Ready or Not!

New Here?  Check out my first journal entry: Twas the night before braces...

Dear Journal,

Well I just got my braces on.

It was really scary at first, but they said “Don’t worry will get you in then out and no pain!” After getting a look around, we went in the office and they took some x-ray pictures. The machine was very large! Buuuuuut it was painless and it took pictures of my bones and teeth! It did not have a camera... how in the world? 

Big white camera-less machine that can see through me.

Then we looked at my pictures! That’s what nightmares are made of! They looked very scary.

Nightmares right here!

When we got done with that, we went to another office where they took MORE pictures… with a real camera this time.

**Spoiler Alert!  This was the most painful thing of the day**

They stretched out my mouth with a menacing plastic doohickey sort of thing. It huurrt my tiny little mouth! She got a ton of shots (camera shots, not needle shots!)—it wasn’t worth trying to smile, my mouth was stretch out and I had no choice!

After pictures, Mom had to fill out papers, papers, papers--I even got to sign one of them! During all of this, mama went picture crazy.

Picture here! Picture there! Picture everywhere!

See?  I look like I'm smiling, but I'M NOT!!!

A mirror in my mouth?

Well, this is weird.

Then the orthodontist came in and looked at my teeth.  

Dr. Guess was super sweet! I really like her!

After calling out lots of weird teeth words like “something over 3, something plus 2, cross bite, overbite normal”, she sat down and all I remember her saying was, “well are you comfortable waiting six months?”

Then mom looked at me and said, “Are you okay with that?  Either way is fine with me." 

SHOCK.

HORROR! 

For some reason my mouth said, "mmmhmm.  That's fine. We can wait." 

BUT on the inside, I was SCREAMING! NooooooooooooooOOOOooooo!!!  Do you know how much I stressed this day?  I couldn’t sleep or eat!  Six months of no sleep or FOOD? I was ready NOW. I was prepared to be ready this day.
 TO. DAY.  
But she didn't hear any of that.

All I remember after that was standing outside of the door. OUTSIDE. Outside of the place that I had dreaded coming to but convinced myself to come to anyway! Mom stopped me.  She said, "Ruby, are you SURE you're fine with this? We can still go back in there and ask if you can go ahead with it since you are ready." I thought about it for a moment and decided to play it cool and barely whispered, "well, sure I guess we can go back in there."  So up the stairs we went!

Mom spoke with someone-I’m not sure who or what she said, but the next thing I knew, she was signing more papers. Then, we went to the front and waited for my name to be called. During that time, I got a talkin to. I always get a talkin to. She says she is supposed to be training me.  Well, this training session was on speaking up for me.  I learned a new word-advocate.  I am my own advocate. If I’m not comfortable or my insides are screaming about something happening, I need to speak up. You got that?  I do.

After about what seemed like forever, but was really only about 5 minutes according to mom, we got called back and I'm not sure if my mom knew what was about to happen or if she really didn't know.

BUT, cow bell! 
A cow bell was rung to get everyone's attention that today was my first day! I could feel my face getting hotter! Before I burst into flames, everyone smiled and clapped and welcomed me! My chair was all the way in the back. I didn't have much time to be embarrassed, but I sure was glad my chair was away from the front!

Then, my new friend started cleaning my teeth. It was almost like being at a dentist. I was not expecting that. I wasn’t expecting to get my teeth shined, but it made sense when she explained that the glue really needed to stick! Then, she put some kind of tooth conditioner on and it tasted like very sour lemon candy…Ew.

Did I get transported to the dentist???

After that, they started sticking brackets on and the orthodontist came over and made sure they were perfect! 

More lip stretching, but Lakosha was awesome!

Then, there was this cool blue light that dried the glue. 

My future is so bright... 

Once the glue was dried, they started to put the wire through the brackets.

Wires and springs?  

 That was fast. Here I am, not dead from pain. I made it! 

Metal Mouth

After she put my metal mouth together—she answered all of my questions and then some!

My new best friend, Lakosha!  She answered all of my questions!

Even about rust and magnets!

Demonstration time!

Don’t eat anything hard or sticky. They will not rust. Nothing will happen if I get too close to a magnet. No special tooth brush. If a baby tooth comes out, it’s okay. Chewing gum, not bubble gum!

All done!

Lakosha. AKA THE BEST!!!

Before and After

Then we left and ate lunch. Mom must have known what was coming, because…

Then.

The.

Pain.

Started.

I was scared of the wrong thing. Sore, stretchy, all the time pressure on my front teeth! I’m taking some medicine and waiting on that to go away. I have figured out that it is very hard to whistle or use a straw. I hope mom makes it to the store to buy me some soft food before I starve.

When I get this pain situated, I’ll let you know how I’m doing. 

See my next post here: I'm Alive!!!