Four Sets and Counting...

This is set three for Sparky alone, and unfortunately it's not looking so good:

You can probably tell how bad the midline is off. At one point it actually looked pretty good, but before we left Virginia the orthodontist tried to do a quick fix to get her upper braces off before we left. It didn't work, and this is what we ended up with in Michigan.


We get to go get three brackets removed and repositioned in a little over a week, a new bottom retainer, and then when we're done we have to have the two top middle teeth bonded to get them shaped correctly. They are "conical" and will not look correct until that is done by the dentist. We already love our orthodontist here after only one visit. Their office probably loves us too, because they see dollar signs.

When I mentioned this was Sparky's third set, her first set was at eight years old. She had a permanent tooth on the bottom (just right of middle) that was laying down under three baby teeth. She had to have it exposed, uprighted, and turned. Thankfully they saved the tooth, and during that they had a partial set of braces on the top and bottom. When they removed those and she had retainers to hold some space, she had large knots develop down in her lower gumline. The oral surgeon said it was from erupting teeth, so the orthodontist put the braces back on to hold position and keep things in place since he already saw negative movement happening. This all happened in Illinois, where we also loved our orthodontist. Sparky proceeded to lose all her baby teeth and as permanent teeth started to come in, the braces were removed. She was ready for this third set right when we got to Virginia.

Our fourth set of braces was actually chronologically our third, and Chatty's first and only set. She got them on in Illinois and almost completed treatment while she was there. She had them on for about six months after we arrived in Virginia, and then had them removed and got retainers. The only bad thing right now is that I packed the box that has her retainer in it, and stink if it isn't one that ended up in the storage unit. So we got an impression made for one at the orthodontist for her too. Cha-ching.

Buddy will be set five. We knew he would be ready sometime in the fall, but he still had a couple of baby teeth that needed to come out. He lost one of them last night. Look at the hole amidst the big teeth:


He's been in treatment for a little over two years, also since we arrived in Virginia. He's had a lip bumper on the bottom and a spacer on the top to make room for his big teeth he got from me, in his small mouth he also got from me. And while you're trying not to pee your pants laughing about me not having a big mouth, I mean actual bone structure.

I only have 24 teeth instead of 32. I got my first set of braces at nine years old the summer before I went in the fourth grade. That's back when nobody got them on until they were at least 12. But my teeth were absolutely everywhere in my mouth, coming out my gums and crossing each other in the front. They pulled nine teeth before they put them on, seven baby and two permanent, and then two more permanent after they put them on. I had the railroad track braces on every tooth, and I didn't have to have a single spacer put in my mouth for the orthodontist to get them on. I had my wisdom teeth cut out when I was 16 and 18, two each time, thus the 24 teeth I have now. Since they took my braces off when I was 12, my bones grew after I got them off and my bite was off and my teeth had moved a little, so I had a second partial set as an adult for one year. I actually got them off the day before I got put on bed rest with the girls.

And you know this has set six written all over it:

At least he won't need braces: