Hi! I’ve been a member here for a long time, but I haven’t posted very often. I guess I just don’t have much to say most of the time. Recently, there’s been some discussion about encouraging people to contribute more to the forum, so I’d like to try to do my part. I don’t have any photos, videos, or fictional stories to share, so I’ll just tell a little about myself.
I’ve always been interested in braces. In the late 1970s, when I was about seven or eight years old, some of the older kids I knew got braces. Whenever I saw them, I found myself staring at their braces, not because I thought their braces were ugly or disfiguring, but because I was fascinated. I really thought braces were cool.
When I was eleven, I was told that I would need braces. My family treated this as a very serious matter. I know now that it was because braces were expensive and money was tight. At the time though, I couldn’t figure out what all the fuss was about. I knew a bunch of kids with braces, and it didn’t seem to me like it was a traumatic experience for any of them. Some of the girls who had braces even seemed to like them. Most of the boys, however, behaved indifferently toward having braces. I figured I’d follow their lead and act like having to get braces was no big deal. Secretly though, I was thrilled.
Before I got braces, I got an upper expander. From the day that I got it, I didn’t like it. It was bulky and uncomfortable, it caused me to salivate a lot, and it made speaking and eating difficult. Worst of all, I couldn’t take it out. On the plus side, it didn’t hurt, even when its screw mechanism was turned. My teeth were pretty messed up before the expander, but once it started doing its job, my teeth were even more messed up, with a nice big gap front and center. After a few weeks, the screw mechanism didn’t have to be turned anymore, but the expander remained in place.
A few months later, on the day that my expander was removed, I got braces, headgear, and an upper retainer. At first, I got braces -- bands -- only on my lower front teeth. Once the bands were in place and my lower teeth were all wired up, I got my headgear, which I was told I was supposed to wear fourteen hours a day. Finally, I got a removable upper retainer to hold everything in place since my expander had been removed.
While I was happy to have finally gotten braces, I wasn’t too happy about having to wear headgear. My headgear didn’t hurt, but it branded me as a nerd or a geek. Somehow, braces were socially acceptable, but headgear was not. My mother was pretty strict with me about wearing my headgear as prescribed, so in order to get my wear time in, and not be ridiculed for wearing it, I chose to just spend more time at home. I refused to wear my headgear to school, so I ended up having to put it on as soon as I got home from school, and except for a short break to eat dinner, wear it continuously until the next morning. That didn’t quite meet my fourteen-hour daily minimum, so I had to wear my headgear for most of the day on weekends as well.
Aside from the headgear, I liked having braces. With braces only on my lower teeth though, some people didn’t even notice that I had them. After a few months, I got bands on my upper front teeth. There was no mistaking that I had braces then. I got to stop wearing my upper retainer when I got my upper braces. Over the next few months, I got bands on my canines and premolars, until I had bands on all my teeth. Finally! A full set of braces!
After about a year of wearing my headgear fourteen hours a day, my wear time was reduced to just overnight while sleeping. I felt like I had been paroled. After about six months of overnight wear, I didn’t have to wear my headgear at all. Unfortunately, my orthodontist also started talking about finishing up and my braces coming off within a few months. I was glad to be done with my headgear, but I wasn’t ready for my braces to be removed.
A few weeks before I started high school, I got my braces off. I got another removable upper retainer and a fixed lower retainer. My braces had been on for a little over two years. Counting the time that I had an expander, my total treatment time was just short of two and a half years. I acted as if I was happy to be done with braces, because that’s what was expected, but really, I would’ve been happier to continue wearing my braces.
During the time that I had braces, one of my friends went to the same orthodontist. Each time one of us had an orthodontist appointment, we’d compare notes afterward, discussing the work that was done and which of the orthodontist’s assistants had done the work. We each had our favorite assistants, the ones we thought were prettier, nicer, or just gentler while twisting the wires around our braces.
When I found out that I needed and would be getting braces, it was understood that I would be getting a mouthful of metal bands. At that time, that’s what braces were. There was no discussion about bands vs. brackets. Everyone just got bands. Bonded brackets had been in use for a while, but no one I knew had them. The first time I saw someone with brackets instead of bands, I’d already had my braces for about a year.
I never had a girlfriend with braces or even kissed a girl with braces. I had a girlfriend in college who sometimes hinted that she liked braces, but I wasn’t self-confident enough back then to really open up to her about my fascination with braces. Years later, I told a different girlfriend about my interest in braces, and although she wasn’t judgmental about it, she also had no interest in getting some fake braces made in order to indulge me.
I’m very happily married now, and I’ve told my wife about my braces fascination. She thinks it’s strange, but that’s about it. She’s never had braces, and although our dentist has tried to persuade her to seek orthodontic treatment, she remains solidly uninterested at this point in her life. She has said that maybe down the road, it’s something that she might reconsider. Maybe, just maybe, someday, she’ll change her mind.
