A few things from this past week:

I went in on Wednesday for the sensitivity. The ortho looked at it and thinks it’s just the nerve of the tooth being hypersensitive from the new force on the tooth. He didn’t think there was gum recession compared to a previous photo of my teeth (but that photo was taken the day I got the lower braces on, and I first felt the sensitivity that evening), and he also said he didn’t think it was the root of the molar exposed. He said it should go back to normal, but I’m still feeling the same sensitivity so far.

I called my ortho’s office Friday morning because one of my upper incisors was very slightly coming in contact with one of the lower brackets when I bit down. I had been told at my consult that I’d probably get anterior bite turbos when I got my lower braces on, but then I didn’t get them. Since getting the lower braces on, I had been watching how close my upper teeth were too touching the lower brackets, and it seemed like they were getting closer and closer. When I called, they spoke to the ortho and said just to keep an eye on it and if it started touching harder they’d personally have me come in for the ortho to look at. By midday, the upper teeth were no longer touching the lower brackets. This has kind of repeated the past couple days (can barely touching for a little bit in the morning, but not the rest of the day. So I’m still hopeful that I’ll dodge having to get bite turbos. They also clipped some wire ends for me (which shows that my teeth has moved a little since getting those wires).

A few other things about the experience so far:

I’ve had to use wax in various spots most days, but usually not until the evening. I was expecting that to be worse (the wire ends getting clipped really helped).

Because my upper and lower incisors were also pretty straight relative to each other (upper because they were already braced, and lower because I had the permanent retainer), if I push on the archwire between those teeth, I can feel it move around in the bracket slots a little (wire is 0.014”, slot is 0.022” x 0.0275”). Feels weird bruise if I tap in the right spot, the wire feels loose in the brackets, whereas it feels really taut on either side of the out-of-line premolar.

That premolar hasn’t moved enough for me to notice, but I’ll have to compare in pictures to be sure.