The first half

After about a million preliminary appointments we finally got brackets placed (February 2007). As my maxillary teeth had shifted the most, and would take the longest to move, we started there first. This picture was taken about a month after placement. As you can tell, my teeth are almost aligned already. I was a little afraid at how quickly they moved, since moving teeth too fast can cause root resorption. (however, radiographs taken since, don't show any sign of it, phew). At this point, my maxillary arch was about the same size as my mandibular arch, so my teeth were occluding all wrong. A quad helix was placed on my palate to widen the arch. A word on the quad helix. It wasn't necessarily painful, but made eating a nightmare. Anything I bit into got wrapped around it, especially fruit. Also, I could never get used to talking with it and always sounded like my mouth was full of food. Above and beyond however was the experience of flossing with all that metal in my mouth. Weaving the floss through my arch wire and then through the quad arms was impossible. On average I think it took about 10 minutes just to floss my maxillary teeth. Needless to say I didn't floss everyday, if it weren't for Superfloss, it probably would have never happened.