Week 2

I must say this week has been much smoother.  I finally am eating solid foods again, although they have to be slightly softer.  I still cannot bite into food, and have to cut it up into smaller portions so I can get it passed my front teeth.  This must have looked funny when my kids and I were eating at Subway and I was using a knife and fork to eat my sub.  Hard cereals, or hard foods still hurt when I chew.  But the initial excruciating pain from before has gone away. I now just feel pressure around my teeth.  They are also slightly loose and I can wiggle them.  I don't do this much as I am afraid my teeth will fall out if I wiggle them too much. 

There are small gaps in the top corners of my teeth, right near my gum line.  They are noticeable.  I thought I had a food particle in between two teeth and over flossed only to discover this was a gap.  I don't notice any shifting yet.  But if there are gaps, there is movement.  The wires surrounding the brackets are also rubbing against a different part of my inner lip causing irritation, which also suggest some slight movement.

I have to smile wider now. My lips need to sit above my brackets when I smile because if my lip sits on my brackets, this also causes irritation.  The wider my smile is, the more my cheeks hurt.  I wonder if I can get through the rest of the year without smiling at all.  My upper lip sits on top of my arch wire.  I guess the wire is slightly protruding causing the resting spot for my lip. I still haven't become accustomed to wearing these darn things and hope that soon it wont bother me so much to keep them in my mouth.

So if I calculate my removal to 1 year, that is equal to 52 weeks.  If  I have been wearing the braces for 2 weeks, that means I only have 50 weeks left.  Seems like a lifetime away.