cori's adventures of oral fun

my fun times (hopefully lasting less than 2 years) of the orthodontic and surgical correction of my open bite, crossbite and slight overjet. sickos! what did you think it was about???

Thursday, July 29, 2004

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

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. 

Wednesday, July 14, 2004

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

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!!!

Tuesday, July 13, 2004

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

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!

Friday, July 09, 2004

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...)

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. :)

Thursday, July 08, 2004

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

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)