(Flickr)
Have you ever thought about getting Invisalign to fix up your teeth, or maybe you had braces and were wondering how they differ from Invisalign.
Well, you’ve come to the right place. I’ll be laying out my experience with Invisalign from the good, the bad, and the uncomfortable.
For context at the time of writing this article I’ve had my Invisalign for about 28 weeks or just over half a year now. Here are my teeth at the start.
(Flickr)
They’re incredibly misaligned and jutting out in extreme angles. And my bottom row is missing a tooth for some reason unbeknownst to me.
The good. While I’m still nowhere near done with the treatment, I can already visually see the improvement my teeth are much straighter than before and neat.
(Flickr)
Another good thing is that I was forced to really get used to flossing my teeth and really cleaning them.
I will be completely honest I never flossed before getting my Invisalign, never felt like I needed to. However, now I feel like if I don’t floss my teeth are disgusting, and after flossing for the first few times my gums stopped bleeding.
The bad. Having to have the Invisalign in for around 22 hours, this leaves you either ~2 hours to eat your meals every day, or you must eat with your Invisalign on resulting in rushing through your meal or having to experience the worse feeling of all time. Chewing with the Invisalign on is the most miserable feeling, it just feels so wrong like chewing with gum stuck to your teeth. Furthermore, if you chew something hard like a potato chip you can end up scratching up the Invisalign’s surface and once it’s not smooth you can’t help but to keep feeling it the rough surface inside your mouth, which your now stuck with for the rest of the time on that tray.
Speaking of swapping trays, for me I had to change trays every 2 weeks and the first few days after swapping HURTS so much, it makes me not feel like doing anything for the day.
However, after the first few days it is fine, you don’t really feel it, although I will say for the first few weeks it will feel extremely weird having a foreign object in your mouth, effectively just having bigger teeth that feel like smooth plastic.
Lastly, the worst of them all, having to really clean your teeth. Having to spend lots of time cleaning your teeth by really getting in there and making sure that your teeth are clean otherwise, you’ll end up with a cavity.
In conclusion, Invisalign is a test, a test on your discipline on maintaining your teeth’s cleanliness, keeping the trays on, and a test of your mentality to not give in to the intrusive thoughts.
Written by: Matthew Lin
Contact: mlin114@my.bcit.ca