End of trays 12 - Long time no see

Hi there,

Sorry it's been a long time since my last post. I've had way too much going on but as there is no evidence that anybody actually reads this I'm not going to beat myself up too much.

I'm almost at the end of my 12th sets and I think it's been about six weeks since my last progress picture so it might be nice to see the changes since then.

As I mentioned in my last blog, this is quite a crucial stage in terms of the overbite aligning properly and I've really noticed with sets 11 and 12 that if feels as though the front top teeth move back considerably each time I take them out for a meal. (Out of my mouth, not out on the town).

As this is 12 of 18 sets, this means that two thirds of the treatment is now complete and I really CANNOT wait until I don't have to wear these things 24/7, visit the dentist every six weeks or so, take endless visits to the ladies room each time I eat out so as not to scare the other guests by removing my dentures and so on.

Here's where I'm at now!

Trays ten and future gazing

I went for my final tooth shaving on Wednesday. I asked my dentist for four sets this time as I didn't want to have to head back over Christmas but he said I should take five instead! I also saw my Clincheck imaging and it all seemed to match up with what was going on in my mouth up until now. Apparently the next few sets are crucial in terms of how the teeth are aligning so if anything starts not to fit or work in the next few weeks, I should head back to the dentist for an appointment straight away. The most exciting part about taking the five sets away was being able to see the alignment of my teeth two and a half months from now. See the picture below for a comparison of my 1st (right) and 14th (left) top trays and just how far my crossbite tooth has moved.

Half way there - trays 9!

I'm now at the end of my ninth trays and the results are below. I flip between being delighted with the progress and being frustrated by the length of time it's taking. I'm now pretty over the wearing and endless brushing of the trays.

I'm pleased this set didn't break like the last two sets. I was getting a bit worried it was down to lack of movement on the part of my teeth and the dreadful tongue sores I got with my eighth trays didn't appear at all during this set.

I'm due to visit the dentist on Wednesday for my last ever shaving so I can expect to be gappy again in the next few weeks but it's incredible how quickly these close up. I'll also ask my dentist to show me my clincheck and what that thinks my teeth should look like at this stage of the treatment. I will try and get that for you but now sure I'll be able to. Anyway here is the latest picture of my teeth.

Here's the difference between my teeth after set one (below) and set nine (above) for the purposes of comparison.

Until next time!

Trays eight and tongueburn

So here I am, one tray off half way through the treatment. This eighth set have been quite problematic. As I said, I put them in early as and then they split almost immediately, as well as that, these one gave me terrible mouth sores and scraped my tongue so much I had problems speaking! Because I was in Munich for a few days and eating acidic saurkraut and drinking beer it was making the stinging worse and not talking wasn't an option if I didn't want to appear completely unsociable so I ended up not wearing the sets that much. I've tried to make up for it since coming back and won't put number nines in until 17 days after putting these in. My crossbite tooth is about half a millimeter over the front of the bottom teeth so it's not technically a cross bite anymore! Still, I want it to line up with the other teeth before I start celebrating.

Late entry - Trays seven

Hi there,

I'm a bit late with this entry because my broadband went down.

This set of trays split just before the end of the two weeks so I moved onto trays eight a bit early which also promptly split quite quickly. Anyway, I'll let the photo show the progress.

33% there - End of tray six

As I'm a third of the way through my treatment I thought that it might be a good time to post a before and after couple of pics.


The braces are so much part of my life now that I barely notice them, though one drawback is that the moving teeth has completely destroyed my bite until they are settled into their new positions. I never have my mouth completely shut and chewing is a bit of a challenge so I've taken to kind of hoovering up my fayre. Not that pretty.


Six months to go!

End of five - photo update

Hey there. Not much to say other than tray five and I have been to Mexico on holiday. Pleased with progress with this set and the extent to which my crossbite tooth has headed out from behind my lateral incisor.

Tray five - early days and ouch!

No photo this time but just a quick update whilst it's on my mind and in my mouth.

I got so impatient with boring tray four (sorry nothing personal) that I snuck the number fives in two days early. Don't tell my dentist.

Anyway, I really know that these babies are in. I had the most pain on my lower molars as though each of them is being grip in a vice and wrenched inwards. They are of course letting me know that they don't like this treatment very much but tough! They shouldn't have been lounging around messing up my bite and pushing my front teeth into funny positions. Fingers crossed for some major movement back there!

End of tray four and seeing no movement

Well here's the latest for what it's worth. I don't really feel that I've seen much movement with these babies which is a bit demotivating and I'm itching to get my fifth set on. I saw a really cool blog which documented what happens when Invisalign doesn't work. Check out Dawna's blog on the Useful Links section to the right. For my part, I'm hoping for some major tombstone alignment come set five.

Tray four and dental confusion

Am now on tray four. I visited my dentist and was a little bemused by a couple of points. Firstly, he tried to give me my seventh trays until I pointed out that I was currently wearing my third trays and then he felt that where he shaved a gap between my two front teeth four weeks ago, the gap had closed at the top but not the bottom so he shaved a little more for good measure. Now, I hope this works and he doesn't have to keep shaving, otherwise this will be the most expensive way to have my two front teeth removed.



The picture shows the new gap. He also shaved between my cross-bite tooth and the one next to that so I expect it to start steaming through to the front anytime soon!



As for the bottom teeth, there hasn't really been too much change in the photos. I think this is because teeth at the back need to move first to create a bit of space for them so I will have to live with the crookedness in this set for a while yet. I have four attachments on my lower teeth and two of the molars need twisting by almost 90 degrees to reach their correct position. These are the teeth that my dentist feels will be the most challenging - not my crossbite. When I wake up in the mornings with a new set, these are the teeth that feel most tender so I guess it's working!

Final thought: There are a few other Invisalign blogs out there but what I find incredibly baffling is that the majority of them don't feature photographs! Why is this? Surely charting the visible difference is the most valuable thing you can do for fellow Invisaligners out there. However, I've found a couple of good'ens in my web searches which I've posted in the 'Useful links' list to the right of the page.

Tray three - Ringing the changes

I'm on tray three. I confess I put them in a couple of days before the full fortnight of tray two was up but I felt ready.


The best news about this is that I felt minimum pain when moving across to these trays and I've not had any soreness on the tongue this time. BF reckons that my teeth must be getting used to moving and I guess my tongue must be getting used to being sandpapered every fortnight.


I will say that more than a few people have spotted that I am wearing trays. I explain that I'm wearing braces and though I'm happy with Invisalign now, wearing them makes me realise that I probably would have been ok to wear traditional ceramic after all. Having said that the difference in price between ceramics and Invisalign wasn't so great that I feel regretful.


I didn't need to go back to the dentist for this set. The last time I went my dentist gave me two sets of trays so my next appointment's not for another two weeks.


Anyway, as there's not really too much to say on the change over, I will let the photo doing the talking. Though I've still got the visual representation of a graveyard after an earthquake in my mouth, I'm pleased that I'm starting to see some real movement. Firstly, the gap drilled between my two front teeth has almost completely closed up now and my left lateral incisor is slowly emerging from behind my left front tooth.


I still have 8 months and 15 trays to get through after these ones but being able to spot a visible (if small) difference has renewed my resolve. What's more, I'm so used to wearing the trays now I barely notice them anymore and the more they hurt, the more I know that they are aligning my teeth how I would like them. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that I can't wait for the fourth trays!

After tray two

Tray two, week two - Gagging for it

I never really explained why I wanted to write this blog. It was only ever for people thinking about going for Invisalign who wanted to see the results unfold, get an unbiased view and then decide whether it was for them.


So, tray two, week two. Having started fresh with a new tray I remembered some of the more problematic aspects of having a new tray. First and foremost for me was the sensation of having an unfamiliar and large plastic object in my mouth makes my gag reflex kick in. This lasted only a few hours on the first day of trays one and two. But never pleasant. The second was that the sharp edge of the trays rub against the sides of your tongue and make it sore. Your tongue gets over it in a matter of a few days but it makes eating anything vaguely acidic something of a challenge for those days. I've read that some people like to file the sides down with a nail file but it's not something that I want to do so I've chosen to suck it up, however uncomfortable.

This last week, I've been to see a friend in Rome. This posed way more problems for me than I thought it would. Firstly, my friend is living a bit of a studenty existance at the moment, so grabs food on the run, such as a slice of pizza rather than doing the sitdown thing. This and the inevitable Italian gelato meant that I found myself doing the unthinkable: eating with the trays in. It's really not very pleasant or satisfying, but when you find yourself sat on the Spanish steps with an ice cream, it was easier to just do it and find a place to brush my teeth and clean the aligners as soon after as possible. The only thing you're supposed to consume with the aligners in is clear water. I certainly don't drink coffee or red wine with them in as they could stain, but I have resorted to white wine drinking with the aligners in. I've also been told that trapping sugar or anything near your teeth with the aligners in increases the risk of tooth decay. I hold my hands up here. I'm not a good example to follow but I guess everybody has to find a way to fit the aligners around their own lifestyle. If it's any consolation the receptionist at the dentist where I got these fitted wears them and admits drinking coffee in them!


Anyway, I wanted to post an update picture here and show you what my teeth look like with the aligners in and you can see this above. This one's come out quite blurry but I sometimes feel they look better! In any case I hope you'll agree that the gap made by the dentist between my two front teeth is stating to close.

Halfway through tray two

Tray number two

After two weeks, popping the trays in and out had become second nature, as had the constant teeth brushing after food and before putting them back in, so I was looking forward to making some more progess with the second trays.


I went back to the dentist on Wednesday where he told me he would be fixing 'buttons' to five of my teeth and filing down other teeth to make room for surrounding teeth to move. Nice.


The buttons are tooth enamel-coloured lumps that are attached to your teeth. The number of buttons and the position of them are attached depending on your othodontic requirements and are designed to allow the trays to grip and turn certain teeth. Compared to traditional braces, Invisalign's main drawback is that they trays are unable to grip teeth so buttons correspond to ridges in the trays which pull teeth the way they need to go. These were attached pretty painlessly and though I've read that buttons can sometimes fall off, mine seem pretty secure for the timebeing. At the end of treatment they're filed off. I don't think they're particularly obvious as they are attached to something like for fourth and fifth teeth at the top and bottom. I wouldn't like to have them on my front teeth though. You can see one of the botton in the far right corner of my mouth.


Having the buttons made putting the trays on and taking them out significantly more difficult.


The filing was never going to be pleasant and I was amused to see a little gap in my front two teeth when it was done, as you can see in the photo. As I said before, this is designed to make space for other teeth and should quickly close up.


It turns out I wasn't ready for my new trays yet, so was instructed to keep wearing my first set for another three days which I was a little disappointed by. They did, however, feel a lot tighter with the buttons attached so it clearly made sense to keep wearing the first set for a few more days.



The first time I tried to take the aligners out with the buttons on took about half an hour of bitching and moaning until I found a way to leverage them out so I could eat dinner.


After a couple of days this went back to normal and yesterday, with a bit of force, I managed to get my second set in! It was so difficult that I was thinking I might need to go back to the dentist but they're in now and feeling pretty snug. Despite them going in just yesterday, I'm not finding taking them in or out very difficult. Well, that brings me up to date. Will post again when new developments come in.

After tray one

Taking the Invisalign plunge

So, I've got to 29 years and am tired of keeping my mouth closed when pictures are being taken. I have crooked teeth, which I could handle but not the crossbite which makes me look like I have a tooth missing. So a couple of months ago I decided enough was enough and, inspired by my father's recent decision to wear braces in his mid-50s, I began to check out what options were out there to help my staighten out my malocclusions.

I started with a bit of googling and a modest budget of £3-4k. I knew the cost would be in the thousands but I thought the sooner I pay for better teeth, the better 'cost per wear' ratio I would get from them. I looked at traditional braces and also came across Invisalign braces. Invisalign seemed great. The marketing is very powerful and the benefit of these clear tailor-made plasic trays is that when they are on your teeth, as the name suggests, they are supposed to be invisible.

I thought this sounded ideal as I do have a job involving meeting clients and interacting with lots of people but I wasn't necessarily prepared to pay over the odds for it. I contacted a number of London dentists for quotes and in the end went for a consultation with the most competitively priced Invisaglin dentists in Harley Street.

The initial consultation was good and we talked prices and time scale. I was told that the trays would sort out my crossbite and straighten my other teeth in nine months and with 18 sets of Invisalign trays, which seemed a reasonable amount of time. The cost was £2995 for everything which was significantly cheaper than anyone else. (Though I've recently seen that my dentists has lowered their costs further to £1,500 - grrrrrr).

I returned to the dentist a few days later to have impressions taken of my teeth. The Invisalign inventors have a facility in Costa Rica where my impressions were to be sent and from which the plastic trays would be created. I was told this would take between 4 and 8 weeks, though in fact they didn't arrive for around 9 and a half weeks.

Invisalign also creates a computer generated image of your teeth realigning (great motivation). So, nine and a half weeks later, I went to pick up my first trays. I'd got the day wrong so my appointment was a little rushed and my dentist showed me the trays, told me how to clean them, (just scrub them with toothpaste and a brush) and put them in and showed me how to take them out. No problem. Off I went.

It's worth noting here that with the trays you MUST wear them a minimum of 20 - 22 hours a day, only taking them out to eat. This is why it's not necessarily a great option for kids as, believe me, the temptation to take them out is pretty great.

So on day one of tray one, I leave the dentist for work and arrive there feeling extremely conscious of this mass of plastic in my mouth. My bite no longer felt natural and I feel like everybody can see them and that the shape of my face has changed significantly. What's more, my lisp is awful!

But that's not the worst of it. Despite the relative ease with which I managed to take out the trays at the dentist, the first time I tried it by myself the pain was so enormous, I felt like I was going to pass out! As with all things, the medical professional said there would be a little discomfort. Whatever! My teeth felt as tender as anything, so much so that I could barely bring myself to eat when taking them off. Plus the pressure on my tooth had made one or two a little wobbly. Not much so but as the invisalign was putting so much pressure my tooth and making it move, it's really to be expected.

Also, on the invisible front, though they are in no way obvious, people did comment on my lisp and a couple of people noticed them on my teeth when we were in close quarters.

This problem with taking them on and off lasted about three days and after that it became a lot more easy. I lost a few pounds not being able to graze or snack during the day which I wasn't really complaining about. Sleeping in them wasn't great.

I definitely kept them in for 20 hours per day for the first two weeks but not always as much as 22 hours which is bad as word is that for every extra hour you don't wear the trays, you may have to wear them for another 24 hours.

Anyway, to the picture:

My gnashers at the beginning of the process. I'll post some pictures of the aligners next time.

Before Invisalign