I have Braces!

Well, as the title suggests, I have gotten braces. They will be in my mouth for two years. When I got them in, they didn't hurt at all. But after about 3 hours, they really started hurting. I have taken as much Panadol as possible. I may not go to baseball training tomorrow although I do want to. I am NOT looking forward to tonight as I may find it hard to get to sleep. I will keep you posted.

Thanks Dad!

Over this weekend from the 16th to the 18th of October, as mum has been in NSW with Jade on a farm, Dad has been doing my mouth job. On friday night, he was able to turn it most of the way and he could see the next hole, but he did not do it the whole way. On saturday night, he tried for 10 to 15 minutes to move it, but as I thought, he was unable to move it. That night, it had me in tears. Dad was trying so hard but he didn't want to hurt me, so he stopped. I found it very hard to control my emotions, as Dad tries so hard every day.

Thanks Dad for trying so hard and being there for me.

We have a Gap!

Well, great news! My two front teeth have a gap in between them! This is normal but hurts a lot. It also means that my treatment is working wonders which is a good sign as at the commencement of the process, I was a little apprehensive on how the whole thing would turn out.

Day 6, 7, 8 - 29/9/2009 to 1/10/2009

This is a jumbo post. I may start doing this with my food summary and only post when there is something exciting happening.

Day 6
FOOD SUMMARY:
B - Nutrigrain and Raisin Toast
L - Carbonara
Di - Leftovers
De - Ice Cream

Day 7
FOOD SUMMARY:
B - Nutrigrain and Vegemite Toast
L - Cup Noodles
Di - Leftovers
De - Ice Cream

Day 8
FOOD SUMMARY:
B - Nutrigrain and Vegemite Toast
L - Carbonara
Di - Leftovers
De - Ice Cream

Day 5 - 28/9/2009

Monday, a week until school starts and that equals lost of questions! But anyway, what's new with the expander. Well, my so called Vampire tooth is nearly back into place, I'd say a couple more days and it will be back in line with all the others.

I have realized that mince is one food that although it is small, it is going to go up into my expander and stick, and because it is so small, mum is finding it difficult to get it out. Oh, and about mum picking food out, she has found another tweezers that isn't as sharp to use. That's a relief because one of these days, I thought she was going to scratch me. Mum is going to go away for a few days in a few weeks so dad is going to have to learn how to expand my mouth and will also have to go through the gruesome task of picking food out. I bet 100% that he is NOT looking forward to this, but he is just going to have to do it.

I should just let you know that we are going to Philip Island from Friday night to Sunday so I may or may not be able to post. Lets hope that I can take my laptop! If not, mum may take hers. We are going to be staying at a campsite in a caravan so I doubt that there will be a internet room to get wireless. I'll see what happens!

FOOD SUMMARY:
B - Nutrigrain (Easy) & Raisin Toast (Ok, food stuck)
L - Beef Cup Noodles (Easy) & Cup Soup (Easy as)
Di - Leftovers (Hard, food stuck)
De - Ice-cream (Easy)
S - Baby Cereal (Easy)

Day 4 - 27/9/2009

Today was a pretty easy day regarding the expander. I have nothing new to report so I have decided to explain a bit more about my procedure.

The procedure itself will take about 2 and a half years. That would make me 16 when this whole thing is finished. So, as you know I currently have an expander in my mouth. I should have this in for about 4 to 6 weeks, depending how long my jaw takes. This will prevent me from talking, eating and even breathing. When I go back to school, it is going to be annoying as mum will not be there to clean out my expander after lunch. I will then have to wait until just before dinner to get it cleaned out.

After the expander, I will have braces put in to move my into their correct position for about 2 years and 5 months. For some of this time, I may have the expander in, just to make sure that my mouth doesn't become thin again.

After the braces, I will have a retainer to keep everything in place.

Well, that is my procedure.

FOOD SUMMARY:
B - Baby Cereal (Easy) and Raisin Toast (Easy, but had food stuck in my mouth)
L - Macaroni Cheese (Ok, food stuck)
Di - Cheesy Shell Bolognase (Ok, Food Stuck)
De - Nutrigrain (Easy)

Day 3 - 26/9/2009 (AFL Grand Final Day)

Today was a pretty good day as far as the expander goes. My family have started noticing changes in my mouth. This morning, my mother pointed out that my upper-left canine was falling into place. For months, as some of you have noticed, it has been out of alignment with the other teeth and been what some have called a vampire tooth. I am really happy about this as I hope soon, this tooth will be back with all the others and I won't have to stop telling people that I am not a vampire.

That night, when mum went to put the key in and expand my mouth, it hurt quite a lot. Mum is starting to really get the hang of things which is making life easier for me, but after she did the expansion for today, she kept saying how sorry she was and that she wished she didn't have to hurt me daily. I feel she is hurting more than I am. I tried to cheer her up by telling her to not worry about me and to just think how good my teeth will look in a few years.

After all this drama, I tried having some ice-cream to relieve the pain and it worked very well. I guess it acted like an ice pack, only a whole lot tastier and a whole lot quicker.

FOOD SUMMARY:
B - Baby Cereal (Easy) and Raisin Toast (Hard, had lots of food stuck)
L - Macaroni Cheese (Easy, but had food stuck)
Di - Cheese Jaffle (Hard, had bread stuck)
De - Ice Cream (Easy)
I have also made a conclusion that bread will get stuck in the expander.

Day 2 - 25/9/2009

Today wasn't too bad. At first when I woke up, I didn't feel like I had anything thing in my mouth, but that was only a spur of the moment thing. After seconds, I realised that I did have the expander in my mouth. Then I started thinking about what it was like when I didn't have an expander in my mouth. The first thing I thought of is that it was much easier to do simple things like talk, eat and take a pill. But then I thought of how much good it was doing and when I thought about that, it just made me all the more inspired to keep going with this process.

Later in the day, Mum went shopping and being a liker of Baby cereal (Yes mushy cereal for babies), I told her to get me some as it was something that I knew would be easy to eat and may not clog up my expander, which would help both my parents and I. This made me think of other foods that are smooth. The first food I thought of was raisin toast. Except for the crust, that is pretty soft. Some other things that I thought of were pasta, rice, muffins and donuts.

That night,as it was mums birthday, we went out to a Vietnamese restaurant called Thythy. There we had, spring rolls, fried rice, Mongolian beef, sweet and sour pork
(Jades favorite) and Chili chicken. When we got home, mum picked out the leftover food and we sat down and had some chocolate jam donuts to celebrate mums birthday! After, Mum did her first expansion and after doing it once and not finding the next hole, she went back and did it successfully. Well done Mum!

FOOD SUMMARY:
B - Nutrigrain cereal (Easy)
L - Chicken Soup (Easy)
Di - Vietnamese (Not too bad)
De - Donuts (Easy)
S - Baby Cereal (Easy)

Day 1 - 24/9/2009

Yesterday, I got the expander in at 2.30pm. It was very disgusting when the cement went in. I had to have it in for a minute or two and the orthodontist sucked it out. It was only when I got home and had some food that the taste was gone. When I arrived home, I tried to have dinner, Chicken and Couscous, but failed badly. I was able to have about one chicken wing and maybe a few tablespoons of couscous. Mum picked out the chicken/couscous that got stuck in my expander and then after that I had some Ice cream which was easy as any food that got stuck just melted.

A few hours later, about 8.30, I had some Nutrigrain cereal with milk and I was able to eat that, I guess because it was mushy. I also had some 8 hour panadol before I went to bed so the expander gave me no pain. I was surprised when I was having the Panadol, I was surprised how hard it was. After a few tries, I think I knocked the tablet onto my expander and that knocked it down my throat. The second tablet was easier as I used the same strategy.

This is a picture of an expander similar to mine.


Anyway, that was my day with the expander.

FOOD SUMMARY:
Di - Chicken and Couscous (Not much)
De - Ice Cream (Easy)
S - Nutrigrain with milk (Easy)

Update

I am currently undergoing some orthodontic treatment. The whole process should take about two years to complete which would make the finish date around September 2011.

I have had some spacers in for about 2 weeks to make space for my expander. These spaces were blue bands about one millimeter wide that fitted over my teeth. I had two on my left side and one on my right. These did not hurt much at all and I was able to eat anything and everything as usual. While I had these on, I did not take much Panadol, maybe only one or two doses.

Welcome!

This is a blog all about my orthodontic treatment. If you are getting orthodontics, this is for you! I will have daily updates on my thoughts and at the bottom of each daily post, there will be a summary of what I ate and how easy it was to eat.

Here is a key for my Food Summary:
B = Breakfast
L = Lunch
Di = Dinner
De = Dessert
S = Snack

Thanks,

JarrahVW