YG Retained
Younger Girl has been pining for glasses (since everyone else in the family wears them) and braces (since her idol, Sarcasm Girl, has braces). Well, last week she got part one of her wish: glasses for distance stuff like TV or (as tonight) going to a baseball game. And today she got retainers, top and bottom, to open up her mouth so that the teeth that have been coming in every which way will have a place to move into. The technology has improved vastly since I had my braces, and she got to choose the color of the plastic mouthpieces (bright pink, with silver sparkles...and it glows in the dark!). Still, the poor kid came home with an unbelievable lisp which will calm down in a few days as she gets used to it. She's mostly more amused than upset by her sudden-onset speech impediment, but doesn't want anyone else making a joke about it.
posted by Madeleine Robins at 5:49 PM
3 Comments:
Yes, those custom-colored bands can be a real spirit-lifter for the kid who comes away from the orthodontist with otherwise no more to show for it than a readjustment. But new colors!, well hey.
I, too, had "big teeth, small jaw" syndrome, as well as the bars and retainers required to widen the spaces. After several years (and some really cool fang-like cuspids), we cut our losses and ended up extracting adult teeth -- NOT that the same scenario will play out here. (I was the queen of baby tooth extractions -- it was the doc's theme-song.)
But the part I remember the most fondly is how my Mom and I would go to this amazing seafood place for clam chowder and good sourdough rolls that were soft enough to eat after an adjustment. It became our "thing," and made visiting the Orthodontist even better than just having the opportunity to read the Mad magazines in his waiting area.
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My children, alas, seem to have inherited my teeth (what, they couldn't have gotten Spouse's teeth and some other more helpful part of me?). When I had my second set of braces (first set was taken off when we moved away from New York and the orthodontist) they had to do all manner of preparatory work--taking out a couple of teeth, going up into the roof of my mouth to lay bare a canine that was buried under my nose, and putting a band around it so that it could be pulled down; Sarcasm Girl has a tooth that is being dealt with the same way. Poor YG had an incisor come down behind her other front teeth, so the point of the upper retainer is to make room for that tooth to move in line with the other teeth. And, as the orthodontist cheerfully noted, this is just work to make sure there's enough room for all the teeth to come in; YG may need real braces in a few years...Joy.
Meanwhile, Sarcasm Girl had her braces tightened today, and several new brackets put on (apparently the tooth being brought down from the roof of her mouth is coming down splendidly, but is still tilted at an angle and needs to be whapped in line.
The Motrin does not stop on orthodontist days.
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