Chapter 14: Broken Braces
Kara cried tears of joy as she looked at her bare teeth in a hand mirror. After spending most of her college years in braces, they were finally off. Dr. Brandt and Hannah gave her a hug and took pictures of her for the website. The poor girl had suffered almost a decade in orthodontia and was grateful when she was handed two hawley retainers to keep her teeth in place.
After a lot of smiles, Kara opened the office, watching over the waves of patients coming in and out of the office for the day. At noon, there was a phone call.
"Good afternoon! This is Kara, how can I help you?"
"Hey Kara it's Elise, and I'm a patient. I was eating lunch and I had a bracket fall off. I just wanted to see if I could pop in to have it attached?"
"Let me look at the schedule and talk to the Dr. I know you're on the schedule in two weeks." Typing could be heard over the phone as Elise waited to hear when she could have the bracket attached.
"Elise, thank you for waiting. You can come in this afternoon to have it fixed, and Dr. Brandt will go ahead and do that adjustment for you."
"Th-thank you Kara."
Elise was upset to hear that her adjustment would be taking place today. She had to give a big meeting with her boss the next day, and she certainly didn't want to be sore for it.
Back at Dr. Brandt's office, Cora was in the chair once again crying. Dr. Brandt announced that she would be needing a tongue crib along with the high pull headgear that he was currently wiring in. He snipped the wires and then adjusted the chair. When he was handed the tongue crib, Cora's eyes went wide as her head was steadied by Hannah.
"Now Cora, no use getting upset. Jared was kind enough to let me know that you've developed quite a tongue thrusting habit. I'd hate to ruin any progress that you may be gaining. So, you'll have this. I am also recommending that you begin speech therapy. With your appliances you'll need it."
The curing light was used and soon after Cora was at the front desk scheduling an appointment for her next adjustment.
Elise saw Cora's headgear and swallowed hard. The poor woman she was watching was drooling, and struggling to talk. Her attention was taken when Hannah walked to her and informed her that they were ready to see her. When she was taken back, she sat on the and put the bracket on the attached tray.
Hannah smiled seeing it, and placed a bib on her patient. She smiled, and couldn't help but pry, "Can I see which tooth that is please?" She aimed the light and picked up a mirror as Elise opened, displaying the bare upper right canine.
About this time, Dr. Brandt walked in smiling. He hummed as Hannah removed the wires, and frowned when it was his turn to look. "Elise, how did this happen?"
Elise blushed fiercely as Dr. Brandt pulled up her xrays taken at last appointment.
"It was really an accident. I took a bite of a cookie and didn't see that I'd grabbed one with walnuts in it from the cookie platter at work."
The orthodontist nodded and tapped Elise's chin signaling her to open. "Elise, I told you that you should pay attention to what you're eating. Walnuts will damage your braces, and cookies are full of sugar." She teared up, feeling embarrassed and nervous. He gave a thorough exam and then nodded to himself as he popped of each bracket of her braces.
"Hannah, dear. I have another patient. I need you to put spacers in between the teeth without anything on them. We need to make sure this doesn't happen again. I will also work on her bite today."
After he goes, Hannah works 35 mins to squeeze spacers in between each of Elise's front teeth. As the spacers worked over the next hour, Elise sat gripping the armrests of the chair she was in. While she lay feeling the pressure of her teeth moving, she could hear a poor patient groaning in discomfort. She wasn't sure what the spacers were for, but she was sure it wouldn't be good.
