I know this may be a little late, but I had the gum surgery about a week and a half ago at a perio office. It is painful, not the procedure (muscle relaxer before procedure, lots of novacaine during and good pain killers for after), but since the good pain pills are gone, healing has been pretty painful. I do have quite a low pain threshold too though. I really hate pain, and have had quite enough of dealing with mouth pain, but still worth it in the end. It is a bit expensive too (total was about $3500). I have a good dental insurance so they are paying for half of it. I had nearly all of my teeth done, top & bottom and quite a bit of bone removed as well. And it was done with scalpel and other tools, no laser. Here are a couple of pics, I am totally happy I had it done. Oh, and yes I had a very gummy smile before braces, and the braces made it a little worse.
BEFORE (big smile):
AFTER (big smile):
I do have some "little triangles" but I plan to have some tooth reshaping done too, in the future. I know that may be expensive too, but how much is too much to get what you want, and if you can work it into your budget, why not? We only live once, you know!