My Invisalign Blog

My Invisalign Braces Experience

Travelling With Invisalign Braces…Tip #1

by 10 Comments

Well, sorry folks, it’s been a while. Yet again I have been off globetrotting with scant, if any, regard for my blog; so my apologies that my updates have been rather thin on the ground lately. The good news is that I have been merrily collecting tips for travelling with Invisalign whilst on holiday – or rather, what not to do as the case turned out.

It all started so well. I had remembered to carefully pack an extra wash bag filled with all of the Invisalign supplies that I might need on holiday- the sterilising tablets, the floss, the emergency Colgate Wisps,(#aff link) the spare toothbrushes- you get the picture. I had also packed a tiny version in my carry on bag containing everything I might need to get me through the trials of a 24 hour flight from Australia to the Uk. Brushing your teeth in plane toilets is one of the joys that everyone should try to avoid as much as possible, so my plan was to abandon all pretence of wearing my Invisalign for 22 hours on the flight, try to manage about 16 hours, and hope for the best.

With all of the scurrying about, last minute emptying of the fridge, frantic unpacking and repacking of children’s cases to search for missing toys in response to tear stained pleas that a month long trip entails, I didn’t have time to have breakfast before leaving for our 8am flight. So, as is my usual style I whipped out my Invisalign, grabbed a snack bar and a nutritious bottle of diet coke (I know, I know) and headed out to the taxi clutching passports, drink bottles, favourite teddy bears and a thousand other bits and bobs in my clammy, overspilling hands.

Travelling with Invisalign - pack your aligners! Image of suitcases

Travelling with Invisalign – pack your aligners!

Thirty minutes later we were at the airport, bags checked in, feeling surprisingly calm and organised when I suddenly remembered that my Invisalign weren’t in my mouth. After two minutes of frantic rifling I realised, with a leaden stomach, that they were neither in my handbag or my carry on bag. That left two options; they were either in a checked in packed suitcase, or sitting nonchalently at home on the top of my coffee machine. Of course, whilst I had packed the lower aligners that I needed to change to in a fortnight, I had forgotten to pack my previous set as a back up and as the top aligners were my last ones in the series. This meant If I didn’t find them I would have no upper braces for a month.

Two minutes later I was back in a cab, hyperventilating and begging the poor bewildered driver to speed through suburban Brisbane to get back to my house as fast as possible. At this point I knew that it was a round trip of about an hour from airport to my house and that it was about an hour and twenty minutes until my 24 hour, non refundable flight took off, with or without me.

Fortunately, my taxi driver rose to the occasion admirably, his foot never leaving the floor, and seat belt burns not withstanding, we made it to my house in around 22 minutes, a record. Of course, after a frantic two minute search which included a quick scan of all the most likely places that I dump my braces I simply could not find them. Anywhere. I ran from room to room becoming increasingly hysterical and much to taxi drivers amusement even ran back out into the garden and began foraging through the dustbin in an attempt to find them. Finally, after about six frantic minutes I came to the conclusion that they must be in my checked in bags, grabbed the previous sets from a drawer to wear on the journey and flew back into the taxi to start another hair raising grand prix back to the airport.

We made the flight. Just. By the skin of our teeth.

Travelling with Invisalign - image of plane toilet

Travelling with Invisalign – brushing in the plane toilet is not an experience to be savoured!

Of course, it was the usual joy on board of the rigmarole of 24 hours of putting in aligners, being offered a drink, removing aligners, drinking, squeezing past other passengers,queuingg for toilets, attempting to brush teeth in the fist sized, stained sink, returning to seat, five minutes later being offered food, removing aligners….you get the picture. Invisalign on planes are hard even if you aren’t squeezing your teeth into the previous set that you had stopped wearing a week ago. I don’t think I managed to wear them more than about 12 hours out of the 24, and even that was fraught with inconvenience.

It took me 24 hours after we arrived to get over my jet lag sufficiently to launch the search through our 90 kilos of luggage for my set six aligners. Despite checking the fifteen thousand small suitcase pockets, every washbag, the ten thousand pencil cases that my children deem necessary for a months holiday, they simply weren’t there.

Stuck in the Uk, on the other side of the world from my orthodontist, we had extensive email discussions back and forth about what exactly I could do to get my teeth from set 5 top and bottom that I was currently wearing, into the set 8 lower that I had in my bag. In all of the palaver, I had also forgotten set 7. Yes, I really am that stupid. I was astonished to be told that replacements would cost me $600. Gulp. Not only a stupid mistake but a costly one too.

So, to avoid the $600, with a little encouragement, some panadol, and a surprising amount of brute force, I actually managed to move my teeth from set 5 lower, to set 8 lower, skipping two whole sets.This incidentally is really not advisable except in dire emergencies. Hell, they were tight. There were moments, trying to force them onto my teeth where I wasn’t sure whether my teeth or the aligners would break first, but nonetheless, they went in in the end.

My instructions from my orthodontist were then to wear set 8 for three weeks before moving onto set 9 as normal. In the meantime, to also wear set 5 upper as retainers.

Home safe and sound I am still waiting for my orthodontists appointment to find out the damage I have done to my treatment. To this day, having looked through my whole house, I have no idea where set six went- only that they are gone, and it appears gone for good.

So, tip #1 for travelling with Invisalign. Remember to take them with you….

Widening Arches With Invisalign

by 7 Comments

I finally have photographic evidence that my teeth are really, really improving. I took my daughters to a function last week at which there was a professional photographer taking photos. Usually in such situations I just do my usual closed mouth, tight lipped, teeth concealing smile. However, this was a woman photographer and she was fierce! There was no way she was going to accept anything less than a full on toothy, Hollywood smile. So, in the interests of leaving there in one piece I went for it.

The amazing thing was that I saw the pictures on screen and my teeth look good. I mean really good, like straight, well proportioned teeth. Ok, they aren’t yet Hollywood perfect, but compared to how they were before I started Invisalign, they are fantastic. I think what has changed is that my upper arches are starting to widen and fill out my mouth. One of the questions I always had about Invisalign is can Invisalign widen arches and it seems it can. One of the reasons (and not the only one, believe me!) that my teeth used to look so terrible is that I have a Julia Roberts sized mouth, but with a toddler sized set of teeth. My arches simply weren’t wide enough to fill my smile. Thankfully that seems to be changing.
I have spent a lot of time looking at close up comparison pictures of my teeth, analysing them for tiny changes without realising that, actually, it is from a distance that the improvements are most noticeable. Even my husband told me this week “your arches definitely look wider. ” Of course, being a woman I had to ask him, “Does that look better?” to which I got the response “ummm, yes?”
The thing is whether he thinks so or not, I think they look better. It is a little strange though, to see this new look evolving. I have always seen myself as someone with bad teeth and to suddenly find myself needing to reevaluate that self image is exciting. Yes, I know it’s pure vanity, and vacuous, and all those other terrible things, but hey, let’s be honest, this whole $6300 dollar escapade is really just an expensive beauty treatment. I might be telling people that I’m doing it because my bite alignment might cause me jaw pain in later life, but the reality is… well, I made that story up to hide my embarrassment over how vain I am!
I am including below a comparison of my set 1 and set 11 aligners. There is definite evidence now of the widening of my upper arches. I can’t for the life of me see a lot of difference on the lower arches other than that the gap is beginning to open to allow my wonky tooth to move in. I’ll let you be the judges though.
All has been a breeze with set 11. Let’s hope it continues this way!

One week in Invisalign Braces

by 5 Comments

Well, I’m a week in and feeling pretty fantastic, all things considered. I can get my trays in and out swiftly and easily now, and they feel fairly comfortable, snug rather than tight, and the feeling of pressure has gone completely. In fact I have actually started to forget they are in and can finally concentrate on other things again, which wasn’t always the case in the first couple of days.

The thing that I am finding hardest is having the self discipline to keep them in for as many hours as you need to to get a good result. I am aiming for wearing Invisalign 22 hours a day, but frankly my social life keeps getting in the way! If you go out to dinner for 2-3 hours you’ve already blown it, unless you have no lunch or breakfast, and believe me that is never going to happen!

I’m the one on the left!

Pictures Wearing Invisalign Braces

by 2 Comments

I just wanted to show you some pictures wearing Invisalign braces so you can see what they look like in. Bear in mind that these pictures are VERY close up, they don’t look nearly as noticeable from a social distance.

Also, I have a confession to make. Vanity has got the better of me and I have pressed the enhance button on my photo editing software for the second pic. What that does is make the teeth look a little whiter. Sorry, but they looked so diabolically yellow before that it was either a case of pressing that little button or not posting the picture!! Luckily my treatment plan involves whitening, but I haven’t started on that yet. I’m reserving that as tonight’s little drama…

Pictures Wearing Invisalign Braces

Pictures Wearing Invisalign Braces – my teeth before attachments were added

Pictures Wearing Invisalign Braces Before attachments

Pictures Wearing Invisalign Braces Before Attachments were added

Importantly, as you can see they do fit very closely to my teeth. However, as you can also see, they do make my teeth look much shinier and in some respects larger than normal. Those small grey patches that are in the photos don’t really look like that in real life, they are clear- it’s just air pockets that have photographed badly I think.

These photos were taken before my attachments were added. This is important because I really do think that the attachments or buttons really add to how visible they are on the tooth. Although attachments are tooth coloured they obviously stick out from the tooth. I don’t have any on my front teeth, mine will be at the side. This is something to bear in mind if you will have attachments.

Although I definitely don’t think Invisalign are truly invisible, I do think compared to metal braces, or even white ceramic braces that they are a LOT less visible. Of course, they are also removable which makes a huge difference if you have something that you are desperately keen not to be wearing braces for.

Forgetting Invisalign – Things Slowly Improve

by Leave a Comment

Happily, I think things are improving here, as evidenced by my newfound inability to remember to put my Invisalign trays back in after meals!

Forgetting Invisalign - Once They Become More Comfortable It's Easy To forget them.

Forgetting Invisalign – Once They Become More Comfortable It’s Easy To forget them.

This afternoon, after a frenzied bout of tidying my daughter’s revolting bedroom pre a relative’s visit, I suddenly realised about an hour in, that I had forgotten to put back in my Invisalign. Doh! It seems that I have just stopped thinking about them as much. The truth is that as the pressure subsides, I have stopped noticing them in my mouth, and also, thank goodness, they have become much easier to insert and remove. I think I’m certainly improving my technique, but also it’s just becoming less stressful. I have stopped dreading it, it has simply become more of a pain, something that you sigh before hauling yourself out of your chair to do, than something that induces frantic, wailing, toddleresque tantrums. After a year of Invisalign I’ll be able to do it without thinking at this rate.

One little tip. When you get your first Invisalign’s you get a patient starter kit, which includes a couple of cases to store your braces in when you aren’t wearing them. TAKE THE CASE WITH YOU WHEN YOU GO OUT!!

Forgetting Invisalign - remember your invisalign-case

Forgetting Invisalign – Remember Your Invisalign Case

Yesterday morning I trotted happily off to the shops, not even considering how long I would be or whether I would need to remove them whilst out. After a couple of dull hours of trudging the local mall searching for new school shoes for my children the whole family were ravenous.
Unfortunately, what I had failed to consider was that without my Invisalign case it was going to be fairly difficult to find somewhere sanitary and safe to keep my braces whilst we ate. So, rather than trying to wrap them in a paper napkin, something that the ortho had specifically offered dire warnings against doing because of the dangers of breaking them or throwing them away, I schlepped off to do the supermarket shopping, my stomach grumbling furiously, whilst the rest of the family ate lunch. As somebody who does NOT like to skip meals I was less than impressed with myself. Suffice to say that this was a lesson learned!