cori's adventures of oral fun

day 41 - tuesday - SPLINT OFF!!!

2005-08-30T23:46:00.000-05:00

so today was my BIG day, I got my splint out! my OS is a great guy. he started clipping the wires holding my splint in. it did not hurt, though at times the tongue depressor he was using to hold my upper lip out of the way would hit a tender spot of my incision. he finally clipped them all out and I was free! my mouth/jaw kinda freaked out. I didn't bite down, I was kinda afraid to, I liked having my splint in to tell me where to bite! :)

I brushed my teeth quite throughly (I had brought my electric toothbrush!) but they still felt funny afterwards. kinda porous/rough. eww. my OS checked my bite, and when I bit down it was weird, but did kinda fit together. my front teeth touch! (I had an open bite before).

my OS also took out most of my stitches. while they were the resorbable kind, they needed a little help. getting my stitches out hurt a little, but again it was usually the tongue depressor hitting something sensitive.

I of course, had more questions for him. (I always go in with a bunch of questions) Yes, I can floss right away. No more restrictions other than contact sports (two more weeks for that!). Eat softer foods for a while and transition to harder stuff over a few weeks. Yes, state fair food like corn dogs, etc is ok (MN STATE FAIR THIS FRIDAY FOR ME!).

my OS wouldn't stop saying that he thinks that my ortho did an amazing job, great set up, my bite immediatly post op is great. he doesn't think there is much left, some tweaking, etc. of course I'll find out a little more on friday when I go to my ortho.

my OS gave me the casts he used for my surgery. I now have a lower presurgery cast, and upper presurgery cast, and the cast that he did 'surgery' on. these are super cool for me as I had a bite plate before braces to wear at night when sleeping. I have molds from 9th grade and from my sophomore year of college (they were exactly the same) so now I can see pre-anything, after ortho yet pre-surgery, and then what surgery should do. yea! :) I'm a goof, I know.

with all that my hubby and I were off, in search of soft food!

my first food that I ate and that I could CHEW was Noodles & Co. unfortunately, though we go there all the time, our food this time was not good. of course we got it to go and once we got home to eat we found that it was essentially noodles wiht a little tomato and no creamy goodness sauce! (yes, I did call to complain). though the food was not spectacular, eating went well! I just had a snack a little bit ago and it was a hamburger and fries from McDonalds. I was able to bite through the bun and hamburger, mostly (I think it's that I have NEVER been able to and I need to practice!).

I'm kinda finding my new bite. I miss my splint, it was nice to know where my teeth were supposed to go, right now I feel a little kittywhompis with my bite. it seems to fit if I slide where I want to bite slightly to the right. I can't tell if this is where I'm supposed to be biting or not. I figure I'll talk to my ortho about it friday morning.

day 26 - sunday

2005-08-14T22:08:00.000-05:00

i sneezed twice today, whoohoo! no issues, either time.

ron and i went up to FL today to visit my mom. didn't do much, just sat outside on the deck in the gorgousness of today. watched some peeps launch a hot air balloon at the park across the street (happens once every summer or two).

went grocery shopping, then came home and went for a walk. i did great, we did our 'normal' route and I wasn't even tired when we got home (the other day we did a modified walk and i was pooped!), yea me!

had a horrible dream last night! In it, I suddenly came to the realization that my teeth didn't fit into my splint anymore, my right side was hitting and my left wasn't even close (right now it is a perfect fit!). I was freaking out, so I called my OS. It was late on a Sunday night but I called his emergency number. When I talked to him though and told him what was going on, he said, "You wrecked it, you chewed. It's your fault." I freaked out of course, tried to explain that I haven't chewed ANYTHING but he would have nothing to do with me, he just said, "Nope, you wrecked it" and wouldn't listen to me, he just
kept yelling at me for chewing.

I was SO happy when I woke up and realized that I was dreaming and that my teethdo still fit together! I was crushed in my dream thinking that I would need surgery AGAIN! My OS is a great guy and has never yelled at me at all.

day 24 - friday

2005-08-12T17:54:00.000-05:00

friday already! how did that happen??? not fair!

i'm back to work next week, this is my last weekend before working again. yes, i don't go back to work until wednesday so it's a 3 day week, poor me. oh and thursday is a team building event so we're out of the office from 11-5, he he he! should be an easy week. which is good.

today is going ok, couldn't get to sleep again last night. no headache though so no tylenol PM for me. i did fall asleep slightly faster than i did in the previous nights, which means that i only laid around in bed for around an hour before falling asleep... blah.

swelling sucks. it's still here. i want it to go away. it's only slightly worse but to me it seems WAY worse than it was before. ron says it's a little noticeable. stupid naproxen.

i'm still feeling good though other than the swelling. i had a shower and ron and i were out of the house today by 1:15! this is a miracle! at least it is for me lately. :) i'm a big lazy bum.

day 23 - thursday

2005-08-11T18:07:00.000-05:00

slept like crap again last night. blah. actually sleeping wasn't an issue, it was the fact that i COULDN'T fall asleep at all! and i had a headache (i think because i was so freaking tired, it wasn't a jaw related headache, not like my headaches before surgery anyway). i finally took 2 tylenol pms and then finally fell asleep. i didn't wake up until ron came home for lunch at noon. oops. so much for getting into a more regular schedule as i'm going back to work in LESS THAN A WEEK! gah!

i started some lace knitting, which is notable because i haven't been able to knit anything remotely requiring thought since my surgery. lace knitting = requires thought. it's going slowly, but going and i have yet to make a MAJOR mistake, so yea me! i must be getting better or something. :)

we're now on day 2 of no naproxen. it's going well. went out today to the evil empire and to target and i got pretty tired. but i was also hungry. how i am going off to work for 8 hours a day starting next wednesday, i have no idea. we'll have to see!

day 23 = yes virginia, you can choppy pizza. once taking off the crust, you cut it into little pieces, and then choppy the hell out of them. my choppied pizza was from target, a CPK garlic chicken pizza. not so bad. i've been kinda meh about eating lately because i'm sick of pastas and the like. blah. and soup, please. i don't want soup. i'm just not in the mood for anything. i want to chew.

day 22 - wednesday

2005-08-10T18:14:00.000-05:00

three weeks! i had surgery three weeks ago today!

i decided to celebrate by not being able to fall asleep at all last night, then sleeping like crap, waking up congested despite still sleeping next to my humidifier, and then passing out cold for a good 3 some hours.

my sister woke me up at 11:30. i told her last night after group that she could come over and i'd make pancakes again. so she called and i said, i'm sleeping. i'l call you back. then i went back to sleep. i did call her back and it was not that much longer. she did come over and i made pancakes, scrambled eggs with cheese and sausage and we also had oj. it was quite yummy. i almost impressed myself. i rock.

then i did nothing for the rest of the day. la la la. here's me. i am just sitting on my couch. doing nothing. oh, i'm watching futurama, kinda. and surfing the net. no shower even yet. but i plan on doing that shortly.

i'm off my meds today completely. i woke up yesterday and things were blurry. i put on my glasses and they were still blurry. i rubbed my eyes, i had just woken up and shouldn't that fix everything? it didn't. hmm... so it went away, after a little while. but i didn't like it. so i decided, no more naproxen for me.

i'm doing fine other than being tired. which could very much be related to me sleeping like crap. meh.

i'm off to take a shower.

three weeks ago at this time i was in the hospital. next week at this time i'll be telling ron about my first day back to work (!)

day 20 - monday

2005-08-08T21:29:00.000-05:00

today I ate at a restaurant, for the first time since surgery! it was very exciting, yet slightly scary as well.

it is my sister's birthday, and she and my mom were going to red lobster for her birthday dinner. well red lobster, i can eat that! (i have heard from other post-opers that fish and chips are usually easy enough to eat). our waiter was great. i did get the fish and chips but i asked if the french fries were the big wedges (good) or little fries (bad). he said shoe string little guys. hmm... not good... I asked if i could get mashed potatoes instead, he said, "yup, no problem!". he then asked what kind of salad I wanted. um... i said, "um, well I can't chew anything, so... none?" he said, "hm, do you want applesauce?" what a guy! i was impressed anyway. i said, "oh... not really" (sorry, i want real food!) he said, "soup?" so i got the chicken fajita soup.

my meal was awesome. the soup was perfect, i was able to easily eat it, no big chunks of anything but still chunky enough to make me happy, and it was good! my fish and potatoes came and i was easily able to chop up my fish with my fork, add some tartar sauce and eat it with no chewing. the mashed potatoes were easy to eat, and i was even able to eat small pieces of the yummy cheddar biscuits!

good day overall.

i'm getting more feeling in my palate on the inside of my mouth. it's been swollen on the back left area, and i think today is the first day that it's almost entirely not swollen. it feels pretty similar to the right side of my mouth. this left area has been kinda tingly weird. not numb but not normal.

my cheeks and my nose area seem slightly more swollen today. i think it's because i'm weaning myself off my naproxen. i don't need it at all for pain, but do for the swelling still. blah. overall i'm still doing great swelling wise, not much at all.

i have been able to feel my screws a little more easily today as well. it's weird! luckily it doesn't really freak me out, which is good as they are staying here for good unless they decide to get infected or try to come out.

day 19 - sunday

2005-08-07T23:28:00.000-05:00

today was my sister kristi's birthday party in FL! ron and i went up there and we had DQ ice cream cake (just for me! although my sister does like it too so it all worked out). i was able to eat most of it, i just gave the inner layer of crunchiness to ron.

day is going well. slightly more swelling than before, i think both because i'm not taking as much of my naproxen and not as often, and because we slept in and i slept longer than i have been sleeping.

still fighting the girl issue. but it's getting better thank god!

day 18 - saturday

2005-08-06T11:47:00.000-05:00

feeling good today. tired jaw, face is tired too. not sure if i'm talking too much or smiling too much or if it's just being off the drugs. swelling is ok, better than yesterday.

today for breakfast i ate (choppied) sausage and cream of wheat for breakfast.

ron and i spent the afternoon test driving a car. he's looking for a new main car for us. i'm not into it but if he can pull it all off and we aren't spending much more per month on our payment, then i'll think about it.

had noodles for early dinner (penne rosa & tofu). had to bring it home of course, to choppy it all up.

after dinner we were hammocking on our deck, we LOVE our hammock and we took a nap.

after my nap i had yogurt snack. (still trying to kick that girl issue, anything i can do!)

it was villagefest at a local town so ron and my sister and i went to the fireworks they were putting on. they were ok, no rhythm and booms (madison WI amazing fireworks show) but good. i had a snow cone, i'm into ice and ice cream, they make the inside of my mouth feel better.

after the fireworks ron and i went grocery shopping. needed breakfast food for me, food for ron.

ate very late dinner of baked potato with potato topping. i did choppy the potato before i ate it but mostly just because i like eating the skin of potatoes, if i had just eaten the potatoe inside it wouldn't have had to be choppied.

day 17 - friday

2005-08-05T22:37:00.000-05:00

so i called dr. hobday's office asap in the morning with my stupid broken bracket issue. the receptionish said that they could get me in at 9:40 am. I took it, as i was not into having the wire stuck in my cheek all weekend or longer. dr. hobday was not in, but the other ortho, the assistant and I decided to just clip the wire and rebond that bracket next time. done! that's what i wanted anyway.

so this is my first day with no pain/swelling drugs. i'm more swollen. and the right side of lip is slightly fuzzy/numb and i don't think it was before. plus i'm tired and pooped.

but i went to shopping with kristi today, we went to crafty planet and i got some yarn to make my grandma legwarmers (she has bone cancer and the AC on her legs causes her pain), then we went to barnes & noble, michaels and home goods (TJ maxx's home store) where i got another choppy!

this evening ron and i were tryingo to save money, so instead of coldstone, we had mcdonalds sundaes, and it was $2.14 instead of the $8.71 for coldstone. not bad. we also rented a movie from the red box, which we think is a great deal. and that is why tonight we watched hitch, not as bad as we thought it would be, so that's good!

i'm also pretty sure about the yeast infection, so we stopped at target. yeah, this is one of those situations where you break out the cash and pay twice as much for a one day treatment as opposed to a 7 day treatment. TOTALLY worth every penny. like you want to drag this out for 7 days, kill me now. i'll take the one day, thank you!

day 16 - thursday

2005-08-04T23:57:00.000-05:00

work up at my normal time of around 10:30ish.

today is my week #2 check up with dr. keane (surgeon), yea!

took a shower, got ready, did my hair and put in my contacts (yes again!) and went off to needlework unlimited, my favorite yarn store in the area. spent a little more time there than i should have, i had to run off to dr. keane's. luckily his office is very close to my favorite yarn store.

dr. keane's visit went mostly well. it was weird because as i mentioned, i was running late. so i ran inside and then ran up the stairs to the 2nd floor (where his office is). last time i was there (monday of last week, 10 days earlier) i was holding onto ron's arm on the way in, and then we took the elevator both on the way up and down from my appt. so there is one example of how i am doing better.

anyway, dr. keane says that things are looking good and i am healing well. my stitches are loosening up (apparently that is good?)

i asked and he said that yes, i can use my electric toothbrush as long as i'm only on the teeth on my upper teeth and i don't go higher. as i am not into brushing way above my teeth, i was fine with this.

i also asked about sneezing and blowing my nose and he gave me the ok to do both. YEA!

then he tried to kill me and said that MY SPLINT MAY BE IN FOR 5-6 MORE WEEKS. i said/stammered... but, wha? but, before? 5-6 MORE weeks? i thought... you said 6 weeks, maye earlier? but?

he said that we will discuss it more the next time i come in, which is in two weeks. luckily dr. keane likes to change his mind about things and i'm almost thinking that next time i go in he'll say, "ok, let's take out your splint!" and i'll say, um, what? but you said? whatever. so i'm not letting myself get freaked out about NOT BEING ABLE TO EAT AT THE STATE FAIR IF MY SPLINT IS IN LONGER. no, i am not thinking about it.

we had chipotle for dinner, mine choppied of course. then i went to poker with ron, both of them. he does texas hold'em tournaments (free due to MN law) at a few bars in the area. i haven't been to them so i was intrigued. i knit the whole time, it was pretty boring for me as i was just off to the side and not by any of the action.

at the first location (grand rios in MN, MN's largest water park) i walking around and went to check out the waterpark (not so impressive, it's obviously the largest in MN because it's the only one in MN). so i was walking back to the bar and i realized that i had a poking wire on my right side on the bottom, what is going on? ran to the bathroom and looked in the mirror, bottom right farthest back bracket is broken off. huh??? what??? how??? i am definetly not eating anything that would snap it off and i checked all my brackets after surgery, none had been broken during surgery so wtf? i don't get it. so i'll be waking up early to call my ortho, i don't want this poking me all weekend long.

today was ok. i knitted alot. i also think that i'm getting a yeast infection? i'm sure 3 days of IV antibiotics and then 2 weeks of heavy duty antibiotics would do that to a girl. all i know if that IT SUCKS.

day 15 - wednesday

2005-08-03T21:32:00.000-05:00

today was a big day! today i played with a few friends of mine that i haven't played with since before surgery! mr. hairdryer and my contacts. why the big day? well i'm going out into the real world today. acutally did my hair, and wore my contacts! i could have worn my contacts a long time ago, but i haven't really had a reason to wear them around the house so i haven't put them in.

so off i went to dr. hobday (my ortho) today. he looked at my teeth, had my bite, told me things look good. so i guess that's good. then his assistant lori (who always takes care of me, i'm not sure if she likes me or if no one else likes me... i'm not that demanding...). anyway, she took off my surgical hooks!!! i don't think you people understand how freaking happy this makes me, these things have been driving me INSANE since the day they were put in, the 21st of june... i have had wax on them this entire time. gah! but now they are gone, and i am so happy.

after my ortho appt i visited my friend nicole at work. her work is very close to the ortho office i went to (not my normal office, this was the one REALLY far from me, but they could get me in at 3 pm, so i took it as opposed to 8 am at my normal office). nicole was impressed with how i looked and i liked that she introduced me to people as, "this is my friend cori". and didn't mention my surgery. that made me feel like i look somewhat normal as she didn't mention my surgery.

on my way home i stopped at the yarn cafe in maple grove, and then crafty planet near my house. yarn yarn and more yarn, yea!

i picked up jersey mike's for dinner to surprise ron, he LOVES jersey mike's. i had my own sandwich, i just scraped the yumminess out of my sandwich and choppied it. i even added some of the bread/sub and it worked out really well. YUM.

today was my last day of antibiotics, yea!!!

day 14 - tuesday

2005-08-02T23:31:00.000-05:00

ron was at poker today, so i ran out and got a chicken bol from chipotle. yum! i love chipotle and it's easy to choppy and it tastes so good!

sent out cori update #2 to my peeps to keep them updated. i'm also working on my website so you peeps can start seeing some pics of me! this is taking up a bunch of time, i didn't really think about it before, but now that i'm putting it all together, it's a whole site that i'm putting together. oops, i could have done this before surgery so now all i had to do was upload pics to it! oh well.

day 13 - monday

2005-08-01T23:31:00.000-05:00

my sister moved close to me over the weekend, so today i woke up and asked if she wanted some pancakes. she said yes, so she came over and i made pancakes! we had pancakes, sausage and oj. good meal! i did choppy my pancakes and sausage, but it was good overall. yea for choppys!

for dinner ron and i had burger king! he's a sucker for rodeo cheeseburgers and i was dying for something greasy. i had a whopper and fries! we obviously brought them home and i choppied them (separately of course). it was SO GOOD!

day 12 - sunday

2005-07-31T23:28:00.000-05:00

today ron and i went to FL to visit my mom and to help her set up her new ibook!

she bought us dinner, and i wanted mexican. we all wanted something different so we called in our orders and picked them all up and went home. i had a chicken chimichanga, YUM! i knew we were eating up at her house, so i came prepared. i brought my choppy, a flexible cutting board, my waterpik and my toothbrush and toothpaste so i was ready to go. getting everything together was a pain, i think it's preping us for having kids!

day 11 - saturday

2005-07-30T23:25:00.000-05:00

today we got another choppy, this one from target. yea! a fleet of choppys has been started!

later ron and i helped my sister and her boyfriend move into their new apartment! however not really. they live on the top floor of their apartment building, no elevator so we're talking 2 long flights of stairs. i wanted to help, but i'm only at day 11! i did carry one small box up the stairs, i started getting slower and slower the more stairs i went up. at the top, i was pooped and done. i spent the rest of my time resting on the couch. :) i know, i know. i feel almost normal, until i try to do normal things.

after we helped for 10 minutes with the moving, i said "let's have some ice cream!" (it was hot out, and i wanted ice cream!) i convinced everyone that we should get some coldstone. so off we went to coldstone. i told my coldstone chick that i needed mine chopped up REALLY WELL as i just had jaw surgery and i can't chew at all. she gently folded my ice cream and mix ins together. she then looked up and said, "how is this?" i looked at her, trying not to give her a look like she was insane, are you joking? i said, "um... not really, i can't chew at all, i need it REALLY chopped up". she then went to town on it and then gave me a snotty look like, fine then, i'll chop the hell out of it. i said, "thank you". :)

oh, and it was awesome!

after ice cream we went to walmart near by. my sister needed some basic stuff for her new apartment. you know, cleaning stuff, paper towels, toilet paper, etc. i'm not into the evil empire, it's safe to say that i RARELY go there. but i went, mostly because i'm up for anything that makes me feel like a normal person. :) we were there for some time getting everything, i was pretty tired by the time we left.

day 9 - thursday

2005-07-28T23:22:00.000-05:00

today was my last MLD appt. leslie and i think that i'm doing great and that most of what is left for swelling is the long term swelling that is going to stick around for a while, so she released me from her care. yea! MLD today was amazing. it was like a massage. so relaxing and wonderful. yea!

also today, i went on my first adventure alone! i went up to my hometown where my mom/family is. ron was at poker so my night was free.

on the way up there, i stopped at michaels for knitting needles to help finish up a project i am working on. by some miracle, they had them! whoohoo!

once back in my car i called my friend nicole, i haven't talked to her since before surgery (driving very carefully of course!). ron did call and tell her that i was ok and things went well, but i hadn't actually called her. she told me that she sent me a beautiful big bouquet of gerbs in the hospital, but just got a call two days ago from the flower store. turns out that they delivered them to a different cori in the hospital and they were just calling to let her know. she was a little pissed, they are calling her a WEEK later to tell her this! she said, "i want my money back to my credit card immediately!" apparently the person on the phone gave her crap about it so she said, give me your manager. she got the money back to her card that night. what a bunch of hosers! she said she would send me flowers some day. :) just knowing that she tried makes me feel happy.

my mom wasn't home and my sister was packing so i visited my grandma and grandpa while i was in town. they were happy to see me, my grandma said, "you aren't swollen at all!" i beg to differ of course. no, i'm not that bad, but i am still swollen!

my mom was home when i came back from my grandparents. she wanted coffee but my mom and i wanted ice cream so we went to DQ. i had a key lime pie blizzard, with no pie crust added to the blizzard. it was slightly good, but got old rather quickly.

then on my way home i gave into one of my many cravings and stopped at arby's on the way home. i got potato cakes and mozzarella sticks. yum! had an issue where the idiot running the cash register gave me $5 in change, when the total was $4.56 and i gave him $10.61. um... he gave me the five and shut the window. i looked at the five in my hand and thought, dude i may be on pain meds but this isn't right... i need $6.05 back! the guy finally came to the window with my food and i said, 'hey! i need more $, i need another $1.05, i gave you $10.61!". he said, "no, you gave me 51 cents, i threw in a nickel we had on the register." i said, "whatever, i still want my dollar." he had to go find someone to open the register, blah blah blah, i finally got my dollar. dork. i felt silly fighting with him, my speech isn't amazing yet thanks to swelling and my splint, i didn't want to fight him and i found it hard to get myself understood, but i did it anyway.

so i got home and mashed up my potato cakes, drizzled ketchup on them, yum! it worked well. my mozz sticks were another story. didn't work that well, i fork chopped one up and gave ron the others. oh well. win some, lose some.

day 7 - tuesday

2005-07-26T23:20:00.000-05:00

so when i woke up, my tongue is covered in ick, i made the mistake of looking at it and it looked like kinda dried blood and ick. ewww! i used the tongue cleaner attachment for my waterpik to get the ick out, and used my new scope (but at a like 8:1 ratio, water:scope). it was MUCH better but gross overall.

today i showered, yea! it was good. amazing how that works.

this evening i went to group with my mom and sister, got tired. stayed only an hour into it (it's a two hour group).

on our way home we got chipotle! and i did too (chicken bol, rice on one side, chicken on the other, cheese on the whole thing, tomato salsa, sour cream and guac on the side)! my mom ordered for me (i'm not comfortable talking to people i don't know).

i blended my chipotle up with our stick blender, it worked well. i was happy, real food!

day 6 - monday

2005-07-25T23:40:00.000-05:00

today i FINALLY felt better! no more puking! thank god!

i woke up with TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE breath and gross taste in mouth. the first thing i did was waterpik and brush. when rinsing and waterpiking i was spitting out lots of clots and ick. so gross!

ron stayed home with me all day today to make sure that i was ok, isn't he sweet?

had cream of wheat for lunch. did ok, yea!

i had MLD #3 today. i was nervous, i was kinda associating MLD with my weekend of puking since it started after my MLD. i have no real idea of why i was puking, could have been anesthesia post effects, could have really been the Vicodin, could have been my removing the anti-nausea patch from behind my ear. Who knows. MLD went well though. Leslie is great, so kind and gentle and I felt good afterwards.

we went to visit dr. keane for post op appt week 1. he says i look great, things are healing well, my rent looks like it's healing well. everything is good. we asked about the stank breath and he said i can use diluted scope, as long as it's at least 1:1. he doesn't want me using full scope, it's too strong and he doesn't want the alcohol upsetting the balance in my healing mouth.

after my appt even though i was totally exhausted, we went to walgreens and picked up some boost juice. it's not bad and full of nutrition, better than regular juice. we also got some scope and tom's of maine mouthwash.

my mom came over to visit later in the night. she was very happy to see me feeling better (so was i!!!) later i had a stuffed green pepper and she had the other one. even though it was stouffer's, it was yummy! i blended mine up with our stick blender and it worked well. i was starving so i had peaches too! (also blended with the stick blender).

Surgery day!

2005-07-20T00:06:00.000-05:00

surgery in just a few hours! i'm nervous but doing ok.

today was my last day of work. i'll be out for the next 3-4 weeks. my team is unbelievable. they had treats for me at the end of the day, my manager got a bunch of cookies. not only that, but they also got me a HUGE bag of stuff. they are so sweet. i have play-doh, origami paper and instructions, lotions and potions and bath stuff to pamper myself, travel connect four, other crafty things to do while i'm out. my manager's husband got me a box of jaw breakers. ha ha ha! :) that's my kind of sense of humor.

ron and i went to baker's square for dinner tonight. we already did the sushi blowout last week, and his steaks over the weekend, so we weren't doing fancy tonight. plus i LOVE the grilled cheese and fries at baker's square. so it was all good. last real meal for some time!

tomorrow i'll be in the hospital at this time! mom is sleeping over with me if she can (apparently it's only allowed in private rooms and they are first come, first serve and they cost extra, that insurance won't pay... fun!), yea!

Or maybe not? (also known as, UPPER ONLY!!!)

2005-06-30T16:19:00.000-05:00

After trying unsuccessfully to set up a CT scan of my lower jaw to see where the main nerve is located to aid my surgeon (they didn’t have my referral from my OS), my OS’s office called (also known as Lisa, my favorite employee there!). She said that dr. keane had been able to get more into my molds and did surgery on them and he has decided that my surgery will be for upper only. Apparently before he had only played around with them and was thinking that it would be both upper and lower, but then after having time to actually do the surgery on them he had decided upper only.

WHOOOHOOO!!!

This relieves me so much. I am VERY much not into lower, I don’t know why it creeps me out so much more than upper. I have no idea. Maybe because I’ve had a year and a half to get used to upper? Anyway, I am very excited about this. YEA!

More details after my appt on Friday with dr. keane.

sushi party baby!!!

2005-06-29T23:23:00.000-05:00

JULY 20!!!

a date! finally! it's for real!!!

BUT, it’s upper and LOWER. Suckidy suck. I didn’t want lower. But if he thinks it will be better for my bite/my appearance/for whatever reason, he’s the one to make the call. But still. Suck.

wow.

so is this when I start freaking out about this???

THAT'S THREE WEEKS FROM TODAY!

so then, sushi party for me. who's in???

la la la... um... oral surgeon's office? hello?

2005-06-28T21:22:00.000-05:00

So… no call. I called dr. keane’s this morning to check in and to make sure that they got the records and, guess what? They didn’t.

Ugh.

Thanks to the wonderful lisa at dr. keane’s, my records were hand delivered to them from the ortho today. She’s waiting for a call from the assistant surgeon to verify that he’s open the 13th and the 20th and then I should get a call tomorrow regarding my surgery date. FINALLY. I’ll believe it when it happens. I’m starting to feel like this surgery might not happen until NEXT july. Grrr…

hooks are for pirates!

2005-06-21T20:20:00.000-05:00

Presurgery appt with dr. hobday - ortho. Goodness. That was an appt and a half. Took out my wires and then it all began. Starting with xrays, they have a new machine so I got to do two of the panographic ones, the first one wasn’t saved. And the one where they do the side of your head and you have the things in your ears. That one always creeps me out and I was particularly disgusted because I swear I saw some ear gunk on the ear thing BEFORE she put it in my ear. Ewww. Then onto the molds. Two sets. I chose grape flavored mold which has been great in the past. Not this time, it just tasted like ewww. Then dr. hobday came in and we did the soft wax mold fun where you bite down into soft wax. First with your front teeth, then with your molars, the whole time he’s guiding my jaw into a position that feels very unnatural. Finally the assistant wired tied EVERY tooth, and put hooks onto my 4 front teeth on both the top and the bottom. (but I’m not being wired shut??? Why are we doing this?). finally I have my powerchains put back on. Dr. hobday says, ‘see you 2 weeks after surgery.’. I say, ‘huh? Dr. keane says 6 weeks after surgery.’ He says, ‘nope, two weeks later for a retie.’. um, my upper teeth will have a splint on them for SIX WEEKS. How will they be retied with a splint WIRED to them??? Whatever. I wasn’t about to fight him with mold crap all in my teeth and all over my face. I’m on dr. keane’s side, we’re not doing anything to my teeth until that splint is off.

I called dr. keane’s after my appt to let them know that the records are on their way. They told me that I should get a call Friday or Monday to set up my surgery. Yea!!!

oh, and p.s. these hooks, on the bottom, suck!!! it's like I just got braces again! where's that wax???

and she huffed, and she puffed....

2005-06-15T15:16:00.000-05:00

So I called and called and called and finally got in earlier for my pre-surgery appt at the ortho. yea!!! I called Lisa at the OS to tell her and she said, yea! Now I should get a call about my surgery friday or monday after that, and we'll be in door county! I'll have my cell on me at all times I guess.

did some one call for an oral surgeon?

2005-06-10T23:15:00.000-05:00

Appt with oral surgeon, dr. keane. Many good things at this appt. #1 – I’m not going to be wired/banded shut, AT ALL! So even though I can’t chew for 6 weeks, I won’t have any issues with meds or food, no being shut for me. Yea! I’m so happy! Dr. keane still can’t tell me if I’m doing just upper or both at this point. Apparently the mold they got from dr. hobday just tells him that things look good, he needs an articulator mold to do surgery on and this will tell him what he needs to know. He kinda laughed and said, ‘you seem to be chomping at the bit and want this done soon.’. um, are you sure???? If I have a ‘pre-surgery’ appt with my ortho june 29th… no, I want to wait until September for my surgery. Yes I want it done soon! I’ve been waiting on this for a freaking year! I want to go on with my life! I want to be able to think about having kids, stuff like that. Get this behind me and over with! But of course I didn’t say that, I said, ‘um, a little. I just want it done soon.’ He says surgery should be the 13th or 20th of july, he will call as soon as he gets the info from dr. hobday’s records appt to set things up. The 4th of july is in there screwing things up, not sure about the timing.

getting somewhere?

2005-06-03T23:13:00.000-05:00

Things look good, dr. hobday thinks I’m ready to go! Did progress molds and setup an appt for june 29th for my pre-surgery records appt. yea!

are we there yet??? (55 weeks/12 months)

2005-06-01T09:37:00.000-05:00

the gap is BIG, at least as big as it was last time I was at the ortho. It is just at/slightly larger than 1 mm (it’s hard to accurately measure a gap in your teeth on your own…). I better be ready for surgery. Appt for molds is in two days, pre-surgery consult with dr. keane is next Friday. Hopefully we can schedule the surgery at that time, whoohoo!!! I want this over with asap! It is getting quite annoying to not be able to schedule ANYTHING for July and August. I’m hoping that my surgery is in July. When I talked to dr. keane’s office they told me that his surgeries are on Wednesdays, and they usually schedule 30-45 days out. I’m hoping for July 13th, it would work best for me. If I can get in, July 6th would be awesome too. I’m thinking the 13th is a little early though, I would have a lot of dr. appts between now and then! But that’s fine, it doesn’t matter when it is, I’ll have a lot of pre-op stuff to do. If it was the 13th then I should hopefully be able to eat sushi for my birthday in September! That’s my goal anyway.

I’m getting more nervous/unhappy about the food situation. I can’t remember how long dr. keane said I would be banded shut. I know I have the splint in for 6 weeks and that whole time I’m on a no chew diet. That’s fine. Well it sucks but it’s ok. My question is, how long am I banded tightly shut? I have been talking to peeps who have had the surgery (a buyer at work that I have been talking with, she had surgery last may, and a girl on my new team who had upper and lower 3 years ago) and they both say that while you are banded/wired shut that you can’t eat anything. Even applesauce is too thick. Great…. I can’t imagine subsiding on vanilla and chocolate boosts/ensures and juice. Blah.

can I be an orthodontist too??? (53 weeks/12 months)

2005-05-18T09:36:00.000-05:00

5 days later and my space is slightly bigger, but barely. It seemed to move the tiniest amount that first day, and then nothing. Ugh… So I call the ortho, again. Dr. Hobday would like to see me, he can see me at 4:30 TODAY. I tell the person on the phone, well… I’m at work, it’s 2:30 pm and I take the bus. There is no way I could make it today, at all. Of course, it’s dr. hobday’s last day at work for some time, he’s going on vacation. Ugh. I can come in and see any ortho though, he has made notes in my chart. Gah! So I chat with the lady and tell her that dr. other ortho had a hard time deciding whether to put the chain over my gap or not and finally decided to do it, can I just cut the chain and watch it? She says yes, but then talks to a dr. to check. They say go for it. YEA! I clip it.

be careful what you wish for i guess... (52 weeks/12 months and ONE DAY!)

2005-05-13T09:30:00.000-05:00

So… now my space is almost closed. Gah! I called and of course they wanted me to come in. fine. You can come in on Friday. Great. But then I get in on Friday and dr. hobday isn’t even there! I have some other ortho. Meh. I sit down in the chair and the assistant says, 'so what is the problem?' I explain that my space is not big enough.' she looks confused, 'not big enough???' FOR GODS SAKE PEOPLE, DO YOU READ THE CHARTS AT ALL??? Yes, I'm having surgery, my upper jaw will be split into 2 pieces and they need a space between my two front teeth for the incision. That space was too big last time, it is now too small. Good lord. So dr. random ortho (who was quite nice by the way) has the assistant put in this metal piece between my bracket and the spring to make the spring more active. Works for me. He wavers back and forth but then decided to put the power chain over it. Tells me to watch it and call if it is too big or too small…

is there a dr. in the house? (51 weeks/12 months/1 YEAR!)

2005-05-04T09:27:00.000-05:00

Anyone else want to check me?

I had both a dental cleaning and an ortho appt this morning.

As much as I LOVE dr. wong, I do not really like his hygienists. I had a horrible experience with the one (too bad I don’t know her name…). the one I have been seeing is ok but this cleaning was no fun. Let’s see. Well, when polishing my teeth she decided to go across the front of my lower teeth in one swoop. Goodbye gums. I was worried about recession before, after that one I’ll probably need gum surgery. And then, for some reason she flossed my teeth. I have been to the dentist twice already with braces and they have never tried to floss me. First she was all, ‘do you have any problems flossing?’ I think I pissed her off because I said, ‘no.’ and she was expecting me to whine about my braces. She was in a talkative mood and I just didn’t want to chat, I was annoyed. Anyway, then she tried to kill me. I don’t know what I’ll do next time, but flossing is out!

The torture was finally over and it was off to dr. hobday’s. fun. I brought up the fact that my space on top is HUGE, and I know that we want it greater than 1 MM but it IS greater than 1 MM. so they took out a section of the coil and put a power chain on top. Hopefully that helps. Plus the larger wire on the bottom, from a 19 steel to a 25. ouch, that one was tight. I was surprised.

who's a fool today??? (46 weeks/11 months)

2005-04-01T09:23:00.000-06:00

finally the day was here, the day where we get going on what needs to be done before surgery. the day i have been waiting for. yea! A strong coil/spring was put between my two upper front teeth. It feels quite weird and is opening already! Dr. hobday wanted to keep the other springs in there until I asked him why… he thought about it for a second and then looked sheepish and said, ‘yeah, I suppose we should take those out.’ He also said that next time we’ll put in a stronger wire on the bottom. Yea!

a month is too long to wait... (44 weeks/10 months)

2005-03-18T09:19:00.000-06:00

i called dr. hobday's office last week and asked if dr. hobday could call me and let me know what is up with my molds once he gets to look at them. he called back a day or two later, and is much more personable on the phone. it was great, he said that my molds look good. new plan is to do a 2-piece lefort instead of a 3 piece. it will mean better healing for me, and also less risk to my teeth as they are only cutting between 2 teeth instead of 4. sounds good to me, if it works that's cool. he did say that i will then have my coils/springs moved to between my two front teeth, and i will have a space between my two front teeth before and after surgery. ick. :( but it's only a mm. ONE MILLIMETER? that's almost nothing. so i guess that's ok. he said he sees this taking 2-3 months (i'm assuming he means from my next appt date, which is april 1). and that he sees surgery being during 'summertime' and that i should have my braces off by the end of the year. of course, depending on how things move, etc. (always an asterisk at the end of his sentence). well, 2-3 months that's june 1 - july 1st. that's soon! but that's good, the sooner the better. (gah, scary!) his big concern was that he hasn't heard from dr. keane.

so, once off the phone with him i called dr. keane's office to get things going. told her the news of the change in surgery, and they said come on in!

so I went in for a consult with OS dr. keane. I wasn't too sure of him after last time, I thought he was nice enough but he made me nervous doing my surgery. But then we chatted for a good 1/2 hour, and now I like him a lot. I impressed him too! He was like, 'wow, so you have been researching this, huh? You know more than I do!'

hey, what can I say, the internet has a lot of info out there and the yahoo orthognathic surgery groups are full of great info.
He and my ortho now say that I should have surgery sometime this 'summertime', possibly july or august* (always with the asterisk of, provided your teeth move correctly, no problems come up, we don't change our mind about things, and the moon aligns with the 3rd star past jupiter, etc). So that will be a blast. They have changed their minds and now think that I'll only need a 2 piece leforte, not a 3 piece. Which is better because my upper jaw will only be in 2 pieces and that will heal better/faster than 3 pieces and be less complicated. Both dr. hobday and dr. keane are really excited about this, it’s one less cut, easier healing, etc. Which is great, yes it is. At the same time, my upper jaw is still being cut into 2 pieces! 2 or 3, it doesn’t much matter! Dr. keane also dropped a bombshell on me that he thinks I 'might' need lower jaw surgery too. But we'll see once I'm about a month out from surgery and they have my surgery molds done. So that sucks. A lot. But I processed it for a minute and then started firing new questions at him. He was very impressed with my knowledge of all this. Of which, I feel like I don't know much at all. Gah!

Some time in 2005, maybe? (43 weeks/10 months...)

2005-03-07T11:46:00.000-06:00

had my big progress mold appt last friday, YEA! was very odd though, the ortho lady just plunked the mold into my mouth without taking out my wires or powerchains. so when she took it out my wires pretty much obliterated my molds, at least that's how it looked to me, both looking at the mold and picking the impression material out from between my teeth. my ortho looked at them though and said they were good, so i guess that's ok? whatever works for him i guess. i got my powerchains changed thank goodness, i was sick of pink and pink. i got a nice lavender on top now and bright teal on the bottom! the ortho had me make an appt 3 weeks out for a 'long adjustment' as he doesn't know what he'll need to do until he looks at my molds. of course, i couldn't get in for 4 weeks and my choices were 10:40 and 1:00... uh huh... so then, I picked 1:00 and will be taking a half day off of work. what a joke. gah! oh well, it's a friday so getting out early will be good. one thing that is annoying with this is that i get to go 4 more weeks without knowing ANYTHING about my surgery, what he needs to do to get me 'ready' and/or how much longer it will be. ugh! i feel like i can't plan my life, and now i wait another 4 weeks to hear anything at all! maybe my teeth will be perfect and ready to go? maybe? dr. hobday obviously is not in that camp as i have this appt set up. he was saying we might do some rebonding, etc. ugh. if he moves brackets then i start all over again with the flexy wires! :P that's ok. i didn't want to have kids before i was 40 anyway...

one thing i'm concerned about is that i have some gum regression on my bottom right, between teeth 2 & 3. i first noticed it a week ago friday. it was sore and red and SHRINKING. i called my ortho and they said that he would look at it on friday. he did, didn't seem too concerned, said that i had some before, maybe something irritated it. i have been careful to brush it well and thoroughly yet carefully at the same time. looking today though now i see that if you look at my two bottom middle teeth, the one on my right has a lower gumline than the left. gah!!! great, one more thing to worry about with all this.

sometimes orthodontists lie (36 weeks/8 months)

2005-01-21T15:33:00.000-06:00

archwire appt today for me!

so my ortho lady today was a little slow. i wanted to floss as long as my wires would be off. so she cut all my tie wires on top, then on the bottom. took out my bottom wire and i said, 'when you get both off, i would like to floss.' she said, 'oh, they are both off. here.' gives me floss. i am thinking, um, but she didn't take off the top wire... so i say, 'they are both off? even the top?' she says, 'yup'. i feel like i'm in the twilight zone. so i go to the mirror, look at my teeth, AND, THE TOP WIRE IS STILL IN! so i go back to her, sit down and say, 'my top wire is still in...' she's all, 'oh, i swear i took it out!' well, what are you going to believe, your faulty memory or the fact that if you look over you will see that IT IS STILL IN MY MOUTH! do we really need to fight about it? it's right here! so she takes it out, and it was a pain in the butt as it has been the last few times. yeah, it's already out... so, i floss. it's awesome as always. also, with the wires and chains and tie wires off i can kinda see my teeth. they look AWESOME! i can't wait until i'm all done!

so, i go back and she's getting my springs ready. yea! (to put the spaces in between my eye teeth and the tooth behind it so dr. keane has a safe area to cut for my expansion). as she's putting them in she mutters, 'i wonder why he's doing this, are you getting bonding done or something?'. ok, i'd like to take a second to mention here that my chart is highlighted with yellow highlighter mentioning that i'm a surgical patient, lefort 3 piece... i tell her, 'um, it's because i'm having surgery and they need a space between my teeth so he doesn't damage my roots.' she says, 'oh... ok' now i know they are busy people, they see alot of patients but come on!

so all is done and my chains are on and i ask, 'do you really want the upper to have a power chain all the way across it? won't that make the springs not make spaces? or at least make it take much longer???' (as powerchains are put on TO CLOSE SPACES...) she says, 'it doesn't say not to. i'll ask dr. hobday.'. so he comes over to check me and she asks and he's like, 'whatever will make spaces. i would cut them, put singles on the back.' thank goodness, at least someone knows what's going on around here. so she cut the power chain, it goes from 3 to 3 (eye tooth to eye tooth), and i have regular ligatures on the two teeth behind those. she also asked if anything was poking. unfortunately, i've been to her before and she does wire tires very poorly. they are done fine, but when she folds them over they are VERY pokey! so i had her fix two of them. one is much better, the other is... ok. oh well. hopefully i don't need to go in again over them.

dr. hobday looked at my teeth for a bit, tells the assistant lady, 'set her up for 6 weeks' (i groan on the inside, 6 weeks! so long!), and then says, 'and have her come in for progress molds.' WHAT?!? molds?!? but you said 3 more appointments! hello?!?

who cares! molds! yea!

let's get this show on the road! (35 weeks/8 months in braces)

2005-01-14T10:05:00.000-06:00

was in the ortho's tuesday to have a chat with dr. hobday. ron came along. the reason for the meeting was that my benefits reenrollment is up. last day to change things is friday the 21st (the day of my appointment). i wanted to make sure that we would have enough time to figure everything out as i had many questions. what were my questions? well. see below! (yes, i had prepared this ahead of time)
________________________________________

Healthcare Spending Account – Questions for Dr. Hobday

-Re-enrollment ends January 21st. Plan year of March 1st 2005 through February 28th 2006. (no reimbursement during March 2006)

Things to budget for during this time

-Surgery – have been told approximately May/June timeframe. Is this still the case?

-Braces – for 3-6 months after surgery? (Nov-Dec)

-Probability to be out of braces by end of February 2006?

-Total retainer cost (permanent and clear overlay types) - $400 total or $800?
________________________________________

The answers i received were varied, but we finally got some info from him after trying and trying. :) He did say right away to take my copay amount for my surgery, the full amount of my braces and the cost of my retainers as it will be done by February 28, 2006. This made me excited. Until he said, 'if needed we can charge you ahead of time on the remainder of the braces and the retainers so you don't lose the money.' GAH! NO! braces must be off by the end of next Feb or I will go crazy! (although that is good info to know, i won't lose my money)...

so i said, 'so... you said surgery in may/june, in sept you said 9 months (may/june), are we still looking at early summer?' he makes a face. talks about something else. gah! no! :( so i say, 'are we looking at early fall???' he makes another face. explains to ron and i that he won't know until he does a progress mold and then does surgery on it to see how things line up. ron says, 'so you will do that on friday at her next appt?' dr. hobdays says, 'no, we won't do it for another two appts. AFTER this next one, so three appts.'. bummer. says that when doing surgery on the molds some people are immediately ready, others still need 6 months of work. gah! i hope i'm in the ready group! please!

i do think these appoinments help remind them that i'm a surgical candidate and that i want this done soon! once we talked dr. hobday added springs to the list of things to do in my next appt. so now i get my steel 19 in on the bottom, and springs between my upper 3 and 4's. (after my eye teeth). these will open a space up for dr. keane so he can cut my upper jaw into 3 pieces. fun! at least it's starting to look closer...

it's beginning to feel alot like christmas... (7 months or 32 weeks in!)

2004-12-22T10:02:00.000-06:00

so... appt friday 12/10. was an archwire adjustment and a rebond of the L7 bracket that fell off at the last appointment. no lori this time, it was a different lady, oh well. appointment starts with them putting on the missing bracket, this goes well, although i hate the protective glasses i have to wear to protect my eyes when they use the UV light to cure the glue. they are always gross and dirty and i have issues with them on my face. what if i just shut my eyes REALLY tight? anyway, dr hobday leaves, assistant lady takes off my lower wire and moves to the top. the top one won't come out. it's stuck on the right side. this is a good time, she's nicely trying to yank and i'm thinking that she's ripping my teeth out. she finally works it out after forever, says, 'that one must have gone in pretty hard!' funny, i don't remember it being that hard to get in! so she pulls it out and i think, what is that in my mouth, glue like last time? nope. it's a bracket. my upper left canine bracket fell off. this isn't even one of the brackets that was in the way or being torqued around. nope, other side. ugh. so she grinds the glue off. tells me it's not my fault (i wasn't thinking that it was!), there wasn't much glue on the tooth to clean off, must have been compromised when they were putting my braces on, etc. meh. so now we need to put my bracket on. of course, i'm supposed to be going up to a 25, now what? dr. hobday had left for a funeral, so dr. new ortho used my old wire to line things up and get the bracket in place. they bonded it while it was lined up with the wire. we were able to get the 25 in there, yea! she then put on the bottom wire. it felt EVEN LIGHTER than the one before which freaked me out, i want bigger, better, stiffer wires every time! just as i was about to speak up and say something about it, the assistant said, 'now you may be sore later, this one is flexible but it's bigger than the one before.' what? i laughed and told her what i was about to say. how weird!

so, get the wires in, wire tie 40 teeth (ok, ok, 6 on top, 4 on the bottom). pick raspberry chains for on top, light blue for the bottom. yea! get them all in, i'm outta there.

next appt is jan 21st. wow! so long! :(

but no, i'm back tuesday. i have a wire tie that is twisted weird and is ripping up the inside of my lip, and my upper left has a wire that is poking me in the back of my mouth. fun!

so, went in again for an emergency appt. a little clippie clippie and all was well. although looking them over my wire ties suck! they are very irritating in general. this lady must twist them and flip them over weird because they are all very jabby. meh. and of course, a week later and the left lower needs to be clipped. she tried when i was in last tuesday but it wasn't close enough. that space between my last two molars is closing and now it's pokey. i refuse to go in again!!!

this, that and a pokey wire (just short of 7 months, or 29 1/2 weeks!)

2004-12-06T11:42:00.000-06:00

wow. i haven't been around for a bit. my dad passed away the day after my last entry (sept 23). amazing how my teeth were so sore that night from my powerchains, new archwire and wire ties, yet the pain seemed to disappear instantly after hearing the news about my dad. anyway, things are getting easier every day and now it's time to catch up on my teeth.

been in to see dr. hobday twice since then. well, i've been into the ortho 4 times, seen hobday twice. was in twice to get a wire clipped. dumb powerchains! :) also went in to dr. wong for a teeth cleaning.

1st appt to dr. hobday was just a retie on october 20th. boring. i went from pink powerchains to a lilac chain on top, purple on the bottom. thank god i did the purple on the bottom, you could barely see it. it was pretty dark. the lilac was great, kinda a purply pink. i liked it alot. dr. hobday seemed to like my teeth movement. he told me that at my next appt i would be getting the band on my right side bottom 2nd bicuspid replaced because he didn't like the position of it. sounds good to me. he showed me how on my left side the 2nd bicuspid biting surface lined up with the tooth next to it, whereas on the right it made a step and the two were not on the same level. this is that same tooth that was quite rotated before that they had a hard time even getting a band on. i was quite intrigued as to how they get the bands off so i was all for this.

went in november 3rd to see dr. wong, my dentist for a teeth cleaning. they took x-rays of my molars, which i thought was weird, can they really see cavities with my braces?!? i think it may have been kinda pointless. all went well, he was very interested in my bite, not so much in my teeth. things must look well, i asked if i needed to come in for 3 month cleanings and he said no, just 6 month cleanings. WHOOHOO! so all that brushing, flossing, waterpiking and colgate phosphoring (ultra fluoride) must be working!

next appt with dr. hobday was on november 12th. a friday (this will be important later...). the assistant (the ever lovely lori, who i think traded someone for me as i was told chair 3 and then when i got into the room lori told me, 'sorry, chair one!', fine with me, i like her, she's nice and funny and doesn't stink like smoke). she took my wire off the bottom, and called dr. hobday over to remove my bracket (band). he came over, said hi, etc. had a pair of pliers and reached into my mouth with them, then took them out. to me, i thought he was testing them out, seeing if they were the correct size, but there was also some ick in my mouth, turns out it was the glue from my band, and my tooth was smooth! i looked at him in confusion and said, 'that's it? it's out?!?' he smiled and said, 'orthodontist secret'. so apparently getting your bands off isn't so bad. that's good. so then they scraped the rest of the stuff off my tooth and put on a bracket only! my tooth feels so naked! it's amazing! i can't even imagine not having braces, this one band off already feels so clutter free. :) i'm a dork. it will just be so cool though. i asked lori if i had to go back down to a flex wire and she said yes. :( but she did put in the biggest flex wire they have, so hopefully it's not too long before i'm back in the steels. i choose a spring/lime green chain for my uppers, and a darker green for the lowers. the upper green is just a hair too florescent for me, but it's ok overall. i have wanted this light green for some time, i may as well just do it. unfortunately, while putting on my lower chain my back bracket on the left side snapped off. gah! i had already been there forever and was almost done. lori just clipped my wire and said that we would put that bracket back on this next time. bummer. that is the back molar where i have a space between my furthest back molar and the one in front of it. so i'm sure next time i'll need to come in to get the wire clipped after a few days as that space will close up nicely with the chains, but torture me with the wire poking me. oh well. lori finished up and i was off. yea!

remember when i said that i went in on a friday, and that was important? um yeah... this is why. so dr. hobday had repositioned that one bracket (on the tooth that he took the band off of), and that is the same tooth that was rotated quite a bit when i first got my braces. well it seems that in the space of a day that tooth rotated enough that my teeth were fitting together more tightly than before, because i was already being poked by the end of my arch wire while eating. great. and it's mid day saturday. i have to wait until monday to get it fixed. monday morning comes along, i call dr. hobday's from home before work. oh, but the maple grove office isn't open on mondays, they can get me into rogers, in mid morning or mid afternoon... ugh, not going to work. of course, i have a work class tuesday morning so no getting in then. we finally figure out that i can come in tuesday november 16th at 4:20, up in CHAMPLIN! gah! what a joke! driving 20 minutes past where i normally go (which is a pain in itself) all for a 7 second procedure. oh well, i needed to do it, the wire was poking me and eating was not fun. i managed to get there 20 minutes early. they got me in, clipped it and i was on my way, 15 minutes before my appointment was even scheduled. ugh.

that's it, seems like i'm caught up now! my next appointment is this friday already. i think i'm going to do a christmas themed power chain this time. we'll have to see!

i can't floss without my 'equipment'... or can i?

2004-09-22T13:42:00.000-05:00

oh, i can't believe i forgot. it was wonderful this morning! so the ortho lady took off my ties and wires and then asked if i wanted to brush with my wire off. i didn't hesitate, 'heck yea!' she handed me some floss and said, 'here, you can floss too, go crazy. i'll be getting your wires ready' i looked at it and was confused for a second, it was plain old regular floss. (well mint flavored but still). then i realized, i could FLOSS. with out floss threaders or special floss. it was so weird. after 4 1/2 months of taking 10 minutes to floss and it took 90 seconds tops. yea! now i'm depressed that i have wires again. and to top it off, i have power chains too. it's weird. the color isn't so much around my brackets anymore as it is in between them. it's weird now to look in the mirror, i feel like my braces are much more noticeable. and the 'raspberry' i picked seems awfully bright pink... oh well. i suppose after 4 1/2 months of braces i can have a day of being depressed about them.

my teeth feel bulky. and when i brushed it was not happy. :( i'm going to be sore tomorrow.

oh well. sore is good. sore teeth = moving teeth = surgery sooner!

new wires and wire ties and power chains, oh my! (19 weeks - 4 1/2 months)

2004-09-22T10:40:00.000-05:00

had TONS of fun at the ortho this morning. got my steel wires in. they are the preformed arches, square steel wires. YEA! steels are good. i also got a buttload of wire ties, almost every tooth is wired tied. looks like 9 on top, 6 on the bottom i think. hard to see under the power chains. i'm not sure if i got all the wire ties because of the power chains, or because of the new wires. so either the power chains are not strong enough on each tooth, that's why i need them or if my teeth are just not angled correctly compared to the wire... eh. anyway, lots of pain for me!

so, ortho man thinks i'll be ready for surgery in, oh... 9 months or so! :( he and the surgeon have different ideas of how things should work. he thinks that the teeth should be absolutely orthodontically perfect so they just fall into place during surgery, whereas the surgeon thinks that the ortho work can be done after surgery. blah.

oh well. as long as ron's insurance doesn't change with the coming year, then i'm fine with it. if his insurance DOES change and i'm no longer covered... this surgery is happening ASAP.

fun. that's one thing i didn't want to worry about. insurance issues.

look at me, i'm an orthodontist! (18 weeks - 4 months...)

2004-09-14T10:31:00.000-05:00

so, after 4 weeks of blue jellie braces i was getting sick of them. they started out a nice light clear almost sky blue. after a week or so they were greenish blue, but still pretty. it was only if compared to the original color taht you could tell that htey were discolored. fast forward to last saturday. my o-rings are icky greenish blue with hints of yellow stained ugliness. i decided on saturday that i didn't want ugly braces for my birthday (thursday). we had a lull in our day and i had some time so i grabbed my o-rings, my twirl on tool and my tweezers and decided to do a little experiment. took off a gross o-ring, and put on a new clean red jellie one. wow, did that look nice. so i just continued on down the line. i now have clean pretty red jellie o-rings. yea! i was able to change all of them, i even replaced the two that they twisted halfway on (to hold it on better???). but i did it! yea! and it looks SO MUCH BETTER!

off to the ortho a week from tomorrow. plan to discuss this surgery thing and see what's up and when we can do this. i'm all about as soon as possible. we'll see!

so my new oral surgeon smokes crack... (15 weeks, 3 1/2 months)

2004-08-24T10:33:00.000-05:00

went in for a consult yesterday early morning with new oral surgeon, dr. keane. he was very nice, i liked him alot, he answered all of my questions (and seemed impressed by some of them), was a good time. towards the end of my questions i asked him (with the uncertainty from dr. hobday's statement of, 'WAY ahead' ringing in my ears...). 'so, how close would you say i am to being ready?' i wasn't expecting much for an answer and i got what i expected. he laughed and said, 'well, i'm not the orthodontist, i can't really tell you that one. but, things do look aligned and leveled.' eh. oh well. asked some more questions and then i asked, 'so... i know you can't give me a real answer but, i have approved for surgery, dr. rahimi's office sent in a pre-auth and it was approved, so i know i am approved for surgery. i would like to get this done with by the end of the year so i don't have to worry about my husband's insurance changing or the company changing providers all together and suddenly i'm not covered. is there ANY chance we can get this done this year, or is this DEFINITELY next year?' and he said, 'oh, totally this year. yeah, no problem with that. how does october sound? then you would be healed up for the holidays.'

WHAT?!?

he took a panoramic x-ray and a profile of my skull x-ray and i was off on my way to work.

but then i spent all day in a fog. OCTOBER?!? how? wow! that would be AMAZING!

i don't even go in to the ortho until sept. 22nd... how is that possible??? so this morning i called dr. hobday's office and said, 'hi! so i've changed oral surgeons and dr. keane seems to think that i could be ready in october?!? but i don't even see dr. hobday again until sept 22nd... so...' the ortho chick was beyond nice, she took my message and offered to fax my chart over to dr. hobday (he's in the champlin office for the morning) although he'll be in the MG office this afternoon. i told her that this afternoon is fine. so he'll look things over and either he will give me a call, or an assistant will give me a call to let me know what is up.

i don't know how i could be ready in october unless dr. hobday gets on board and i start going in more frequently. and i thought that you had to stabilize in your braces for some time before you could do surgery... ???

UPDATE - the ortho lady called back. apparently dr. hobday does think that this is slightly agressive and i will not be ready by october. she did say that i MAY be able to do it this year, and that the fact that i do want it done this year is in my chart (because that means what???). so that is where we are at right now...

i'll keep you updated.

whoohoo! (3 monthsish, or 14 weeks exactly, but who's counting anyway...)

2004-08-18T11:21:00.000-05:00

a little late but oh well...

so, it's been just over 3 months now and i think things are going well, but i've never had braces so i was wondering where i was in the scheme of things. so far i've been in thermo flexible wires for a month and a half, and then they put me in a stronger thermo flexible wire. my teeth are pretty much lined up now (although because of the flexible wire my bottom teeth are a little wavy...) and my upper is already MUCH wider than it was before. i never realized how narrow my upper palate was, i do have the crossbite on one side, but since comparing pics from before, you now see MANY more teeth on top. it's like they have flattened the front of my upper jaw some, which is good because i think my overjet is much reduced.

so, i was at the ortho last Friday and i managed to snatch a minute of dr. hobday's time while he was checking out my mouth after the retie. i asked him how it was going, was i on track, ahead of the game, behind? he looked into my mouth, looked at my chart, looked at me again and said, 'yeah, things look great.' he kinda looked puzzled, checked out my mouth again, then my chart in depth, then my mouth again and said, 'it's been three months? yeah, you look great, on schedule. ahead of schedule actually, MUCH ahead. we'll change your wires next time and start working on your arches, some detail work, (something else i don't remember) and then get you ready for surgery.' then he started highlighting things in my chart and told the assistant to set me up for steel 19s next time.i was too surprised by all this to ask just HOW FAR ahead i am and what it all means. :) of course i'll ask when i go back in mid sept for the wire change...
but still! WOW! WHOOOHOO! MUCH AHEAD!

i swear i'll have surgery this year. :) i hope anyway.

so that's amazingly awesome news!

PLUS! i have new surgery friends in MN! found them on the yahoo board, a bunch of us MN girlies who have either just had surgery or are having it in the future. yea! it's nice to think that there are others in this area going through this as well. plus kristin has dr. hobday as a surgeon as well! how cool! HI GUYS!

how to gross out your huband and your family, CORN! (3 months)

2004-08-09T11:34:00.000-05:00

my wonderful little sister had her birthday yesterday, yea! happy birthday kristi! we were up at my parent's for dinner and a little party. what did we have to eat? well, we had chicken and potatoes and stuff, but mostly CORN ON THE COB!

and i had two pieces.

with no damage to the braces (although it was NOT south beach friendly...)

it was damn yummy. and the cleanup really wasn't that bad. although i smiled at my husband and my mom and they both said, wow, have fun cleaning that! oh well, gotta use the waterpik for something!

how to save $2100 - $10K+ in just a few minutes (3 months...)

2004-08-02T16:45:00.000-05:00

so... due to other factors jolting our brains, ron and i started looking into in-network oral surgeons. i didn't before because dr. rahimi was referred to me, i've heard he was awesome, etc. good times. but he's out of network. and our max out of pocket for surgery would be $3600 PLUS whatever insurance deems is more than what they think is 'reasonable and customary'. which could add up to ALOT.

so i looked into in-network oral surgeons. and instantly saw dr. keane's name on the list. dr. keane is the oral surgeon who has done jaw replacement surgery on my local surgury guru (ex boyfriend's mom with advanced TMJ, over 30 surgeries so far...), as well as the wisdom teeth of her son (the ex). well... that changes things as i remember that she REALLY liked him.

i called her to find out her feelings on it. i know she is now going to the mayo clinic but i didn't think that she had some falling out with dr. keane or anything, i just thought she had to move on. and i was right. i was telling her of my situation and when i mentioned dr. keane's name she could not stop raving about him. she's known others who had him for surgery and loved him, she had surgery with him and loved him, etc. she thinks he's amazing, his staff is amazing, etc.

yea!

so i called dr. keane's office to check into it. they would love to assist me. they will be a provider of our insurance for at least the next 5 years (good news!). all i have to do is call them for a pre-op appt once i get closer, and then schedule surgery when ready.

bam! got the surgery down to $1500. yippee!!! (ONLY $1500... ha! it's still alot, but much better than before!)

the secret life of lettuce (11 weeks OR almost 3 months!)

2004-07-29T10:47:00.000-05:00

so, last time i went into the ortho (last tuesday, week & two days) they added two more bands on top, two more brackets on the bottom, and a bigger wire. whoohoo! wow, was i sore! i wasn't expecting that one. i thought i had made it through the sorest times, but nope, this one really surprised me. oh well. the soreness is gone now, i can eat everything again, although when i bite down my teeth make some funky cracking noises, but no more pain. like that alot! my bite has changed alot in a week, i now feel like my open bite is larger as my back molars are being moved into place. this isn't a huge surprise to me as i was told that it would get exaggerated some, just an observation. i'm really not wanting to wait another 9-15 months for this surgery. my secret plan is to get this surgery done this year, before christmas. that would be nice. :) then i'd be mostly healed for israel in april, and this whole thing would be over with. plus i wouldn't have to worry about ron's insurance changing or changing policy come the beginning of the year, i wouldn't have to worry about potentially losing our coverage, etc. too many things to worry about with this! so, like i said, plan is to get it done before the end of the year. the cori plan.

but that most likely won't happen, even if i'm working my hardest to visualize my teeth moving into position.

oh well, at least i have glow in the dark braces. it is so cool! yes, the o-rings came last monday. i have purple glow in the dark on top, green glow in the dark on the bottom. in day to day life they look, more like hint of purple and hint of green (they are very light colored) but at night with the help of a flashlight, let the fun begin! THEY GLOW! it's the weirdest thing! and kinda creepy too. i was checking it out in the mirror and i was so amused that i laughed, and i saw them move apart as i laughed. FREAKY!

i go back for a retie august 13th already! only 3 weeks 3 days! weird. but i don't care. the faster i'm in, the faster the surgery, the faster it's all OVER!

the eating thing is getting old. i went to subway yesterday and got a roast chicken breast sub. when i got to the part where you tell them what you want on it, i just kinda sat there. um, lettuce and... salt & pepper? the people looked at me like i was insane but, i can't eat any of that other stuff without making a mess! and then, the lettuce drove me INSANE anyway. it was shredded and pieces end up WRAPPED around my wires and brackets and it was just everywhere. blah.

you want space? i gots space! (week 9)

2004-07-14T16:45:00.001-05:00

got the spacers yesterday! just two on top WAY back between my 6 year old molar and the molar behind it. (12 year molar?). as soon as they were in i had that odd nose feeling i had from before! it went away much faster this time. it's almost as if my nose is tingly/numb. weird!

so even though it was close to impossible to get my spacers in, and i was expecting the worse, especially from my super fun high quality time i had in spacers before, i am not really in pain at all today. weird! wonder if my teeth are just used to moving now so it's not such a big deal? i had thought it wouldn't be that bad as when flossing i though i had a larger space between those teeth than before, but after the fight my ortho lady had to get them in, i though i may have been mistaken... oh well, i won't complain!

i also got her to put an o-ring on the inside of that rotated tooth of mine! my teeth in front of my 6 year molars have a band on them, and on the inside of the band is a circular post that is very sharp to my tongue. they put o-rings on three of them when i got my braces on, but since this tooth was so rotated, they couldn't get an o-ring on it. oh well, didn't bother me. well this last adjustment they wire tied that tooth and did it ever move. it looks great, almost there. however that movement brought that annoying post with no o-ring into my mouth. blah! my poor tongue was being assaulted daily. i tried wax, that seemed to work ok but it wasn't spectacular. i had stopped by the ortho last week after my teeth cleaning at dr. wong's (with the evil hygienist) and they would have put an o-ring on then but there was a wait and i wanted to get into work so i left. i was wondering how much of this was in my head and how much of the irritation was taken away from that o-ring. well, i can officially tell you, alot! she put it on and it was immediately a huge change. yea!

i'm hoping that my o-rings show up this week... i really want glow in the dark braces when i get them changed on tuesday!!!

ready, set, ... approval! (9 weeks in!)

2004-07-13T00:21:00.000-05:00

my pre-auth approval came in the mail today! i am so relieved!

so, i get to have a 3 piece Leforte 1 (more info on that later... essentially they chop off my upper jaw, take a sliver of bone out to bring my back molars up, split it into three pieces and make it wider, put a bunch of plates and screws in there to hold it into place, and then bolt it back into my head) to fix my open bite/overjet/crossbite. i know alot of people have insurance issues and i am so glad that this went so smoothly! i panicked a month ago when we got a letter from the insurance saying that they wanted more info/proof of medical need (x-rays and all that...). i called my OS's office and they were already on top of things, i just wanted to make sure that they were sending it all in as i don't have that stuff! (although i do have a jpg of an xray of my skull. i have it up at work. some peeps love it, others are scared of it... personally i love it)

now i just wait for these braces to move my teeth to the liking of the ortho and OS. hopefully i can have surgery this year (although i was told 12-18 months in braces pre-surgery and from what i read of others experiences (on the yahoo surgery boards...) i know it may be even longer, and i'm not really expecting it to be this year. but we can all dream, right?), i don't want to go through the new year to add the chance that my hubby's insurance may change their policy... we have already looked into my insurance and it's a definite no go with them.

this almost makes up for the fact that tomorrow i get MORE SPACERS. yes. more rubber band bitches of torture. i do have full braces now but my ortho wants me to get brackets and bands on ALL teeth, even my very back molars. which i was expecting being that i'm a surgical case, i am just not looking forward to the spacers again... mashed potatoes and jamba juice, here i come again!

and i don't even care. :) i'm pre-approved!

my teeth are rotting from the inside out! or how cori's mind can be dangerous when it has too much time to think... (8 1/2 weeks in...)

2004-07-09T17:21:00.000-05:00

a few weeks ago i had an interesting issue. on my two lower front teeth, i had a weird ridge, especially on the left one. it was as if my teeth had eroded some in my gums and now that they are moving them they came up a little and there was a ridge that i noticed when i flossed my teeth. i was freaked out, why would my teeth be eroding in my gums??? what was going on? when did this happen? recently, years ago? gah!

well... one day at work i figured it out.

and scraped it off with a heavy duty metal T pin.

she put too much bonding stuff on my teeth when they put on my braces. it was extra that pooled along the gumline and made a ridge.

at least that's what i figure. if i'm wrong i've managed to scrape off part of my lower left front tooth. and it was pretty easy to do it, so if it was my tooth i'm screwed. :)

knee high by the 4th of july! and other stories... (8 weeks in braces already!)

2004-07-08T13:54:00.000-05:00

so, as hinted at in the title, this entry has alot to do with CORN. POPCORN more specifically. i had some. two different occasions!!! first was friday june 5th. we went to see fahrenheit 911. good flick. and even better because i had finally convinced ron that i could have POPCORN! he had ground rules (no shoving handfulls into my mouth, hello, like i would!) and i had to stop if it was determined that i couldn't eat it. well, i found ways. it was AMAZING. i loved every minute of it. until the next day. when i woke up with sore teeth, specifically my molars on my upper left. so i flossed some more (of course i had flossed and waterpiked and brushed after the popcorn experience), and something green came out (green??? what did i eat that was green?). flossed more and some brown sludge came out, eww! and then flossed some more and a big chunk of popcorn came out. (it was one of the seed shell pieces of course). and then things got better and didn't hurt anymore. yea! i did go out and buy thicker floss (oral b ultra floss) and i love it! my teeth are moving apart anyway and i had some spaces so this helps out alot!

my next adventure was on the 4th of july in the little town of evansville, WI. ron and i were in town visiting his parents. we went to the park for the 4th of july celebration and of course they had roasted corn on the cob. ron got an ear and after convincing him that i WOULD NOT wreck my braces, he let me have a cautious, very gentle bite. and i did it! i ate corn on the cob with my braces! it was almost easier to do than it was before braces when my open bite was slightly worse. unfortunately, the corn wasn't the best. but it was awesome anyway!

and later that night we went to spiderman 2 (it was mostly good) and i got popcorn again. YUM! i now have a new method for popcorn. and it's pretty disgusting. i put the popcorn in my mouth (still one at a time), i let it dissolve and i suck all the yumminess off of it, and then when it is just the shells i spit it out into a napkin. eww! but less chance of an episode like last time happening and i still get the pleasure of popcorn! YUM!

went in two days ago for my first teeth cleaning since getting braces. i am lucky enough to have to go in every 3 months for cleanings as i have apparently been labeled as a person with 'poor oral hygeniene'. did anyone tell me this? no, i read it in my chart. what? what a joke. anyway, so i go in. and was tortured. the dental hygienist apparently thought that the sucking tube doubled as a masochistic torture item. she tried to gag me with it, she tried to shove it through the back of my jaw on both sides, she tried to put it through my gums in front. she was horrible. when i left i had open sores on the inside of my lower lip. hello my friend wax! unfortunately even the wax didn't help out alot. suck. luckily when i woke up the next morning it had healed up alot, and today they are only kinda tender. but anyway, what a hoser! i WILL NOT have her next time, and i will walk out if i get her AFTER surgery! gah!

oh, and all she used was the tooth scraper, the ultrasound teeth cleaner (not sure if it's safe for braces, is it?) and the polisher/cleaner. she didn't floss or anything. (THANK GOD!). oh well.

and we get to pay for that one out of pocket. whahoo. thanks!

i go in for MORE SPACERS next tuesday, and then the tuesday after that i go in for a retie and bands on my top back molars, and brackets on my bottom molars. fun. MORE metal in my mouth!

at least i'll get new o-rings, i'm SO sick of this ick dark blueish. i feel like the biggest DORK! and speaking of bands, i'm ordering some on the internet! GLOW IN THE DARK! and jellie ones! i'm bringing them in with me. screw their dumb colors, i have my own cool colors. i can't wait! i'm ordering them tonight! since they come in packs of 45 strips of 22, i'm getting an assorted glow in the dark and an assorted jellie, otherwise you get 45 of the same color. i'm splitting them with good friend candace's daughter jillie. yea! we can have cool braces together! i can't wait!

(p.s. the site that sells the awesome o-rings, if you are interested, is http://www.jawproducts.com/privpatients.html)

where's the popcorn?!? (6 weeks into braces, yes weeks already!)

2004-06-23T15:24:00.000-05:00

i had been having issues with the headgear tube again after my last adjustment. instead of hitting (and wrecking) my crown when i was grinding at night, it was hitting the tooth behind my crown. a REAL tooth! gah! so, i called into the ortho office and we made an 'emergency' appointment for me to come in that friday after my retie.

the assistant checked it out, saw what i was talking about, thought for a second and said, hmm... so it's happening because of your crossbite, which will be fixed when you have surgery, but that's not going to be for quite a while so yeah, we've got to do something about that. (little voice in cori's head, surgery isn't for a LONG time??? i'm not going past 18 months in braces with no surgery!).

dr. hobday finally came over, checked it out, saw the marks on my teeth (the assistant had marked me up with some biting paper stuff). said, 'well, unfortunately we can't grind that tube off, you'll need it for when you get your headgear.' HA HA HA! dr. hobday you are too funny. i don't think so.

he ground down the tube again, seemed to be better but he said that if we needed to, we could take that band off and grind the headgear tube totally off and then put the band back on.

luckily it's been a week and a half and it seems that it worked! yea! while there are mornings that i can tell that was grinding the night before, those teeth (the one with the headgear tube and the two under it on the bottom) are not aching the way they were before and i haven't hit the headgear tube in my day to day life (also was an issue). so yea, one problem down. 4000 more to go?

one thing that was a tease was going in after 3 1/2 weeks and having my bands changed. now i have to live with this color for twice as long and it definitely seems like it's taking forever! i wanted a light/lime green, a happy springy color. but the green at my ortho was more like, fluorescent burn your eyes out green. ick. so i saw these, they looked pretty, metallic bluish with a hint of purple. so we did them. she threw them on quick (i can't believe how fast they do that!) and while waiting for dr. hobday i took a peek. oh... well... that is darker than i though it would be. oh well, i'm just having fun with this, you can't seriously make braces look good so why not have fun. i want to lighten it up next time though. i'm still wanting the perfect green but... let's see, next adjustment is july 20th (next appt is july 13th, MORE SPACERS!). but if i have them on for 6 weeks that takes me to... end of august/beginning of sept. so what do i have planned for end of july and all of august. we have a wedding we are going to in mid-august so that's something to consider... don't know what i'm wearing yet though, so i don't know what color to even think about yet...

i met with a buyer at work today though, she just had upper surgery done a month ago! she looks great! well, still slightly swollen of course but not bad overall at all! it's nice to find and talk to a real person who has had this done. while i love the yahoo groups i have found and they are VERY helpful, it's nice to look at someone face to face and chat in real life.

one down, many more to go! (day 27...)

2004-06-07T17:20:00.000-05:00

i went in today for my first adjustment. whoohoo... it was fun. actually it really wasn't that bad. off with the old o-rings, on with the new!

i thought i'd get light green or lighter blue something, more of a summery color. i left with metallic purpley blue that's pretty dark! from far away it almost looks black (oops...) and up close it looks like i just ate a grape popsicle. eh, oh well. (check out my moblog for pics of course) it's not so bad. i like it! mostly anyway.

the ortho chick (different than last time, no smokey grossness!) tied some wires onto a few of my brackets before putting the purple o-rings on. she said it helps them move. one of the ones with wire is the crooked dork tooth on the bottom so hopefully that moves soon. yea! (and yes, that is the official dental name for that tooth, the crooked dork tooth).

dr. hobday wants me to go in to dr. wong's for teeth cleaning every 3 months. he said we'd be careful as I had some gum recession before. (i did get an excellent today though for brushing so that is good!) i saw a note in my file from a phone call from dr. wong's office. it was a nurse at dr. wong's who was apparently letting them know that i have 'poor hygeniene'. whatever. i bet it's the chick who cleaned my teeth last time. she attacked my gums when flossing them and they bled. well of course they did, if you poked me that hard in the eye i bet my eye would bleed. dork. but whatever. so back at work I set up my next two appointments with dr. wong. when i asked if this was normal with braces the chick there said not really. great, thanks! but she also said that we'd do this next one 3 months out, and then the other 3 months later (normal 6 month time) and if everything looks fine they will tell dr. hobday that i only need to come in every 6 months. which is good because insurance only pays for cleanings every 6 months and while i realize that $75 for a cleaning is better than cavities and such and that $75 + the $10-14K we are already spending isn't much more, it still sucks!

dr. hobday did grind down that bracket that I was hitting so hopefully I won't need a mouthguard. that's good. we didn't even talk about a mouthguard/bite plate for sleeping. i'll bring it up next time if needed. dr. hobday did say that things look like they are doing well so far so that's good.

funny story from the ortho office though. kids! adults with braces have to be MUCH better patients!

the little girl next to me... dr. hobday sits down and her ortho chick says, "so (insert little girl's name here, i can't remember it) hasn't been wearing her elastics."

dr. hobday says, "just today or every day so far since last time?"

little girl - "well we didn't have time today."

ortho chick - "she told me everyday so far."

DH - "everyday??? um.. (obviously has thrown him for a loop). you haven't worn them at all??? why not?"

LG - "um, i don't know. i just don't remember to wear them."

DH - "this is all we have left to do before your braces come off, we just need to fix your bite. if you wear your elastics, next time might be the last adjustment before we take your braces off. don't you want your braces off???"

LG - "i guess"

so dr. hobday tells her how important it is, how to remember, keep rubberbands everywhere, etc.

HA! kids! i would be wearing my elastics every moment of the day if he told me i could get my braces off in a month if i did! i'd find a way to put two on there!

just when it's getting good... (3 weeks!)

2004-06-02T09:39:00.000-05:00

three weeks to the day of getting braces on and my biggest stressor is that i hate my new haircut (to the point that i'm going back to get it 'fixed'). not bad mouth wise. :)

looking at my mouth, i believe that my two front teeth are damn near straight. well, straight in the arch of my mouth anyway, the one on the left used to be a little crooked and was at an angle compared to the right (it was the reason that the ortho said i had minor crowding on top). the bottoms/chewing surfaces of them are crooked due to my nocturnal grinding habits, but the teeth are mostly straight. i don't know when that one happened. otherwise, not much else changing, i guess the top wire looks slightly straighter. the backs are straight, then it comes up a bit on my four front teeth, i think this is due to my overjet and once it is straightened the wire will be straight. bottom looks good. my rotated tooth in front of my molar (that had the cement issue) doesn't look much different. i wonder if/when anything will be done about that one.

i go back in next monday morning for a retie adjustment (new o-rings on my brackets, same wires). dr. hobday said something about adding my furthest back molars to the party as well (as i am having surgery i need all teeth banded and bracketed together...) so it sounds like i get more spacers WAY back there, and i'm assuming will then be back a week later to get the fun on. he had said that i would most likely have bands on my uppers and brackets on my lowers. not sure if that is because i am having surgery on my upper so they want them banded, while the bottoms can handle just brackets, or if this is standard. so it's looking like my days of eating freely are going to get limited again. just when i can handle just about anything (although ron won't let me have popcorn still! gah!). and i'll be in pain for another couple of weeks, first from the spacers, then from the new hardware. whoohoo! whatever gets this done sooner works for me. i just do what they tell me to.

oh, also my grinding hasn't been as noticeable lately. don't know if i grinded off whatever was hitting, or if my bite has changed already, or what. i still plan to bring it up with dr. hobday on monday. i think we'll take a wait and see approach with the grinding splint for nighttime. the ortho lady had told me that he could grind off the part of the bracket that was hitting as well. guess we'll see!

trying to grind my braces off... (day 15 already!)

2004-05-26T10:55:00.000-05:00

i've been hearing a funky noise in my mouth when i notice i'm grinding/clenching/sliding my bite, so i was just checking my braces out in the mirror to see what's going on in there. it appears that when I grind my teeth at night (such a great habit to have btw) or do those other things, I'm hitting my very back lower right molar and the crown in front of it on part of the massive band/headgear tube/rubberband attachment/mess of metal on my upper right molar. not a huge deal but it's now left a metallic mark on my teeth on the bottom and I know it can't be good for my tooth to be repeatedly grinded against chunk of metal for 6-8 hours (ha! like I ever sleep 8 hours!) a night.

dr hobday had talked about maybe needing a bite plate of some kind at night as i have had one for the past 13 years. i haven't worn it for the last 6 months, it hasn't fit it since i got my 3 crowns. while i have been fine without it during that time (other than the monthly headaches and such), it doesn't look like i will be fine now. it looks like i'll need something to protect my teeth and braces from myself, this whole procedure is costing enough $, i don't want to wreck my teeth and cause damage! or screw up my ortho work and need to fix hardware that i've broken or need to have my braces stay in longer/push back surgery as a result of the grinding. that would not be cool.

i called the ortho office to see what they say. chick thought it was weird that it was leaving marks (go me!). she said i could come in earlier, but dr. hobday is in rogers today plus, i am at work and don't have access to a car. she seems to think that it would be ok to wait until i come in on the 7th, and i think so too i guess (i don't have any time to come in earlier!). she said we'll definitely talk about it next time with dr. hobday and will probably make a night bite guard.

ha! like i need more stuff in my mouth! plus i don't understand how that really works... how does it stay on your teeth yet let your teeth move from the braces? do you have to make a new one every week or every adjustment? is it just a sports mouthguard to keep your teeth apart and protected from each other or ??? plus, not that it's not obvious something is needed, it will be an additional charge on top of the rest of this. for some reason i think i remember a price of under $100, and i know that when you are talking $10K+ for all of this, what's another $100, especilly when it is to help the bottom line goal. it still sucks!

in the meantime, i have put some wax on that band back there. i hope it will help during the day when i unconsiously slightly grind/slide my teeth. hopefully if it bumps that i'll notice and stop doing it... i hope. at night, well, guess we'll wait to see what dr. hobday says, a blob of wax won't stop me from doing anything at night. i grind holes through plastic bite plates, wax won't stop me.

cheeps! (day 13!)

2004-05-24T16:54:00.000-05:00

had a great weekend, ate anything and everything. arby's roast beef, check! sante fe chicken salad, check! lasagna (actually wasn't concerned about this one, but...), check! whopper junior, check! and even a 1/2 stick of gum, check! i can officially bite into things and eat salad. yea!

survived cleaning while out of town. would have been easier had ron's parents not been redoing their bathroom and i could have brushed my teeth in the bathroom instead of the laundry room, but it worked out fine anyway. (same can't be said about our car... a tree decided to fall onto it friday night... got some nice dents to fix now. http://homepage.mac.com/cori_wilbur/PhotoAlbum4.html)

of course now today come monday, my lower front brackets are annoying my mouth. made it all day, but just broke down and now i'm packing wax on my lowers. blah, whatever, i know i'll toughen up but at the same time, i tried and now i'm sick of it so i'm just going to chill with the wax for a bit. i don't wear wax to bed so i can toughen up then. :)

i have also experienced one of the things that the favorite sister kristi told me about. waking up with your braces stuck in your cheeps (she did mean cheeks). it is a very interesting feeling. :)

hello? anything moving yet? (day 10!)

2004-05-21T15:23:00.000-05:00

is it friday already??? well, i can attest to the fact that at some point you will forget that you even have braces. i haven't quite hit it, but i don't so much 'notice' them anymore. i know they are there, and i don't forget when i eat (it's much easier but still sometimes a challenge), and i brush so much there is no way i can really 'forget'. but they are just there. not good, not bad. pretty amazing. 9 days ago i thought this was impossible. things to remember for the future.

but speaking of brushing. gah! i brush when i wake up, i brush after breakfast, i brush after lunch, i brush after dinner and i brush before bed. i also floss after dinner and waterpik after dinner and before bed, and use ACT before bed. yup, my nights are exciting. 20 minutes after dinner and 15 before bed, all on oral hygiene. whoohoo...

tooth movement wise, i haven't seen anything spectacular... my slightly crooked front tooth looks the same to me. well, then again it may look slightly less prominent than before. hmm.. my very rotated tooth in front of my 6 year old molar is not much better, but it IS sore and sensitive to pressure and i did just uncement it from my molar what, 3 days ago? :) my lower front teeth are still sensitive to pressure and i do notice some movement among them, however they are looking crooked to me (and they weren't before). the two in the middle are coming up some so you can see that i have grinded them away in the center and it makes the points on the sides much more noticeable. those four teeth are also VERY tight when i floss. which is weird because then the teeth on the sides of them are very NOT tight when i floss. i would think it would even out? i know things sometimes look worse before they look better, and that orthodontists sometimes have to move things around and this ISN'T how they will look when i'm done. just observing is all.

i'll have some work to do once braces and surgery are all over. as mentioned before from my ortho, my two center lower fronts will need to be either bonded or shaved down or something. the ones on either side will probably be ok. my upper front centers will need something as well. i've ground the outside of them off, so the inner edges are slightly longer. the two on either side, just like the bottom, are probably ok as well. guess we'll see when it's all over!

she's obsessed with flossing! (day 7)

2004-05-18T13:57:00.000-05:00

so last night i was flossing my teeth. (yea for flossing!) anyway, i am able to floss between all of my teeth, other than my 6 year old molar and the tooth in front of it on the right bottom. now these are the teeth that had the excess cement issues when they put the braces on, and looking in my mouth, they were cemented together. no big surprise that i couldn't get the floss though. i have been able to poke the stiffened end of the floss between and through these teeth, so i could still floss in there but haven't be able to pull up through the teeth to get the floss out, was only able to pull the floss out from underneath. well yesterday i managed to pick the chunk of cement that i could see off, but still couldn't floss. so i threaded through the teeth again, and slowly and carefully worked my way up. took me forever (seriously, 5-10 minutes) but finally i was able to pull the floss up and through! two large pieces of cement also came out (actually very small pieces in the grand scheme of things, but they were big enough!) and it looks as if they were the issue. I can now floss between these teeth with no issues.

i would have just left it until i went back to the ortho (june 7th, less than 3 weeks already), but the tooth in front of my 6 year old molar is rotated about 30-40 degrees towards the front of my mouth and the fact that it was cemented to the other tooth really bothered me. this is one of my 'worst' teeth and i want to make sure it starts moving! it does feel more sensitive today. hopefully getting it unstuck helped out!

other than that. not much else. had turkey, mashed potatoes and asparagus for lunch. worked fine. what a difference a week can make! no wax, no real pain eating. it's all good. yea!

yum!!! (still day 6!)

2004-05-17T22:50:00.000-05:00

i ate steak! steak!!! it was so good! so wonderful!

m&m's! (braces day 6)

2004-05-17T19:37:00.000-05:00

breakfast of a banana and orange juice. yippee... i don't think i'm quite up for my usual breakfast of toasted english muffin/eggbeaters/processed cheese sandwich quite yet. that's ok. as much as it sucks this braces diet is starting to work. my shorts weren't quite so tight yesterday. i guess i can get used to that. :) helps curb the snacking too. if i'm going to have to brush after a snack, i'm more apt to just skip it instead. not a bad thing either.

had a frozen meal for lunch. turkey, stuffing and veggies. turkey wasn't that bad to eat, managed to do it.

i told ron i want steak for dinner tonight! yum! i wonder how i'll do with that one!

i'm also very tempted to go out and get some gum. i miss gum, and i hate that even after brushing i feel like my teeth are so scummy. ick. plus, on the yahoo braces board i found, they say that chewing gum helps your adjustment pain go away faster. see! how can it be bad if it helps you???

it is amazing though, i'm on day 6 (truly, really full day 5 since i got them on at 4:00 wednesday) and i can see how other than the cleaning and the 'banned' foods, how people can forget at some point that they have their braces on. i'm on day 2 or 3 with no wax. i think it was friday i only put on just a little bit. but now i'm mostly fine. last thursday i would have beaten someone if they had told me to just hang in there, soon i'll 'toughen up' (actually someone did tell me that i DID want to beat them, luckily you can't beat though e-mail). anyway, i think the fact that i never slept with wax in helped alot!

i have never brushed my teeth this much ever before in my life. after every meal, after ever snack.

speaking of snacks, i had some peanut butter m&ms this afternoon! peanut m&ms are on the 'banned' list, but plain m&ms are ok. seeing as how the PB m&ms have the same taste as peanut m&ms without the crunch of the peanut, and are actually 'softer' than plain m&ms, i decided they were ok. i had about 12 of them. they were very good. :) yum.

FOOTLONGS! (braces day 5)

2004-05-16T22:36:00.000-05:00

breakfast of a banana. did the AIDS walk, had another banana. (btw, not having as many issues with bananas as things actually ARE toughening up and getting used to the braces). after the AIDS walk we headed towards somewhere to sit. after we were sitting i saw the sign, FOOTLONGS. YEA! i haven't had a footlong in TOO LONG (silly 8 year vegetarian streak...). found out that hotdogs are tougher to bite through than you think, but i pushed thorough the pain and ate it anyway. feels like my front teeth are going to give when i bite into things, but they say the more you use them, the faster the pain will go away. ready go!

p.s. the footlong was painful but very good! ready for the 4th of july and the state fair now!

flossed again. yea! that glide floss is so awesome. only took me 15 minutes this time. still got the right side joint pain. blah! just a little massage to the jaw area helps out alot, then i have some pain and clicking that goes away relatively quickly.

noodles and flatbread for dinner. took me a while to eat it, but overall it was a much better experience than last time (first night in braces). yea!!!

flossing is FUN! (day 4 with braces)

2004-05-15T21:34:00.000-05:00

breakfast was cold cereal, steered away from the lucky charms, but did had honey nut cheerios with no problems. yea!

went to redstone to eat, had sea bass. was very good (but LOUD and noisy and the service was less than stellar). also had cooked veggies, bit through a cooked carrot (yea!) although also had one was just too hard. getting there!

i also flossed today! well, mostly. it took a good half hour. i tried the oral b super floss first (mistake). first, after the stiffened end that you thread though, they have this bulky extra thick floss before the normal floss. annoying to try to get through that first before the floss, EVERY TIME. then i shredded it until it finally broke when i was trying to go between my molars. finally i whipped out my other alternative (btw, i don't consider real floss and a flosser to be an alternative, what a joke!), special glide floss with one end that is stiffer for threading through things. dude, that thing kicked ass! got through ALL of my teeth, even the ones that the oral b floss couldn't get into because it was too tight of a contact. and no pain in the ass chunky floss part to get past. even though it is $6 for a 30 pack we went on out to target and got me one (had samples from the ortho). definitely worth every penny.

i did give myself a callus/sore raised area on the top knuckle of my left middle finger from flossing. apparently something i do when flossing irritates that area. weird things you find out when you floss for 30 minutes. i also experienced my first TMJ/jaw pain from this whole experience from having my mouth open (and trying to open wider) the whole time flossing. my right joint was not happy at all. but went away soon enough.

sammich and pizza! (day three with braces)

2004-05-15T01:33:00.000-05:00

the teeth are mostly fine. front ones are a little sore, but nothing compared to the spacers horror. the inside of my mouth however... seen much better days. my braces on the bottom in front are quite annoying. that's what hurts the most. that and not being able to eat anything 'harder' than mac & cheese. yesterday i had a fruity soy drink for breakfast, fruit cup for a snack, soup and mashed potatoes for lunch, and another fruit cup during the afternoon for a snack. i was absolutely starving last night, and for REAL food! i waxed up all good and then we had mac and cheese. it was amazing. (p.s. bet you didn't know this is now cori's food blog).

bananas might be on the no side. while soft and easy to eat, they have always slightly irritated my mouth, and now with my mouth already irritated, it's just not worth it. they are so easy though and so good for you! gah.

ate my first sandwich today! (lunch) egg salad and a piece of muenster cheese! so i didn't bite through the sandwich that well, it was more of a tearing instead of a biting. it's a good step! unfortunately, the pickle slice, proved to be too difficult. oh well.

went to CPK for date night, ate bread and butter (not the crust though), hummus and warm, soft pita bread, and pizza! (with knife and fork, but still!). it was an amazing dinner. brushed in the bathroom, at least theirs is mostly nice. then we went to see troy, managed to get through a movie with no popcorn. :(

at least i got to play with my new toy! i got a cordless waterpik! it's so cool! bulkier than i expected but totally recommended. picked mine up at target. manufacturer's retail price = $39.99. mine = $24.99 plus my 10% discount. whoohoo! i got the suggestion off my surgery boards, they say (if allowed by your surgeon) that waterpiks help clean when you are banded shut and are dealing with your splint, however practicing before surgery is HIGHLY recommended. i can see how it would help, this thing rocks!

food? please? (day 2 with braces)

2004-05-13T14:17:00.000-05:00

la la la... so, definitely eating to live the rest of this week. ortho chick told me to make sure i had a good meal last night as my teeth wouldn't be sore yet. ha ha ha! they weren't sore yet but i could barely eat with all this crap in my mouth, then when i did, my lower braces tried to scrape the inside of my mouth off, the bands on my molars have sharp things on the inside that tried (successfully, i'd like to add) to rip apart my tongue and there was food everywhere. gah. we had noodles, i was able to eat not even half of my food. i did have a banana later. then today, my teeth are not very sore at all, however these brackets are just against me. i hate them. they look kinda cute though. check out the pics on my macwhore site.

oh, i had cauliflower and cheese soup and mashed potatoes. (funny story about the mashed potatoes...) but i couldn't really eat the cauliflower in the soup, it was pretty hard, not soft and soupy like.

i also just had a banana. bit into it. holy crap, that hurt. didn't notice because i haven't bit into things but my upper front teeth, VERY sore if i bite on them. good times. still not as bad as the spacers yet. but i'm breaking out the wax as soon as i brush my teeth. again. getting tougher but not there yet.

they are on! (day one with braces...)

2004-05-12T18:30:00.000-05:00

soo... getting braces sucks. both the experience of the application of the braces, and life with the braces.

go in for my appointment. first thing ortho chick does is pull out my spacers. and i mean pull out, like i feel like my teeth will come with them. gah! then when they finally snap and pull out, little bits of food that was stuck in with them comes out as well (i swear i brushed, alot!). ick. she makes comments about my 'tight contacts' and it gets to the point that i want to yell, 'i'm sorry!' apparently i have tight contacts. blah. so she pulls out the 9 rubber ones, then moves onto the metal ones. she tells me that the metal ones don't like to come out. and even with all of the moving and wiggling that they did while in, she's right. she rips one out finally. i'm convinced my crown came with it. gets the other two out. i'm ready to go home. but no, this is just the beginning of the fun stuff.

next comes the fitting of the bands around my molars. this involves trying to make a metal band go around my molar. i have to bite down on this tool to help shove it on. i'm not into that. she keeps telling me 'bite harder!' i want to tell her, 'bite me ortho chick. and by the way, you smell!' (she was a smoker. and not even like her breath or her clothes were stinky (although they were) but also her hands just seemed to stink.) once we got them on, she'd pull it off and we'd start all over again because she didn't like that one. apparently she also didn't like trying to fit the bands on my crowns, crowns are a pain. well doesn't that suck. once again, I'M SORRY!

finally get the four bands on my 6 year molars, then onto the one in front of them. i wanted to cry. 'i need 2 bands?' 'yup.' ugh... these had brackets on the side of them so when i wouldn't bite hard enough she'd just grab the bracket with a pliers and shimmy it up my tooth to the gum. wow. thought i was in pain before! so then she leaves them in. i get to put on sexy orange tinted mechanic glasses and ortho chick puts a lip stretcher in (she asked first if i had ever used one before. um, no... why would i have??? is this some weird fetish thing i don't know about? sorry...). dried off my teeth with air, then she painted my teeth with what i know was etchant. (i think she explained it as, this stuff tastes bad but it helps the glue stick to your teeth. now i know they usually work with young peeps but... i can handle the big words...). then she put the bonding/sealant on it. then she called over dr. hobday and started plopping the brackets on my lower teeth. he adjusted them into place and asked me if we had talked about my two front bottom teeth. we hadn't, and this is a major concern of mine, so i tried to tell him no, with the lip stretcher and his hands and brackets and stuff in my mouth. he said he could either excavate my gums and bring those two teeth up to make them look right, but then my gumline would be off, although no one would notice although i'd have to worry about cavities, or i could bond them with dr. wong and not worry about cavities (and whatever the hell 'excavating' my gums means! sounds NOT FUN!) so he finished and ortho chick cleaned my lower teeth with water (very bitter taste!), took out the lip stretcher, and then i got to rinse. she announced as she took off the lip stretcher, 'here is your first feel of your new braces!' then asked, 'what's it like?' ok, you just stretched my lips out and then dried out my entire mouth. i have no idea how it feels, my mouth feels parched and weird without even trying to feel the brackets...

back to the chair and the process starts all over again on top. i go to rinse the nastiness out, and back to the chair. now the fun part. it's time to take out the bands! then we get to put glue in them and shove them on, again. luckily dr. hobday does this and he's stronger so they go on better. side note, i thought maybe the stale smoke/ick taste of ortho chick's hands might have been the gloves she was wearing, however dr. hobday's gloved hands taste like mint. yum!

anyway... now the bands are on for good. ortho chick proceeds to do what feels like ripping out my teeth, but turns out to be her trying to get all of the glue out of my teeth. she finally stops, however we both know there is a big chunk still on my lower right bottom back molar. she says that she'll ask dr. hobday to try to get it later.

she then asks what color i want. i look them over and over as she waits impatiently (hey, first time here! it's a big deal!). i choose raspberry. she puts a light wire on and then bands it in. finally i'm done. i now get to wait for dr. hobday to check me out. as i wait i see a hand mirror on the stand next to me. i think it's odd that ortho chick didn't give it to me so i could check things out, so i swipe it and check things out. the color isn't as big of a deal as i thought it would be. which is both a good and a bad thing i guess. less noticeable braces is never a bad thing. done looking at my new braces (for now...) i check out the rest of the stuff on the stand.

i see my chart wide open and start to read it. lots of stuff i recognize, not sure of some of the stuff. the first entry is notes from a phone call from dr. wong, my dentist. bullet points state facts about me, that i have already been referred to dr. rahimi (oral surgeon), it mentions my issue (only back molars on either side touch, open bite.) and the last bullet point says, please take good care of patient.

that is why i like dr. wong so much and why driving to maple grove to visit him doesn't seem that bad.

anyway, ortho chick comes back and says, i get to drill that cement out. WHAT? she looks (and acts) like she has never handled a drill ever before. actually handling the drill, she looks like she hasn't EVER handles the drill before. she gingerly drills the cemented area in my mouth and i will her to stop. she finally says, there, got it. i feel with my tongue. feels the EXACTLY the same. oh well, i'll have them fix it next time.

dr. hobday comes over and checks everything out. must look good to him as he tells me it's all good. ortho chick comes back and goes over first time braces wearer stuff, how to brush, how to floss, goes over the contents of my goody bag, and then gives me a sheet and tells me to pick a t-shirt design. hmm, they are all... interesting, so i pick the most desirable of the three and then i am on my way.

i'm starving and the ortho chick told me to eat well tonight as my teeth won't hurt yet. yea!

paxil anyone?

2004-05-12T12:48:00.000-05:00

braces freakout 2004 has offically commenced. get your tickets here!

GAH!

one hour before i leave work, less than 2 hours before my appointment... the clock is ticking. i should take some (5) preemptive advil soon...

T minus one day!

2004-05-11T23:05:00.000-05:00

well, woke up sore again, one of my metal spacers (bottom left) shifted and i think threw things out of alignment. it was really bothering me after dinner so i was brushing and a spacer fell out! it was from the top left. gah! i put it back in with some floss... i don't know how much it's doing but it makes me feel better. braces tomorrow already! gah! it's so terrifying and exciting at the same time.

more spacers fun

2004-05-09T22:12:00.000-05:00

so, end of the weekend now and things are *mostly* good. have been able to eat almost everything.

yesterday was ron's birthday (HAPPY BIRTHDAY HONEY!) and we went out for sushi (YUM!). i was a little nervous as there are times when eating sushi that your mouth is full and you need to chew for quite a while with a mouthful of yumminess. now this can be a challenge in normal situations, but now i have these fun and exciting rubberbands and metal thingies invading my mouth as well. we sat at the sushi bar and when we ordered i asked our sushi chef if he could cut my philly and winter rolls into slightly smaller slices. he was happy to oblige (and i noticed that he was a braces wearer, yea!). he was awesome in other ways as well, our food looked amazing, he took such care to make it look beautiful, i didn't want to eat it! anyone who can, go visit kevin the sushi chef at fuji-ya in minneapolis, he rocks!

anyway, the spacers. things are mostly cool. my only complaint, when i yawn my left second to last molar hurts and occasionally cracks (like when you are little and you have a loose tooth and you bend it just a little too far and it 'cracks'.) geh! that's what it feels like. very freaky. i'm a little more comfortable if it did stuff like that when i had braces on so i know my tooth won't fall out, it will be held in. but, oh well. a few miscellaneous things here and there, i can adjust my metal spacers and i usually have to pull them out of my gums after i eat, but it's not that bad.

3 more sleeps til the braces!

day 4 of spacers...

2004-05-07T23:00:00.000-05:00

hmm. well, things are mostly better. sometimes i *almost* forget that they are in (well, kinda but not really). usually until i close my mouth and the right side hits and bounces (the rubberbands are above my teethline...). i feel like i have gum in my mouth, only i can't chew it. it's weird eating with 'things' in your mouth, my tongue is baffled as to what is supposed to stay in there and what should not). i have never given this much thought to chewing in my life! i suppose this is only the beginning of that problem. not much pain, just a little soreness. most of the intense 'tightness' is gone, i was able to floss my teeth (unspacered teeth anyway) last night and while it was tighter than normal it wasn't as bad as it was two nights ago when i could barely get the floss in (and then when i did it hurt like i was shoving a 2x4 in there...).

would like them out though. they are a pain. hard to eat with them in. i know that braces are no picnic but these are on the chewing surface of my teeth, braces are in front of and around the teeth. it's got to be better, right??? *knowing it's a crapshoot either way...*

at least 95% of the pain is gone.

the fun of day 2 & 3 in spacers

2004-05-07T09:55:00.000-05:00

day two with spacers - thoughts from the day -
things are going ok. not in pain but definitely not comfortable. these dumb spacers are more annoying than anything. annoying as in, dude, my teeth feel SO tight and uncomfortable, this blows! i do have one that is VERY SORE. it doesn't hurt anymore when i'm just sitting here working, but if i yawn or eat or try to floss in front of it, it hurts like hell! it's just uncomfortable enough that it distracts me and makes me focus on it. FUN FUN! 7 more sleeps til the real fun. i'm thinking more about colors, now i might go blue instead of the raspberry. we'll have to see.

some time later during the morning at work... la la la. i'm alternating between thinking that my spacers barely bother me, to thinking that my teeth feel so tight that they are driving me insane! i was trying to figure out if i was grinding my teeth last night (first night in spacers). i don't think i did. i think the spacers throwing a monkey wrench into my 'bite' kinda f'ed everything up. for all the pain/discomfort i'm in today, not any of it is in my jaws. it's awesome, it's so weird!

later in the day after lunch... note to self, sammiches, while yummy, = do not work with spacers. chili = 4000 times easier to eat. damn. i LOVE bacon and it was hard for me to eat it. that's SAD!

onto thursday, day 3.

i found the COOLEST ligature color picker for braces, it makes the one i found before seem totally pointless. this one looks like REAL braces. after playing on the new one i think i'm still all about the pink elastics. i don't know. i need to check out the colors when i go in next time. hello! obviously, as I'M GETTING MY BRACES NEXT TIME! i don't think my ortho has glow in the dark colors. i would be ALL about that one!

so my teeth today are kinda better. they were KILLING me last night before i went to bed. it had been hours since i had taken any advil and i could totally tell. my teeth were aching so bad! some advil and a 1/2 hour later, much better. i had taken some yesterday morning and afternoon, but thought i'd try without it last night. guess not!

today they are not as painful, but do have more overall soreness. yesterday i couldn't chew on my left side at all without wanting to die (which was odd as usually my left side is my 'dominant' chewing side), while my right side was uncomfortable with the spacers and all, but perfectly cool with chewing. today both sides are fine to chew (yea!) but they are BOTH very sore. my tongue on the other hand, is PISSED! i can't stop touching/playing/fixing/cleaning the spacers with my tongue and it is totally raw. i'm sure it will be worse when i first get braces, which is something fun to look forward to. 6 more sleeps til braces!!!

i was able to manage turkey & mashed potatoes and gravy for lunch (and pudding and a fruit cup, didn't have as much food in that frozen meal as i thought). did ok with all that. dinner was frozen pizza and winter squash. the pizza had it's hard points but just took me a little longer than normal. i'm over the pain, i am hearing about how if you 'chew through the pain' it goes away faster. i'm all about that and chewing things does make it feel better in a way. what is stopping me is the fact that i don't want to lose/damage any of my spacers. my 3 metal ones are not so stable, i can move them with my fingernail and i usually have to adjust them back into place after eating. otherwise i'd be eating everything with no restrictions. onto day 4!

first ligature color picker - http://www.pbhs.com/ortho/braces/braces.html
second (and awesome!) ligature color picker - http://www.bracesonline.com/elastics.html

and so it starts!

2004-05-04T23:47:00.000-05:00

fun fun fun, my new blog of my oral adventure!

long story short (i'll put up a link to my story sometime...), i need orthodontic and surgical correction of my open bite, crossbite and slight overbite. in other words, only my back molars on both sides of my mouth touch, my teeth in front don't come together all the way and to top it off, i have a slight overbite. FUN! but really, i don't look like a freak! just kidding, everyone of course, tells me, 'why do you need braces, your teeth are straight/look nice!' yup, they are and they mostly do, but they are not really functional and i have TMJ and headache issues already. i've done ALOT of thinking about all of this, and it freaks me out but it seems better than the alternatives of even more headaches, more TMJ issues, cracked and worn down molars, and other fun stuff. plus i want to be able to bite through a sandwich damnit! :)

so then, to the bitching. got my spacers today. 9 small rubberband spacers and 3 small metal spring spacers are now happily wedged in between my back molars. i don't know what was more painfun, the process of getting the spacers in (not that painful really) or paying my braces downpayment of $1700 (MUCH more painful!). during the treatment and right after i was thinking, dude, my nose feels weird. an hour later i was thinking the same thing, kinda tingly and just odd feeling, my sinus area near my nose felt odd as well. i'm weird i think. as some of the rubberband spacers sit more on top of my molars, it is screwing up my pseudo-bite (i have no bite, i have what is my version of a bite, but it is quite pathetic as you would see if you check out my soon to come pics). also, the very nice ortho lady gave me some wax as one of the metal spring spacers is more towards the front of my mouth and immediately started poking the inside of my mouth as soon as it was in. as soon as i threw a bit of wax on it, it was cool. no need to see the movie star (i swear he looks like a 'traditional' movie star, strong jaw, dark eyes look, tell me the mom's of all those young kids in the office don't like that!) orthodontist dr. hobday (who i really like and trust) today.

went right to dr. wong (my dentist) to get his seal of approval on the state of my teeth so i could get the last green light needed before the braces go on for good. luckily dr. wong was happy to oblige and we even chatted a bit after the exam about the fun process i get to go though for the next 15-24 months. it was nice that he took the time to chat with me for 5 minutes. that's why i like him.

first thing i did when i got home was show ron of course (the loving and supportive hubby) and then we went off to noodles to eat because i was STARVING and i wanted to eat before things started feeling not so happy. got one of my favorites, wisconsin mac & cheese, and proceeded to eat carefully. i have to admit i wasn't chewing as much as i probably should have been, but it went ok. had some noodles that got stuck but managed to get it all down as well as 1/2 a warm flat bread. yum.

we then went to target to wander (as we hadn't been to target yet today and we needed our daily dose) wandered around and ended up in the toothpaste/dental area. found me some NON-whitening toothpaste as it not a good idea to use whitening toothpast when you have braces on, you may end up with spots of whiter teeth where there was not braces. amazingly we found some non-whitening toothpaste (which was hard as 99% of the market right now is for whitening toothpaste), got my tom's of maine spearmint anticavity floride toothpaste and i have a week to get used to it before the braces (8 more sleeps! today is tuesday, braces on next wednesday)

of course, now it's later in the night and my teeth (mostly the front ones) are getting, not sore but annoyed. i know that when i wake up in the morning i'm going to be hurting, i can't wait. (*sarcasm warning*). next update soon to come!