Been reading topics on this board for sometime and finally thought of sharing my story here to see if any of you have faced similar situation. so here goes!
I got my braces on when i was 20 because of my buck teeth and the ortho at the time only put braces on my upper arch connecting like 5 teeth including my buck teeth for 4 months. removed it, put a permanent retainer on and it broke after a week or so, and due to my lack of knowledge in retainers and my busy work life, i stayed with a broken retainer for a week or so and saw him and got it fixed. A year and half passed, and one of my front teeth started moving upwards looking as if i don't have a tooth there!!! yikes!!
since it became so obvious, i decided to see another ortho to fix it. he checked my teeth, got a scan done and since my parents were so worried about teeth extractions, he gave me a plan to wear a ex-pander on both upper and lower arches to move some of my crowded teeth front and make some room by expanding my jaws. Since a fixed ex-pander is so expensive, we got a removable one done so i can remove it when im eating etc. 9 months passed, and my teeth moved where it should be; he finally decided that my teeth are ready to put braces on!
this is when i became 24 and 8 months. got my braces on August 20th 2016. he sort of tricked me into getting ceramic instead of metal cause it wont look that obvious (which is pure BS cause ceramic is more chunkier than metal 
) so my braces journey started there, and he insist that i come and show my teeth once in every 2 weeks which was a waste of time 98% of the time. also, mind you ceramic braces are super fragile that i broke one of my brackets 4 times within 6 months time span for silly things like small biscuits, or a slightly brown toast! and my bracket was not fixed back for a month cause he could not find a similar ceramic bracket for me! 
since it slows down my progress even more, i decided to change my entire diet and hence i lost alot of weight too. fast forward to today, its been one year and 6 months which is the said duration for me but my teeth aren't straight YET! my personal opinion for my teeth to look crooked still is due to slow adjustments on my teeth. according to my ortho, i have a borderline issue with few crowded and crooked teeth in lower arch and gaps in my upper.
so fat i have only done 9 adjustments to my teeth.
- 4 wire changes in my lower, one power chain in lower arch.
- 3 wire changes in my upper- no power chains as YET!
The power chain on my lower has been on for 4 months! is this normal? my ortho said i dont need to change it as yet cause it stays active for sometime!