Braces and retainers

After what seems like a looonggg painful 18 months of my life, I finally had my braces removed!

Love said I'm gonna miss them.

WRONG!!

I can finally eat whatever I want! I don't even like chewing gum to begin with, but knowing that I couldn't have it for the past 18 months, I had one recently. FREEDOM!!

Removing the braces was easy. No pain, no sensation, no weird taste like when you had your braces on. Just easy.

But the thing is, the glue they used to hold your braces stayed even after they removed the braces. Even scaling is not able to clean it off entirely. I plan to throw another visit to scale them one more time.

I was given a plastic retainer. Which gave me so much pain at first but getting used to it now. Had to wear it day and night for 2 years. But I just used it at night.

Talking about retainer, there are three types of retainer:

Hawley retainer

Clear retainer

Fixed retainer

I left the decision to my dentist to decide which is suitable for me, he chose clear retainer and so far, I'm happy with it.

My thoughts on braces: If your teeth are almost perfect, forget it. It hurts.. BIG time. Trust me. Every now and then, I was cursing those who said pakai braces tak sakit. Grr..

But the results, totally worth it.

On a different note, I am removing some of my old pics, those times when I haven't started wearing yet. So, please do pardon me for any inconveniences. :)

Colour for your braces

I guess the best thing about having braces is that I can always change the colour according to my mood.

So far I've tried Hot Pink..



Light Purple..



Black..



Royal Blue..



And currently I'm wearing Red :)

I've learned that lighter colours make my teeth looked yellow and my skin looked darker, I regretted light purple.

From Love's experience, he asked me to avoid white and yellow since they get dirty very fast.

I intend to try every other colours possible, then maybe have different colours for top and bottom or even different colours alternately like this..



Anyway, if you need help with braces colour selection, you might want to visit this very useful website..

Bring that braces on!

Had my braces on yesterday, which also means..

I've crossed off one of my "To achieve list 2011"! Alhamdulillah

Would like to share the procedures you have to go through for the braces:

1) Consultation. Some clinics give consultation for free, but mine, I have to pay RM50 for this

2) Moulding

3) Xray. Read all about my experience here.

4) Get your teeth pulled off, I had to pull off 4 teeth. The fourth teeth from front; one from top, one bottom, one left, and one right.

The first two teeth got off perfectly. Not that hurt since I took some pain killer.

The third teeth (bottom left) was really painful. Normally for bottom teeth, you get only one shot of local anaesthesia, but I had twice since it did not go numb. And the root was a bit bent, so imagine the pain.

The fourth teeth (top left) gave me even more headache :( Which reminds me to remind you this, if you're looking for a doctor to pull out your top teeth, find a specialist. Because the root looks like this..



Compared to the bottom one



Makes the top one easier to break.

And my doctor accidentally break my teeth, leaving the root stuck in my gum, which causing me two minor dental surgeries to remove it and the pain and the bleeding, jgn cakapla..

5) Have your braces on. First, the doctor will dry all the saliva in your mouth, put something to stretch your mouth and begin to glue the brackets in each tooth. The taste of the glue was super duper horrible. That I had to take a break and had some drinks for a while

Then, the best part was when the doctor asked you to pick the colour of your braces!! Put the wires on, and before you even realize it, you're done

Tak sakit pun!

Yup, wait for about 3 hours and tell me that again. I couldn't even sleep last night.

X-ray

Just got back from having my X-Ray done in Daya X-Ray in Jalan Raja Laut.

First attempt..
The radiologist: "Your image is too blur, .... (add some medical term i never heard of in my life), I need to take your x-ray again".
Me: "What probably cause it? Did i move?"
The radiologist: "No, probably because your face is too small"

Second attempt, pray hard..
The radiologist: "Still a bit too blur. I have to make a phone call." (On the phone for about 5 minutes, talking something about the machine had some problem. Hang up and said to me..) "Let's do another one."
Me: "Another one? That is not acceptable ke? You know how many cells you've killed in my body today, kan?" (Almost crying, I'm such a paranoid, ok)
The radiologist: "Sorry mam, but we have to do it one more time, I'm going to increase the exposure."

Third attempt, pray really really hard..
The radiologist: "Still blur. I don't know why. Let me check with the doctor."

At this point, I cried a bit. I have a very VERY wild imagination. Those who really know me can understand this. My imagination is so wild, that I could imagine how orange my tummy looked like after eating Super Ring.

Then, I heard the doctor shouted at the radiologist something like this..

Doctor: "What's the point of me sitting here, you should see me before you take another x-ray, machine got problem. Off the machine, on and try again."

Then the radiologist came to see me.

The radiologist: "We need to take another x-ray. Off and on the machine. We have some problem with the machine."

That was when I've had enough.

Me: So, if you off the machine and on again, can you assure me that the x-ray is working?
The radiologist: No. But we won't charge you anything for the previous x-rays.
Me: It's not about the money, mam. It's about my health. My cells. You are the radiologist. You should know the danger of having too much exposure, right?
The radiologist: Yes, but you are going to wear the plumbum gown. What is your concern, mam? Are you pregnant?
Me: It doesn't matter whether i'm pregnant or not! I just don't want to be your lab rat, okay! Seriously, you should x-ray one of your stuff, and if the machine is ok, then I'd consider doing another x-ray. (At this point, I started to raise my voice.)
The radiologist: Hold on mam, I'll try it one my staff first.

Love and I waited outside for a while. Then, the receptionist called us. And asked for a payment, and gave us the x-ray. Just like that. Love asked for justification.

Love: Just now the staff said we have to try another time. How come now you said ok?
The receptionist: I'm not sure. But you have to pay RM60. (Rude!)
Love: The situation is like this.. (explained about the situation and again asked how come we suddenly have to pay if just now everything was not ok)
The receptionist: I don't know. It's not my problem. Maybe your wife moved the first time. So have to take another two times. You have to pay RM60, thank you. (Very rude!)
Me: How could you say I moved when you know nothing about the situation? We are not paying. We would like to see the doctor. Thank you.

In the doctor's room..
Me: Hello doctor. I would like to have an explanation as of why the radiologist took my x-ray three times and about to take it for the fourth times, and suddenly now you're giving me that x-ray?
Doctor: She told me she took it two times only. I'm so sorry. Let me call the radiologist.

So the radiologist lied. The doctor is a very nice person, apologized. Truth is, the second x-ray is already sufficient. But it's true that the machine has problem. And that I don't have to do the third x-ray actually, if the radiologist would just show the doctor the result earlier. But I'm ok with it. Let bygones be bygones. Though it would be really nice to kill the cells of the radiologist as much as she killed mine.

Then we went to the counter and I paid and told the receptionist, "It was the machine's problem. Next time, you really have to learn manners and don't just assume something. I'm your customer. If you want to stay here working, you better learn PR"

She replied with something very rudely, and asked us to leave, even dare tell us to tell her manager if we are not satisfied. Can you beleive it?

That was when Love stepped in, and things get even worse.

Me? I just took her name and ID number and leave. She told me to tell her manager if we are not satisfied, didn't she? That pretty much solved everything.

Nobody talked to me in that manners. Nobody talked to my husband in that manners.

I told my friend about it, she asked me, "Why this kind of things always happen to you?"

I paused and think. I think it's because I'm able to deal with it. Because I don't just shut up and let people do whatever they wanted to do to me. I fight, for my right. And my husband fights even more for my right. And it's freaking annoying where we complained about it the whole journey back from Jalan Raja Laut to Ampang. But it didn't ruin our morning. Back to Ampang, we had a major laugh about it over breakfast, and it's one of the moment I will forever treasure..

My husband fights for my right :)