I've got full braces!
The other day I had the appointment to remove the Carriere, LLHA, and my permanent retainer and got brackets on the rest of my teeth (first molar to first molar, top and bottom).
At the beginning of the appointment, I informed the assistant that I wanted to keep everything that was removed. The tone of voice she responded with indicated that she thought that was a strange request, but she did let me (the assistant I had at my previous appointment was much more cheery and positive in her response when I asked her if I could keep everything).
First thing she did was remove the LLHA. She popped the bands of each molar, and it came right out. It felt nice having a little more space for my tongue.
Then the Carriere bars were removed. The right side popped off relatively easily, but the left side took a little more work (though still nowhere as bad as I’ve seen online some people say). Then their hygienist ground off the leftover cement from the Carriere, and it was just as unpleasant as when back in the fall when I had the front four brackets replaced. I swear that when I got my braces off as a kid, getting the excess cement off was much more gentle, and quieter, too.
The molar bands didn’t leave any cement to grind/polish off because they apparently use a kind that just flakes apart when the bond is broken (according to the assistant).
The assistant put the Carriere bars and the LLHA in a ziploc bag for me and handed it to me.
I think they were supposed to remove the permanent retainer at this point, but the assistant hasn’t noticed it, so I was taken to a different room for updated photos to be taken.
I then went back and waited for the ortho for a bit. I mention the permanent retainer to the assistant, and also picked out my ligature color in this time, too. I went with green, even though I had it somewhat recently. I may have been up for trying something that stuff out a little more, but my high school 20th reunion is in a couple weeks, and am thinking of going to some of it. It’s one thing that I’ll have braces for it (when I had braces the first time was in middle school, but high school was basically all the same kids), but I didn’t want to have like people or orange or something on top of that. The assistant put the green ligatures on the four brackets of my upper incisors (since those would be staying put).
A few minutes before the ortho was ready to come over to me, the assistant polished and etched my teeth and put on the primer (I think; they paint something on the teeth and cure it with UV light, and the the brackets are bonded onto that).
After a bit of a wait, the ortho came over and they placed the brackets, from first molar to first molar top and bottom, other that the top incisors which already had brackets. They put bonded buccal tubes with hooks on my first molar. The upper canines and premolars got Damon Q brackets, while it seems that all of my lower premolars, canines, and incisors got Damon Ultima brackets (which is what my upper incisors have; the upper canines and first premolars had Damon Q before the Carriere was placed, but I didn’t know if that was because they know those brackets would get removed and replaced before doing much).
The way my ortho puts on braces, the assistant hands him one bracket at a time, “loaded” so to speak on a tool (don’t know the name, but pliers or tweezers or something). The orthodontist would place and align the bracket, scrape off the excess cement, and then cures it himself before moving on to the next bracket.
After he was done, he told the assistant the wire size that I'd be getting and said something about 12 hours. He left, and the assistant did another round of UV light on all the brackets, I think to make sure the cement was all fully cured. Then she flossed between my lower incisors, to make sure no cement got in between my teeth, I think.
Having brackets on all of these teeth again felt kind of weird, but not as "mouth-filling" as the Carriere and LLHA did at first.
I then got .014 round wires on both top and bottom (I bet CuNiTi). I was curious what size the orthodontist would go with, since on one hand the upper and lower incisors were each already lined up with respect to themselves, but on the other hand I now have gaps in my upper teeth and my upper canines are too low compared to the other teeth and my lower premolars need rotated (and the lower right first premolar got pushed out of line and kind of became a snaggletooth from the force of the elastics while I had the ). As the wires were put in and the doors were closed on the brackets, I could feel a bit of tension across my teeth.
After that, the hygienist came over and removed my permanent retainer from my lower incisors. It took a while to grind away all of the cement, especially since there was a lot used on my canines, because the wire had been popped free of them at dentist appointments back when I was a teen, and the ortho's office put it back on with way more cement than they used the first time. Again, both the sensation and the sound of the tool is terrible. It sounds awfully destructive, and so you're almost surprised that your teeth aren't damaged afterwards. I was pleased to see that the wire of the retainer came out in one piece (they didn't cut it or anything before removing it. After the hygienist left but before the assistant came back, I grabbed the wire off the tray and put in my my bag.
When the assistant came back, she added hooks to the brackets on my upper canines. The Damon brackets don't come with hooks built in to the posterior brackets, but instead have little vertical holes in the base where a hook can be added. I am to continue wearing class 2 elastics, but just 12 hours at night, and they are much weaker than what I wore with the Carriere. The assistant put them on briefly to show me how and she said I'd barely feel them, which was true. They are 5/16" (7.94mm) in diameter and 2oz (60gm) in force. They are so thin that they look like there was a manufacturing mistake, and if I try to grab just one or two from the bag I easily get five or more. They stretch so easily that it doesn't feel right.
After that, the assistant put the green ligatures on the upper canine brackets, gave me some bags of elastics, and I was on my way.
Seeing myself in the mirror with full braces wasn't as big of a shock or adjustment as seeing myself with the partial braces was last June. Definitely much more of a "silver" smile, though, partially because the colored ligatures are only on the top front six teeth, and because the premolar brackets have larger pads where they're glued onto the teeth, so those teeth are a little more shiny.
So far, there's been soreness basically in all the teeth from first premolar to first premolar; the second premolars and first molars haven't felt much yet. The tooth that has been the most sore in my upper left lateral incisor, which is the tooth that was slightly behind the other before getting my braces on last year.
My next adjustment in in eight weeks, though I haven an appointment here in a couple days because the night after I got the full braces on I noticed sensitivity along the gumline of one of the molars that were banded for the LLHA. It's still sensitive, so they're having me come in for the ortho to take a look at it. Hopefully it's not serious and resolves on its own soon.
Here's a picture of the full braces. You can see the premolar that got pushed out of line and the larger premolar bracket pads. The hooks on the upper canine brackets are sorta visible, but they're out of focus:
https://www.flickr.com/gp/189082961@N04/Zp62SWA7f6
I intend to take pictures of the removed appliances soon to show, and am more than willing to answer questions.
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