is going on? Why are my teeth acting like this?

[djspeece]

Hang in there, don't panic just yet. Things seem to get worse before they get better -- and I am thinking your ortho may have a trick up her sleeve. Heck, I had a gap open up between my two upper front teeth on the day I had impressions made for retainers! And yes, I was slightly freaking out! Best of luck to you!

[Heartofdarkness]

Thank you, Dan. It started out well when she was moving one tooth at the time. Then she started to apply powerchains all over which kind of pulls the teeth from different directions which makes them not move at all. I never thought I would long this much for a gap between my middle teeth.