Sunday, November 12, 2006


November 4, 2006

ONLY TWO DAYS LATER...

Can you see the improvement in the vertical alignment of my top teeth already? Compare the picture above with the "1st day" pictures posted below. The archwire which was bent has now straightened out, and my top two lateral incisors are just about even with the front central incisors. I was amazed at how quickly this took place. SEVEN MONTHS of OrthoClear didn't accomplish this! I'm soooo excited!


November 2, 2006 (cont.)

The two pictures above show the first day with my new braces on top! Can you see where the archwire on my left top lateral incisor is bent a little? That is going to straighten out as my tooth is pulled down vertically.

As you can see, I am wearing my OrthoClear trays on the bottom...yes, I've joined the hybrid club!!


November 2, 2006 (cont.)

(The two above photos were taken the morning before I got my braces put on---my last day with my OrthoClear buttons on top - Yippee!!)
November 2, 2006

Today I finally went to my first ortho appointment since OrthoClear was discontinued after the lawsuit. My next two sets of OrthoClear trays had already been shipped to the office, so my ortho was planning to let me proceed with those for the next six weeks, after which they would take impressions for Invisalign. I told him how disappointed I have been with the lack of progress that I've experienced with OrthoClear, and I asked him if he thought that my experience would be a lot different with Invisalign. He said that in his opinion, the two products were basically the same, and that of the two, he still believed OrthoClear was the best clear aligner treatment. Since I knew what a disappointing experience I've had with the OC aligners, that made my decision easy. I asked him what his opinion was about switching to traditional braces. He said that with braces, that I would most likely see the results I'd been waiting for MUCH FASTER, but that he hadn't mentioned it because he thought that I really didn't want to wear braces again as an adult. Though my first intention (about seven months ago) was to avoid being in braces again, since the clear aligners have been far from invisible, and since I haven't seen the results I was hoping for, I knew that braces would be the way to go. Since my top front teeth are the ones that are crowded, and also the ones that need to be vertically moved, the braces were only put on those teeth. For the bottom teeth, my ortho told me to wear my next two OrthoClear aligners. Pictures are of my progress are posted above. :)