SMILE!

Orthodontists don't like it when you bite them...

If you read the description, you know that these things are not in chronological order. So I'm starting somewhere in the middle of my treatment.

Background-

It was winter, and because of where I live, winter=snow, and naturally, snow=cold. Every one of my appointments were on Tuesdays for some reason. I got my ortho done with the same company as my dentist, but a different office in a neighboring town (that you don't get to know). This was before my ortho office had moved into a bigger, less comfortable, less personal office. This was also before my first orthodontist quit and was replaced by a rude dude.

My orthodontist office has many ortho assistants that do most of the work, the orthodontist just observes them put on braces, or most of the time does it himself (my old orthodontist was a girl). He also comes in once they have taken off the wires and checks out your teeth to see if any adjustments need to be made.

I was sitting in the little room, waiting to see which ortho assistant I would get. By this time, I knew which ones to hope for, not that I necessarily dreaded any of them. They were mostly nice, but some were quick and gentle, while others drug out the appointment and would accidentally stab your gums at least four times with their various tools.

At my orthodontist office, they are kind of unorganized (but that's the next chapter), so there is a lot of waiting in the rooms involved. When the ortho assistant walked in, I knew I was going to have fun (sense the sarcasm). She was one of the newer assistants, she was really kind, but, like I said before, prone to dragging out the appointment.

She got to work taking off my elastics (the colorful things some people have on their braces) and pulled up too quickly with the tool, and stabbed my gums, my natural reaction was to bite down. Fortunately, the hand with the tool had pulled out before I bit it. Unfortunately, her other hand had a finger resting on my tooth on the other side of my mouth. So her pointer finger was bit...

I felt guilty, but, because of all the spit in my mouth*, I couldn't gargle out an apology.

Cradling her finger, she gritted her teeth and said, "Stay with me now."

I tried to make my face look apologetic, which was hard because I was trying to keep from choking on my spit. We continued on with the appointment, and she was a little bit more fidgety and a little less gentle than before.

So take this lesson, orthodontists, do not like to be bit.

*If you have never had braces, then this sounds disgusting, but when you have braces, it becomes a lot easier for your mouth to fill up with spit. I do not understand why. Especially when you are laying in the dentist chair, you have to use your tongue as a barrier between the spit and your throat because another thing orthodontists don't like is you choking on your spit. Also, my ortho place hardly ever used the little spit-sucker unless they were removing or putting on braces, so it was hard to open wide and keep your tongue in place.