Progress Weeks 17-18

Images After: Tray 9

Remaining Trays: 15

Lockjaw: Consistent. No pain
Headaches: None
Pain: Only sore first day of new tray

Wear: 16-20 hours a day
Brushing: Not as much as I should during the day at work
Flossing: Every night

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

Right View 

Left View

Progress Weeks 15-16

Below are pictures after tray 8, I'm currently on tray 10 so I'll also be posting pictures after tray 9 soon.
No changes to my tray-wearing experience. It's actually become pretty predictable, so I figured it would be good to just have a standard checklist that gets posted with each picture set to make posts easier and more consistent for me.

Images After: Tray 8
Remaining Trays: 16

Lockjaw: Consistent. No pain
Headaches: None
Pain: Only sore first day of new tray

Wear: 18-20 hours a day
Brushing: Not as much as I should during the day at work
Flossing: Every night

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

Left View

Right View

Progress Weeks 13-14

Tray seven is done, 17 to go! Below are pictures after tray 7. I was in a rush had just eaten. I didn't have time to brush so some of the pictures show just how super stained your teeth are after food and drink. Insane right? I've decided to try to add side shots to the set because this seems to be where things are doing the most movement right now.

The lockjaw and craziness of not really having a matched bite has become more "normal" for me. I think my teeth have gotten used to moving around all loosey goosey so I don't really have as much pain after a new trays. It's kinda of sore after I take of the trays for sure, but no major headaches or tension like I had when I first started Invisalign. Kind of hard to believe that I'll been wearing my trays for almost 4 months now. I'll be moving into tray 9 in just a few days. Kind of exciting to be coming up on the halfway mark (tray 12) before I know it! :)

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

Right View

Left View

Doing pretty good. I haven't been wearing my trays as much as I should - more like 18-20 hours rather than 20-22 but it hasn't been an issue. Things are moving around well, pain isn't constant in any way. I floss every night and have a brushing routine that isn't psycho. Things are good and it's more "routine" now. Not gonna lie though, I'm ready to have these things off. June 2013 can't come soon enough!

Progress Weeks 11-12

Here are my pictures after tray six, with 18 remaining trays.All attachments are still on, though I did get worried one day when I popped my tray on and something came loose. It was food. HA! Where did that come from? : O

Maybe I'm crazy but I feel like my teeth are looking MORE crooked on the bottom than before. I keep inspecting the trays, to make sure things are matching up and they are but who knows LOL. The lockjaw and popping is constant now, can be painful. When I was on tray 6 it was definitely the worst it'd been. I started taking the soma (muscle relaxer) which helped more than I thought it would. I'm behind on these post so I'm trying to get caught up.

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

Slacked on wearing my trays enough during tray 6. Hadn't been wearing my trays as much as I should - more like 16-20 hours instead of 20-22. OUCH. I still floss every night and the next tray went on without issue due to me being good about wearing it the few days before the switch! I blame snacking and delicious non-clear liquids. :)

Slacking on wearing my trays :(

I admit it, for the last couple weeks I've been slacking on wearing my trays. I blame delicious snacks and non-clear liquids! There have been at least 5 days during tray six where I've left the trays off for 2-5 hour stints in the evening. On average for tray 6 I've been wearing the trays for more more like 16-20 hours instead of 20-22. The effect? Every time I put the trays back on, they're pretty tight and not getting looser the way I know they should be. Brushing your teeth constantly definitely gets tiresome and requires commitment. I gotta buck up.

Tomorrow night I'm supposed to upgrade to tray seven. I'm a little worried about how painful that's going to be. I only have myself to blame, which is both annoying and gratifying. (Who doesn't like control?) To be fair, I have been trying to pick back up on wearing my trays correctly the last few days - and of course expect to going forward. I can feel some loosening in the trays as of today...still not looking forward to the pain that tomorrow evening will bring. Alas! Progress pictures to follow tomorrow.

Progress Weeks 9-10

Tray five is done, 19 to go! All attachments are still on and holding strong after my second tray with them on.

Below are pictures after tray 5. The headaches have been reduced a little, in favor of more teeth pain than anything. I do have jaw tension and my lockjaw has become pretty much constant. I filled the prescription for muscle relaxers when I started tray 7. I'm kind of behind on posting so I'll get these posted ASAP since it's almost time for post-tray 6 pictures!

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

Starting to slack. Haven't been wearing my trays as much as I should - more like 18-20 hours rather than 20-22. I'm still flossing every night though! Not wearing the trays as much as I should, I'm sure it having a direct affect on me having more constant lock jaw. I think its that combined with the fact that the movement is more aggressive now that the attachments are on. :(

Progress Weeks 7-8

Tray four is done. It was the first tray with attachments and I can say with pride that none of them have come off yet. Hopefully the glue holds for the rest of the treatment. :) Only 20 trays to go! Apparently people still can't see my trays. I like it.

Below are pictures after tray 4. No new developments; the headaches and tension are around consistently  for the first 4 days of the tray. The lockjaw chooses to be better/worse at random, but sticks around day in and day out. It's not affecting my health or life so I let it be. I did get a prescription for muscle relaxers just in case, but I haven't needed to fill it yet. We'll see.

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

Still on a roll. Consistent wear (hitting my 20-22 hours every day) and flossing every night. Routine is good - time consuming but definitely worth it.

I Got My Attachments

I didn't know attachments existed and I almost let them be a deal breaker. After seeing videos on youtube I  was not excited about having them put on my teeth. It seemed to take away the "invisible" element of Invisalign to a large extent.

By the time I found out they'd be necessary, I was 3/4ths the way through the process and had paid in full. LOL. The options were either suck it up or lose the invested time and figure out how to get my money back. I'm not saying it was an easy choice. The attachments are on for almost a year, but the already having paid part did help encourage me to proceed. Ultimately the attachments were far less noticeable than any braces would be and I was in it to get my teeth straightened.

The attachment appointment:

• The whole process took no more than 30 minutes for 11 attachments.
• They started by slipping on a retainer tray to make sure my teeth were where they needed to be at.
• The retainer came off loose and they were happy with my progress so far.
• The dentist mentioned at this point that all new trays would be more aggressive in terms of movement. FUN.
• To get the attachments on she primed each tooth that required an attachment with a little wash to make the surface less smooth where the attachment would go.
• Each attachment placement got a coating of glue and a UV light treatment to help cure the bond.
• They popped on my new trays (now with bumps for the attachments) and cured  with the UV light again.

After the attachments were seated:

• My teeth felt pretty rough. Lots of excess glue, but the dentist assured me this would come off over a course of weeks as I brushed my teeth.
• The new trays were HARD to get off. Given I was trying to be careful not to pop the attachments off, but she wasn't lying about the movement being more aggressive.
• No pain from the attachments, but the suggested wear time before removal was 3 hours to let the glue set for a while. I went for 5. She kept telling me she expected me to pop one off so I want to try my damnedest not to!

How they look:

I can definitely say that I'm shocked how invisible they are when the trays off. Impressed even. With the trays on...not so much, but I'll let you be the judge.

Attachments front view

Attachments side view

Attachments with trays front view

Attachments with trays side view

All my trays after this have attachment bubbles. I can't loose break or lose trays because none of the old ones will fit!

Progress Weeks 5-6

Tray three is done, this week I got my attachments and new trays! Three down, 21 to go. Below are the pictures while I was wearing tray 3. I had to wear the tray a couple extra days due to the timing of my attachment appointment. Nothing new with tray 3, it was about the same as tray 2 from start to finish with headaches, tension, and jaw getting locked when I first started wearing it, but significant reduction after 3-5 days.

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

Still on a roll, no slip ups. I've consistently worn my trays for between 20-22 hours every day and have flossed every night. Getting into a good routine and being less psycho about brushing every time after I eat something small or drink something sugary during the day. Just making sure not to leave anything sitting for more than a few hours really.

Oh the Lockjaw!

Lockjaw you say? But isn't that something that happens if you've got tetanus. True enough, it does happen with tetanus, but it can also be associated with a bunch of other stuff. A more general term you might see used online is "trismus" or inability to normally open the mouth. What happens is you start to open your mouth and then BOOM, you realize it's locked and can only open so far. Thus the term lockjaw.

As the weeks have gone on, my jaw has been locked more and more frequently. It happens randomly, but usually is more common 1) right when I wake up in the morning or 2) when I've been laying on my side (putting pressure on my jaw).

It's not usually that painful. Just depends on how hard I have to work to force my mouth open.

When I do get my jaw unlocked there's a massive 'click' sound coming from the jaw itself. As far as I know, there really isn't any other thing you can do than just force your jaw open. After you get it open, just work it out over and over again. This gives you back the range of motion and releases the tension. My jaw clicks most of time now but how loud it is (audible only to me vs. audible to people near me) depends on how recently my last "lock incident" was. It kind of sucks and gets more painful over time, but luckily only one side of my jaw is locking.

I've been unsuccessful in getting the jaw unlocked more than a few times, without either removing the trays and massaging the muscles in my cheek. Once the jaw is unlocked, the trays go right back in. No harm, no foul. It doesn't seem to instigate more locking. I'm going to see what the dentist says about this the next time I go in. Not sure what they'll suggest or prescribe. Just haven't found a lot of useful information about this online when it comes to Invisalign-related lockjaw.


JAN 2013 UPDATE: I'm over halfway through my treatment. Something cool happened temporarily during the first couple days of my current tray.

If I had to rate my usual lockjaw tension from 1 to 10 - with 1 being not much tension, and 10 being so tense I can't get my jaw open without multiple attempts - I'm usually anywhere between 6 and 8. When I shoved my current trays on, the lockjaw loosened up for a couple days! It was around a 3 or 4 on days 1 and 2; the usual amount of tension (without pain) returned on day 3. Like I said, it was temporary, but what is cool is that it's a good indicator my bite is starting to get matched up again! Very cool. I can definitely see a lot of good progress since I started with Invisalign now in lots of places.

Progress Weeks 3-4

Tray two is done and I'm halfway though tray 3! Two down, 22 to go. Below are the pictures after tray two, posting them a little late, but equal intervals from the last progress post. I'm starting to see like one or two teeth moving, but other than that not any major differences. I can definitely feel a difference.

Tray two has been somewhat annoying with headaches and lockjaw. Based on my progress so far into tray 3, I'm expecting things to get more annoying/painful. It's not killer - maybe an average 4 on a pain scale of 1 to 10 when it hurts - but the headaches are inconvenient. Sometimes they try to rage on me when I'm tired or trying to work.

Front View

Top View

Bottom View

No painkillers for you! The dentist is being totally lame about giving me the pain medication I need. Taking 4 advil at a time (800 mg) does very little and any less does nothing. Not really keen on taking that much advil all the time. It's bad for your workout progress and for your tummy.

My previous dentist gave me vicodin and muscle relaxers for some jaw pain which helped tremendously. They want me to come in to talk to the dentist, because if I look him in the eyes and say the same thing, that will be more effective. I'm going in next week for my attachments so I figured I could suffer until then rather then go to the dentist 20 times each month. My dentist's office and I talk almost every week. They're always messing something administrative up, but damnit I like the dentists.

I've been a pretty good girl.
I've worn my trays for between 20-22 hours every day and have flossed almost every night. :) I've been a little more lax about drinking non-water things with the trays in. I keep my trays clean though so it hasn't been an issue. Yay progress.

Cleaning Your Trays (and Your Teeth)

It should go without saying that you should clean both your trays and your teeth if you want to avoid bad breath and cavities. I'll make no assumptions and just give you the run down on what seems to be the easiest way to stay fresh, clean, and keep your trays see-through.

A note about toothpaste and mouthwash: My dentist recommended that I not use any sort of whitening toothpaste when brushing my trays due to it's abrasive nature and potential to cause damage to the trays. That said, it's totally OK to brush your teeth with whitening toothpaste. I was also advised to not use mouthwashes with alcohol before putting the trays on because alcohol can dry out the trays and make them brittle. I'm not going to cover mouthwash here. If you use it, get the alcohol-free version of your favorite kind.

Daily Routine - Brushing / Flossing

You'll need:

1. Two soft-bristled toothbrushes. One for home and one to take with you every where else.
2. Toothpaste.  If your usual toothpaste has "whitening action" you'll also need one without.
3. Floss. I like Oral-B glide. Crest also makes a glide floss.

Morning Brush: Your mouth is going to be full of funk, your trays are going to be in, and you need to brush to be clean.

1. Try leaving your trays in and brush them with non-whitening toothpaste.
2. Spit and rinse, not pop out your trays.
3. Brush the insides of your trays with the remaining non-whitening toothpaste left on your brush.
4. Now brush your teeth with the toothpaste of your choice.

Midday Brushing: You'll be brushing to get the food out of your teeth before putting your trays back on after you eat.

1. Brush your teeth and trays (inside and out) with non-whitening toothpaste.
2. Floss if you're amazing. I only floss at the end of the day.

Final Brush Before Bed: You'll be prepping your teeth for an overnight stay with the trays on. You don't want to leave anything in there. Brush well!

1. Brush your teeth with the toothpaste of your choice.
2. Floss like you mean it, leave no gunk behind.
3. Brush your trays (inside and out) with non-whitening toothpaste and pay special attention to get all the crevices.

Technically if you flossed the night before you should be set so you don't have to floss in the morning. Pay attention to white cloudy stuff on the insides of your trays. This can be brushed off. Also pay mind to any roughness you feel on your trays while you're wearing them. Brush these parts thoroughly before bed.

Weekly Routine - Soaking

You'll need:

1. A cup or a glass big enough to hold your trays.
2. Retainer Bright cleaning tablets.

Easy to find on Amazon.com

About once a week (or when the trays starting to have a smell about them - ick!) I'll give them a soak in the Retainer Brite. You can find lots of sellers on www.amazon.com. I think I paid around $25 for 64 tablets. I think 36 tablets would last you way longer than 1 month, assuming you're brushing your trays.

The instructions are printed on the side of the box. Cleaning is a snap and takes less than half an hour. I've pasted some images of the process below.

Instructions printed on the side of the box.

Take out a Retainer Bright cleaning tablet.

Put the capsule in warm water

It gets pretty fizzy! Toss in your trays.

Wait till the water is clear and then you're done!

Don't forget to rinse your trays after you take them out of the solution. If you notice they aren't as clear as you were hoping, it could be related to needing to brush the trays OR torquing the trays. The trays get bend when you bite down while they're in your mouth or when you remove them. This can cause the plastic to look more white towards the end of their cycle. Cleaning them won't help this. Just try to be careful of bending them.

Progress Weeks 1-2

Tray one is done! 1 down, 23 to go. Below are the pictures after tray one, I don't see much of a difference. Tray one gave me little to no pain. No one has noticed my trays so far. Very cool.

Front View

Top View

Bottom View 

Tray 2 is in! On Monday evening I put in tray two. It's been pretty painful for the last few days. I've had a headache going since Tuesday. Poppin' lots of advil which is helping some, not a ton. The top tray is giving me the most pain, but surprisingly comes off pretty easily. The bottom tray is less painful, but is nearly impossible to get off. Makes no sense!

Today is day 3 of my second tray set and it feels like my teeth are all over the place every time I put the trays back in. It seems to take at least 20-45 mins before I feel like my teeth are lined up inside the trays again. Definitely encourages me to keep them on for longer.

I've been a good girl!
I've worn my trays for between 20-22 hours every day. I've also been flossing almost every night. :)

My Treatment Overview

Since I started Invisalign I've had three sets of trays created. Below are the details of each, including alterations to the teeth completed to assist the treatment. In summary, my first treatment had almost a year of trays, attachments and teeth shaving. As I went through the plan the dentist changed the amount of teeth shaving based on my comments and the actual results. After my first treatment, I got my attachments removed. My second treatment was cut short because the trays were starting to fit sideways on top. I'm currently working through my third set of trays.

Treatment 1 - Start July 2012

Treatment length: 24 trays (48 weeks)
Attachments: Added to 11 specific front teeth after 6 weeks (or first 3 trays)
Teeth Alterations: Interproximal reduction (shaving of the tooth enamel to create space between the teeth)

• Teeth Shaving at 13-18 weeks of treatment (or after 7ish trays)
• 7 reductions on the top teeth of .5 millimeters
• 7 reductions on the bottom teeth of .2 millimeters

The video below shows the expected transition start-to finish and attachment locations (in red). The arrows point to where the teeth shaving (interproximal reduction) will occur.

Treatment 2 - Start July 2013

Treatment length: 15 trays (30 weeks)
Attachments: Removed! I wanted them off after my first treatment. My dentist worked the removal into my treatment plan for round 2. Basically it just takes longer
Teeth Alterations: None. The teeth shaving expected on the top teeth in Treatment 1 was changed after it seemed that the amount completed on the bottom was too much.

Terminated after 10 trays: My trays were starting to fit sideways. I thought it was just because I was slacking on wearing them, turns out the trays were fabricated in a wacky way due to the mold of my teeth.

Treatment 3 - Start August 2014

Treatment length: 17 trays (32 weeks)
Attachments: Nope
Teeth Alterations: None. 

These fit great.

First Appointments - What to Expect

If you're looking to get started with invisalign treatment I suggest you get the ball rolling. Depending on your current dental health and the availability of your dentist, it could be any number of months before your trays are ready. Expect to go in for multiple appointments. I've outlined the process below.

1. The Initial Consultation:  The person(s) in charge of your invisalign treatment will meet with you and look at your teeth. They'll tell you if you're a candidate and whether they think you'll need teeth removed or interproximal reduction (i.e. teeth shaving). You should also get an idea of the treatment length to expect.
2. Dental Exam: If you're confident that you're a candidate for invisalign, you should try to schedule the dental exam on the same day as your initial consultation. I was able to do this and saved myself a  trip. Expect a standard exam. If you have cavities, a broken tooth, gingivitus, etc. expect to come in again to correct these issues before your treatment can start.
3. Correcting Existing Issues:  You'll usually need to fix any existing problems with your teeth. How strict this rule is  depends on your dentist. I got away with just a thorough cleaning. Why correct problems? If you've got a cavity going, invisalign is only gonna make it worse. Think of the invisalign trays like incubators.  If you've got a broken tooth, not only will it be hard to predict how your teeth are going to move, but the tooth could break even more which will ruin the fit of the trays.
4.  Mold of Your Teeth: The dentist will take 2 molds, one for upper and one for lower. They will send these to Invisalign. Think of this as the initiaion of your treatment.  The molds will be turned into digital models that will be used to create your invisalign plan from start to finish.
5. Treatment Approval: After your molds are taken, it will take a few weeks before the treatment plan is ready. Usually this is a video that Invisalign sends to your dentist. I had the dentist email me a short version of the video so I could approve it. Technically, you can authorize the dentist to complete the approval, but this seems dumb. You want to be the one approving the final state of your teeth. I only got to see a short version of the video. To view the full video I would have had to go back to the dentist's office which seemed odd to me. Apparently Invisalign has licensing issues or something that prevents this. You would think since you paid for the treatment you'd have rights to YOUR custom plan, but not so much. Work with your dentist and try to get this emailed if you can't take off work to go in and approve.
6. Tray Fabrication: When you've approved your plan it can take 1-4 weeks for your trays to be fabricated. The dentist will call you when they're ready. You'll need to go in (again) to reeceive your trays and other goodies including cleaning instructions, holders, and chewies. Don't expect to get more than 6-8 weeks worth of trays (3 or 4 sets).

Before you receive your trays, you'll need to sign a waiver that says that a number of bad things could happen to your teeth. AWESOME. This disclaimer is really to protect the dentist from anything that goes wrong with your treatment. If you don't understand any of the terms, be sure to ask what they mean.

In total, I was able to get away with 3 visits to the dentist to get all of this stuff done. I did steps 1 & 2 on my first visit, 3 & 4 on my second visit, approved and asked questions all via phone/email, and then went into get my trays on the third visit. Expect to need to go in at least 3 times if you're lucky!

Progress - Before Invisalign

These are my before invisalign pictures. I take pictures after I've completed a tray - about every 2 weeks. Click here for a full list of my progress posts so far. My teeth tend to look more crooked in photos, so the images show an extreme version of any imperfections. My teeth aren't horribly mangled, but they're crooked in lots of little ways.  I can say with confidence that there's room for improvement. 

Notice twisting and crowding in front 6 teeth on top and bottom.

Crowding on top

Crowding on bottom

Right view

If you read my "About Me" you know that I'm looking to correct the crowding in my front upper and lower teeth. The crowding hasn't caused any major issues like pain or cavities yet. I do have minor plaque buildup on the bottom teeth when I go in for cleanings. Based on past dentists visits, the crowding is expected to increase over time, so I consider this both a preventative and cosmetic treatment. Can't wait to start seeing some progress!  :)