My dentist called me a couple of days ago to say that my re-ordered lower tray (the first one) had arrived. I went round to get it, and that evening I started again. So to recap, I’ve got Invisalign trays for my upper and lower teeth – see pictures here. The course for the upper teeth lasts about 56 weeks and the lower ones about 34 weeks. So a long time!
So far the first couple of days has been fine, but they are very awkward to take out. Popping them in couldn’t be easier, but taking them out is another matter. I don’t know if it is because I’ve got big teeth, or because the square blobs attached to some of my teeth are anchoring the trays in, or just because I’m not used to it, but boy, I really have to put some muscle into taking them off. I have to be careful to lever both sides at the same time otherwise I may end up damaging it like I did the first tray that day in the dentist.
How much does Invisalign hurt? Well putting them on doesn’t hurt one bit. Wearing them doesn’t hurt, it can be a little uncomfortable at times – more on that later – but it doesn’t hurt. Taking them off is more uncomfortable – as I have to put so much effort into it the final moment when it does pop out it does feel like I’ve been smacked in the mouth. But that goes after a few seconds – I’m just being dramatic. It isn’t enough to put me off continuing with the treatment.
So a bit more on living day to day with these trays. I guess there’ll be many more posts like this, but I’ll share how it has been so far. It has taken about four days and four nights to get used to them. The first couple of days I was constantly being reminded that I had this plastic foreign body in my mouth – the slightest ridge or bit of aligner poking my tongue or inside lip would have me agitating about it. Imagine taking a stiff crumpled plastic sweet wrapper and inserting it in between your teeth and inside lip – and then keeping it there – that is kind of what it feels like to begin with. With my lower tray the edge sticks out slightly which rubbed against my tongue and that was sore for a couple of days, and on the other side against my inside lip I could feel it rubbing. But now, four days in, it doesn’t bother me – my tongue and inside lip are fine and I can see how I might manage another year of this!!
Today I put up some videos of my teeth in a fast time lapse demonstrating how my teeth will align over the Invisalign treatment. They are really amazing and hard to ignore if you are thinking about getting Invisalign treatment. Oh why don’t I put one on this post as well – here’s one of my favorite ones:
Betty
May 17th, 2010 – 16:03
Gosh that video makes it look incredibly simple. And how successful do you expect the treatment to be? Just like in the vid?
Ed
May 17th, 2010 – 18:20
Hi Betty – my dentist says that she’s seen something like 99% success rate. I’m surprised too – there aren’t many things in the world that have this level of success rate!