Wait... what?!

[22at26]

So I settled in for my routine ortho appointment this morning- same old commentary about slow moving canine, elastic wear needs to continue 100% of the time, bite looks good otherwise, changing you to wire lacing, your next appointment will be your “deband-check” appointment, let’s wire tie these two for better contact, and I am going to file down some rough edges and level out some chips on your incisors, are you ok with that?

Whoa whoa whoa let’s go back to the 5th thing there, doc!!

Apparently I’m two appointments away from no longer having braces!

I was given an estimate of 22 months and was braced in June of 2017. Two six-week appointments away lands me at about 19-20 months! That’s crazy! I fully anticipated going over the timeframe because I had rank malocclusion in so many aspects.

Sooo... now I really need to start thinking about what I want tweaked during the next appointment. Nothing majorly bugs me except that we can’t seem to get my left upper canine to move back and settle appropriately between the lower teeth.

I can’t believe I’m potentially only 3 months away!

[kplatt2010]

Hi There- I feel your pain as I'm on the clock with the ortho too regarding his perceived lifecycle of my braces. My main challenge is the bottom molars tipping lingual. I'm a fixer so I've been googling like crazy to figure out how to fix.

I mention again this last appointment fixing the tipping and he tells me some of this is normal. Dr. Google suggested a cross bite elastics config and so I suggest trying this and he calls me on my internet searches. Rationale for not doing this is because it put reciprocating pressure on upper molars and might tilt them in. His newest maneuver is to put a notch or curve in the arch wire but I'm not feeling anything in the affected side where the teeth are tipped in.

Not sure if anyone out there has done a cross bite elastic config that might have feedback for both of us? Also not sure if the cross bite elastics works or is used on canines??

[assertives]

Hi There- I feel your pain as I'm on the clock with the ortho too regarding his perceived lifecycle of my braces. My main challenge is the bottom molars tipping lingual. I'm a fixer so I've been googling like crazy to figure out how to fix.

I mention again this last appointment fixing the tipping and he tells me some of this is normal. Dr. Google suggested a cross bite elastics config and so I suggest trying this and he calls me on my internet searches. Rationale for not doing this is because it put reciprocating pressure on upper molars and might tilt them in. His newest maneuver is to put a notch or curve in the arch wire but I'm not feeling anything in the affected side where the teeth are tipped in.

Not sure if anyone out there has done a cross bite elastic config that might have feedback for both of us? Also not sure if the cross bite elastics works or is used on canines??

I actually am facing the exact same problem with the lingual tipping of my molars on both sides. In fact, they aren't just tipped lingually, but also slightly rotated out when they were the only teeth that were perfectly straight prior to getting braces. I'm actually having a pretty hard time dealing with this. The tipping happened when my ortho started closing the extraction gaps but the rotation happened with the class 2 elastics. I brought it up to my ortho and he gave me the same spiel as what your ortho said and long and short of it, tells me that there isn't anything he can do because there is no archwire that can upright a tipped molar and I'm already in the thickest wire that there is out there.

I have been very compliant with wearing my elastics and I must say it's something I regret bitterly now especially if he can't/won't fix the side effects of a tipped and rotated molar. I'm supposed to be still in elastics and haven't seen anything that he was supposedly trying to correct with them happen so I'm actually not keen on wearing them anymore especially if the only effect is the molars getting even more out of alignment. Sigh.

[kplatt2010]

Hi Assertives - I'm going to really push hard for a trial of cross bite elastic config at the next appointment. The rationale has been it will tip in the top molars but I read somewhere that when the bottom ones are tipped in; typically the top ones are out of alignment too. I was going to hang my head over the side of the bed and have one of my kids take a pic of the uppers to see if they are tipped buccal at all.

I don't want to do this but if my ortho is unwilling to try the cross bite elastics and this latest wire "bend" does not work; I think I'm going to have to get a second opinion. I think I've got to do that while I'm still in the braces because I don't want them taken off and then put back on. My husband thinks I need to accept the limitations and get them taken off. Of course; he's not the one that's going to eat his cheek when he chews something either.

Interestingly' I had extractions too; two bottom teeth, prior to the braces being applied, per his recommendation. I also think my tipping occurred when he had me in the box elastic config.

[OHbraces]

When you get to the point of only a few months left for an early release - do you end up with mixed feelings of can't wait to be done and not getting your money's worth for a full term treatment...?