Tim's Treatment NEW PICS ::: UPDATED PLEASE READ 03/11 :::

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#1 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Tue Sep 05, 2006 11:09 am

Before I started treatment heres what happened!

July 5th, 2006 - Dental Cleaning
August 8th, 2006 - Consult With orthodontist
August 10th, 2006 - 2 molars on left side extracted
August 14th, 2006 - 2 molars on right side extracted
September 5th, 2006 - Upper and Lower Braces placed
October 10th, 2006 - First adjustment, placement of spacers for room for bands.

Before Treatment Started:

After Treatment Started:

More pictures on its way!

SDFD TSchott
Code 4

#2 Post by **njdana** » Tue Sep 05, 2006 11:11 am

Nice blue ligs. You've been through alot. hope the journey goes well.

#3 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Wed Sep 06, 2006 11:29 am

Day 1:

Alright for starters I would like to thank those of you in support of my decision in braces so Thanks.

Now for the fun part:
Yesterday September 5th, 2006 I started my journey into the new world of orthodontic braces. I got into the orthodontist office at 9:15 I always like to be early for anything

Well I ended up walking in and walked right out from being nervous and listened to one song on my iPod after that song was over I walked right back in signed in and sat down.

For those of you who walk into an ortho office and having little kids staring at you well I had that done to me yesterday and it felt awkward. Well 9:29 comes up and I hear, "Tim" I get up and walk to the chair and sit down at Exactly 9:30. Wow these people are awesome about getting there patients in the chair at exactly there scheduled time. The orthodontic assistant didn't really explain to much to me so I just started listening to my iPod and next thing I know theres 2 sets of hands in my mouth, wtf is going on. Well it was the Orthodontist himself placing the brackets and the assistant was just handing the orthodontist the next bracket. Next thing I know its 10:30 1 hr of sitting in that chair and I'm fully braced well not litteraly and the assistant explained what I needed to do in order to keep the braces and teeth cleaned. No problem.

Next appointment date scheduled for Oct 10th for first adjustment, spacers, and then 2 weeks or so after that here comes the bands.

Well its 10:30 I have no work but I have school (College) at 6pm so what am I going to do. Well I decide I'll wash my car so I washed my car and it was 3:30 when I finally completed that and then I just went home took a nap until 5:00 and headed off to college, no one noticed my braces except for my cousin who I told about getting braces. My parents don't even know yet. Well school got out at 10 and I went for my VERY first meal in braces. Wow that was a task I thought I had to relearn how to eat with braces on.

11:45: Gone home and brushed my teeth I swear I spent at least a good 25-30 minutes brushing my teeth for the first time. Does it have to take that long?

NEXT MORNING:

I Wake up with little to no pain or discomfort and didn't even relize I had braces until I brushed my teeth this morning so I'm sure I'm going to get used to the new hardware in my mouth pretty quick. Well its now 11:30 so I will keep you guys up to date Next week when my first week in braces passes by.

SDFD TSchott
Code 4

Oh heres a picture of my braces on day one that I compiled into AdobePhotoshop and uploaded to my site:

#4 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 1:23 am

09-12-2006
Well lets see braces applied 09-05-2006 had very little to no discomfort for the first three days of having braces. 09-08-2006 was a painful day. I ended up going into work for about three hours and just could not bear the pain anymore so they went ahead and sent me home early.

09-12-2006
Well today is the day after 09-11-2006 and now I'm finally braced for one solid week, the things I've noticed about having braces was the following;
1. Harder to brush teeth, takes much longer then the normal two minutes I usually brush three times a day but now I'm brushing at least a good four to five times. Wounder if I'm overbrushing?

2. Much harder to floss, takes about half hour to floss compared to the normal ten minutes.

Anyways off to another day of being braced. I will post another update in one month when I have my first adjustment on october tenth when I get spacers put in and then molar bands right after that. So I'm in for a bit more of pain to come down the road.

SDFD TSchott
Code 4

#5 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 1:33 am

KK wrote:Finally your day has come and gone Tim ... and it sounds like it was a good one.

Your hardware and ligs look good! Here's to this being an event free journey!

Take good care!

Thanks Kiwi, I'm not sure what I would have done without the support of this site, people like you, my friends and even my family now supports my desision to getting braces. Now the odd thing I find is that before getting braces I've never had a girl talk to me at work for 1/2 hour or more, yesterday was just a day where I had a girl talking to me for almost 1 hour and we even traded phone numbers wounder if getting braces had anything to do with it? This girl comes into my work like 3 times a week and never talked to me until after getting braces.

Confused
SDFD TSchott
Code 4

#6 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 9:29 pm

Figure I would post this to see if anyone had any solutions to this problem. I've had braces for 20 days, yup thats right 20 days and now I have a split lip from the braces. Anyone have any ideas how to cure that problem other then saltwater rinses which I've been doing for some time since getting braces.

SDFD TSchott
Code 4

#7 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 10:00 pm

Its not a cold sore I've already had my grandmother look at it and she confirmed that its a split lip from the braces and dry lips. I was using lots of lip balm when I got braces but since my accident 90% of my travel stuff that I usually carry with me hasn't been with me its all in my car and my car is in the shop and won't come back to me until the 4th of october so I'm guessing I will have to go buy some extra stuff and create another kit. However that won't happen until Friday when I get paid.

Thanks KK for the advice

SDFD TSchott
Code 4

#8 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 10:30 am

UPDATE:

10/10/2006:
Today October 10th 2006 I had my first appointment with the orthodontist since being braced, today was just a quick in and out five minute ordeal. I went in thinking ok an adjustment is underway well I was wrong. Today they just looked at my teeth asked how I was dealing with the braces and then told me I needed spacers for the molar bands. One assistant told me I need a spacer here, a spacer here, 2 here and 2 here making it a total of 6 spacers. Well the orthodontist of the office came over and said theres no need for spacers here, here and there all you need is a spacer there. Meaning I went from needing 6 spacers to just ONE. WOW JUST ONE

haha sorry. Anyways no pain yet but I'm sure there will be some pain later.

I go back on 10/25/2006 to remove spacers if they haven't fallen out and to get bands placed on. The orthodontist said it will take about 1 hour to 1 1/2 hours so we shall see when it comes to that date.

Look for more updates down the road.

SDFD TSchott

#9 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Wed Oct 25, 2006 3:38 pm

UPDATE:

10/25/2006:
Today October 25th, 2006 I had a the actual first adjustment, the other appointment I had on the 10th was for spacers to be placed in.

Story Behind Todays Update:
Went into work at 7 o-clock this morning ended up clocking out at 8:30 to go to ortho appointent told my boss I won't be in for about an hour and a half according to the ortho. So I get to the orthodontist office at 8:50 walk in sign in sit down.

Not even a full minute has passed by I'm called to the back so I get up walk to the chair and the ortho explains to me whats going to happen today. *Keep in mind he told me it would take about 1 1/2 hours or more*

"Today were going to remove the spacers, put the bands on and give you new lig colors but your going to be keeping your old wire and we will not be connecting any of the bands at this time." Thats what the orthos exact words were. Anyways 5 minutes in they do the normal Open, Close, Open, Close routine to check your bit out. Well another 1,000 + Open Close bits I'm now banded around four molars. Why did they leave one remaining molar in the far back un-banded and or un-bracketed? Well After about 30 minutes of that he puts on a new bracket on one of the molars that cannot have a band cause of a filling and to my shocking image "A NEW WIRE" Placed in. Anyways I will post photos later on of my before smile, my current smile and show close ups of my molar bands hopefully.

By the way the whole 1 1/2 hour appointment took only 45 minutes and that glue/cement really tasted extreamly nasty.

Look for more updates down the road.

SDFD TSchott
Over and Out

#10 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Wed Oct 25, 2006 10:14 pm

Thanks guys however I will not be able to get to photos tonight as my camera is in the the office locker with my firefighter turnout gear so I will make a trip tomorrow to get my camera and take photos.

Wow I've read numorus postings about peoples first adjustments holy crap I didn't think I would be in so much agony I can hardly eat anything even mashed potatoes cause any little amounts of pressure hurts like hell. I've had braces on for 1 month 2 weeks 6 days and this was the first major adjustment, I hope my future adjustments won't be as bad. My tongue is really getting red and irritated so I think I will up the salt water rinses to help toughen it up some more. Being rubbed raw from the little hooks on the inside of the molar bands. You will see what I'm talking about when I post pictures

SDFD TSchott
Over and Out

PICTURES AND MORE UPDATES UNDERWAY!

#11 Post by **Lisa65** » Thu Oct 26, 2006 11:46 am

Sorry you're having some discomfort Tim! I hope it passes soon. About the bands/brackets on the back teeth - I had my bottom braces put on in mid July but the very back teeth at the bottom were only bracketed and brought into the arch a week ago. I'm not sure why they don't do them all straight away but I'm sure that remaining tooth will be brought in eventually.

hope you soon feel better!

Lisa

#12 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Thu Oct 26, 2006 1:56 pm

Pictures finally posted!

SDFD TSchott
"FIREFIGHTER DOWN"

#13 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Thu Oct 26, 2006 7:39 pm

UPDATE: Wow I've just took a look at my previous photo before braces applied and a picture I took today, your right Kiwi I've noticed some changes in the upper and there is changes in the lower also I took a look in the old profile photo and another look at the new profile photo and wow you can tell the bite is coming together.

SDFD TSchott
Firefighter Down

#14 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Thu Oct 26, 2006 7:39 pm

UPDATE: Wow I've just took a look at my previous photo before braces applied and a picture I took today, your right Kiwi I've noticed some changes in the upper and there is changes in the lower also I took a look in the old profile photo and another look at the new profile photo and wow you can tell the bite is coming together.

SDFD TSchott
Firefighter Down

#15 Post by **SDFD TSchott** » Fri Dec 22, 2006 12:34 am

UPDATE

Today was a work and go to orthodontic appointment kind of day. I was scheduled to work from 7am â€“ 4pm so all I decided to do was create my own work schedule for the day.

I worked from 6:30-2:43 yes I know it sounds weird but here is an explanation of what the work schedule consisted of. I got into work at 6:30 am and worked from 6:30-8:30 I then left work to head to the orthodontist office for my adjustment. Iâ€™m speeding of course to get there before 9am when the time on my clock read 8:49 am and the time to go from my work to the Orthoâ€™s office takes about twenty minutes with lots of traffic and stop lights. Off to the story of Adjustment number 2.

With speeding I get there to the Orthoâ€™s office with approximately two minutes to spare and sit down and wait only thirty seconds in the chair when the assistant calls my name and says you ready for some changes today? Well I get in the chair the Ortho looks at my bite and does the Open Close, Open Close check and says all right today we are only going to change the top wire and it will be connected to the molar bands in the back. The lower arch wire is going to be the same and will not connect just yet to the molar bands but maybe next adjustment we could go further. Well about 30 minutes passes by and I have new wire on top the same wire on bottom and was given the option, â€œWhat colors you want today?â€