Flare and slight crowding, No Previous Orthodontia. New York, NY

When I was a teenager I had a modeling agency pluck me off the street only to tell me my "teeth weren't perfect, and Wilhemina want's perfection." *Shudder*....one of many reasons to say no to a life in that industry. Having said that my parents couldn't afford braces and as an adult I found my self chipping my front tooth repeatedly because it's slightly flared. After seeing a sale in NYC I thought there was no time like the present and took the plunge. My case is admittedly mild and straight forward - slight flaring of front teeth, mild crowding of bottom teeth, and one askance bottom incisor. My trays came in about 2.5-3? weeks after taking impressions. No attachments and no IPR are needed for my treatment (my wisdom teeth were all extracted ages ago.) I'm on tray 4 of 17 and should be done in about 7 months (I'm changing trays every two weeks.) So far so good. Since I'd never had braces the first 2 days of the initial tray were head-achy and lisp inducing. After that no real pain and speech is normal. Pretty easy considering! I've already noticed my flare start to flatten out. I apologize for the first two photos (tray 1 & 4), they were taken before I decided to post and don't show my bottom teeth. Now that I've decided to review I'll get some better shots of my full smile going forward.

Went through a break-up and clearly have had a distracted couple days because I managed to somehow lose tray number 4 while cooking dinner in my own apartment, brilliant girl that I am.

After searching high and low for over an hour switched to tray 5 in exasperation. My dentist told me a horror story about a man who told the office he was moving to Florida and got his 28 trays at once. He switched a tray every day only to have several teeth fall out. Long story short, I know switching early is ill advised and won't do it again... but so far so good. I'm being given 3 trays at a time which means I'll keep tray 6 in a bit longer than normal before getting the next batch at the scheduled time. Starting to get quite curious about my half way point (tray 8 or 9 depending how you split the difference) as that's when I was told by the office you'd start noticing a change. I'm due for new headshots and am thinking I should schedule them at the half way point. Have been also thinking about cosmetic dentistry as I've been self-conscious about my "hyper-mobile lip" and a gummy smile. Anyone have any experience with that? It's one of those quirks though that I'm wondering might just be better to embrace. Still weighing the options and definitely the cost! If I do go that route I'd have to tackle gummy smile post Invisalign and postpone new headshots even further so something to think about!

After tray 1 the pain factor has been low and a pretty consistent - slight tenderness on a scale of 0-2. After seeing everyone's progress on RealSelf I checked with my doc at my last ClinCheck to see if I'd need attachments and IPR but she says its not indicated, so again more gratitude for my straight forward journey (no pun intended.) ;)

I am very thankful to use this opportunity to invest in myself. It was quite cool to see in the computer projections how my bridge will widen and that my incisor is due to rotate in tray 15.

Such is life, one step in front of the other! :)

Still on tray 5, and have more than a week to go before I switch to tray 6 & have been going about my daily life asking myself "is this thing on?" Lol. There's no pain. At all. Does invisalign still work without any pain? Wow!

I'm sort of shocked and amazed, even the tenderness I used to get when biting down while eating is gone. Feeling a bit impatient to see my teeth straighten out but what I have noticed is more space in my bottom teeth like next to my left bottom incisor (not the twisted one). I'm guessing this means my bridge is indeed widening and laying the groundwork for the straightening that is to come. I'm definitely counting my blessings at the short treatment time but with only 6ish months to go I've started to chomp at the bit so to speak with excitement for the end result. I've also put in a preminary call to the office that specializes lip repositioning surgery. The thought of a natural looking, healthy, vibrant result makes me never want to stop smiling! Mentally, it feels like peeling back the layers to reveal the woman you always saw on the inside.