Coping with complications and hardships

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melere
Posts: 9
Joined: Fri Feb 01, 2019 9:34 am

Coping with complications and hardships

#1 Post by melere »

I'm on month 8 of my braces journey (getting jaw surgery next year) and I've been having a hard time since my adjustment in September. We've been trying to close my extraction gaps and the bottom is going fine, but the top is taking a lot more. First they had me on power chains on the top, but that wasn't doing it. Then it was retraction springs plus elastics from the 4th to the 6th teeth for two visits.

It was announced at my September appointment my ortho is retiring and so my new orthodontist was there for that check-up. I like him right away because he wanted to fix my midline (which is way off on the bottom) and my old ortho wasn't concerned about it. He noted my front teeth were tipping inwards and he moved my springs back to the 7th on the top. My wire wasn't changed, even though it had become deformed in places.

I started with a class II division 1 with open bite and my top teeth were now getting lower and lower, to the point I kept hitting my bottom brackets all the time. I had to go in a couple weeks later to get my wires trimmed and I mentioned to the assistant that my molars really weren't moving or tender whatsoever, but my front teeth seemed to be. She said it was "probably fine" and I didn't argue, but left feeling frustrated.

Then I noticed when I was checking my teeth a couple of days later that in addition to continued movement in the front rather than the back, and the wire getting more deformed by the day, that my top right canine--the root is so prominent you can feel the whole shape of it through my face. It doesn't feel like it's in my jawbone anymore and when you press the end, you can feel pressure from the wire and brackets on the tooth surface, like you're rocking the whole tooth like a seesaw.

I made an appointment as soon as I could (5 days later) and my old ortho said he was glad I came in, as I'm at high risk in general for attachment loss. He didn't say a lot besides keeping an eye on it and didn't investigate the "I can feel the root through my friggin' face" thing. A much stronger wire was put in and it was extremely painful as one of my molars had tipped forward. I would rank it as about as painful as when I had a wisdom tooth pulled when it wasn't properly frozen. Worse, it seemed to tick off the assistant that I was crying out in agony.

My top teeth are thankfully moving back up and out, but I'm so scared I'm going to lose my eye tooth. I really don't know enough about orthodontics to know if it's going to be okay or it's too far gone. Plus I noticed today (two days later) that the assistant put my spring back on the wrong teeth--from that problem eye tooth to the 6th, rather than from the premolar (4th), and I know my orthodontist didn't tell her so.

Overall I'm just really upset and anxious. I know complications happen and sometimes things take unexpected turns, but I feel like I just don't have any idea where the "line" is between taking a detour and going off the rails. They usually just say "It'll be fine" but that doesn't do it for me. How does everyone else deal with things like this?

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