24 Year Old Starting Invisalign. Melbourne, AU

Hi!  And welcome to our Invisalign community :).  

So, Invisalign generally recommends 20-22 hours of wear per day.  Doctors vary in their recommendations from that amount, some of them insisting on a minimum of 22 hours/day of wear.  Most people severely underestimate the length of time they have their aligners out in a day, so sometimes it's helpful to try a timer for a day and see how you do.  But if you are leaving your aligners out for a maximum of 2 hours, that is well within all of the recommendations I have seen.  Doctors here on RealSelf recommend that it not be all at once, but broken into short bouts throughout the day (as for meals and hygiene).

I hope you give us some more info about your case so that we can follow your progress!  You can also help others as you go through your treatment :).

BTW, we have lots of Aussies right now, and quite a few from Melbourne specifically.  Here are some of them: Nadinelliana, CJ13, SophieD, Astrodog21, littleoz, Crooky24, Sunluvva, smilemelb, shannon1990, Dante555, Malnic, Megastar, and Bec1234.

Hi - I'll be interested to follow your progress - I am also from Melbourne, 30 years old and started my Invisalign 2 weeks ago. :)

For me, the grossness stopped when I stopped using toothpaste.  I know it sounds counterintuitive, but some of us use toothpaste that has these microbeads that help clean your teeth better.  But those tiny little things can scratch your aligners, and the tiny scratches are a great place for bacteria to live and multiply.  But the scratches are smaller than the bristles on your toothbrush.  Which makes it really difficult to get the bacteria out of them.  If you either switch to a gel-type toothpaste without grit in it, or just use some sort of soap to brush your retainers, I think you'll have a much better time of it.  You can soak them in a soap-and-water solution in between--it doesn't have to be diluted vinegar.  I used hydrogen peroxide most of the time, but soap and water is fine--even unscented, clear dish soap.  I found that using the highly scented ones left me with that taste in my mouth (ugh!) and I was afraid the colored ones would stain so I stayed away from the one at my mum's house :).

Like TwoPlusOne said, mine got better once I stopped using toothpaste on them. I soak them in Polident every three or four days only because I didn't seem to get anything from the vinegar (maybe I didn't use enough?)

Yeah mine get a little cloudy in places, I try to rinse them off really well after taking them out for any reason. I try to wash them with a soft washcloth to get all the cloudy stuff off using some dial soap.

I soak mine in Efferdent denture cleanser every couple of days. I brush the trays with liquid soap and water on the days that I don't use the denture cleaner. I have no odor or problems.

Thank you for introducing yourself! :D  

You will be so happy to have fixed your teeth instead of just covering them up.  You will be wearing retainers for life, so there is eternal maintenance in that sense, but you won't have to go and get veneers replaced.  You're too young to have to deal with that for the rest of your life ;).  

The fact that you're feeling happy about your decision, though, is the most important thing.  So excited to see how happy you are going to be at the end of this!  It's a great feeling to be able to smile and know that everyone is just seeing your joy, instead of wondering whether they're looking at whichever tooth it is that bothers you.