Fully guided Elk hunt or Braces?

kansasdad said:
@Addicting
I’m guessing that your question is more rhetorical than actual, but there are similarities regarding your two possible purchases. I encourage my patients to visit with more than one orthodontist office. Sometimes one office will be a much better fit for your kid/family. I imagine the same philosophy applies to elk guides.

And I would point out that usually you get what you pay for. A T-shirt from Dollar General won’t last five washings. It’s cheap and it shows it’s nature quickly. Getting a great elk guide or a great orthodontic office will be worth it in the end.

One little nugget of truth I leave with families contemplating orthodontics is this: when done well AND WELL MAINTAINED afterwards, this ends up being a lifetime investment. And I share with them that a fairly significant percentage of my orthodontic patients (active aligner technology similar to Invisalign) are former teenager orthodontic patients who didn’t do the retainers like instructed.
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I did good with the retainer but didn't have my bottom wisdom teeth pulled(dentist opinion) because they weren't bothering me. Now my bottom front teeth are a little crowded.
 
rjthehunter said:
I got that cemented on wire for the top and bottom as well, but they still said I had to wear a retainer... I decided then that there's no way I'm wearing that for the rest of my life so I might as well just quit then!
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Gen X - I got metal bands hammered onto my teeth!

My three kids had braces during the Great Recession. I shot OTC bulls in heavily hunted units.
 
Had a sh*tty dentist/orthodontist growing up. Guy was missing half a thumb. If I recall correctly my parents insurance didn't cover braces at all, and with 5 of us running around the bill racked up pretty quick, so my guess is my parents went cheap.

My experience was awful. I remember leaving one appointment in tears because my bottom teeth were covered in wires and excess cement. My teeth were looking pretty decent there when I had my braces taken off. Still loads of excess cement everywhere, which my parents were reassured would flake off over time. My permanent bottom retainer snapped off sophomore year and we were assured my teeth were now locked into place so we didn't need to reattach it. I have a pretty severe gag reflex, so the upper retainer with all the excess plastic often ended up with my dry heaving until I puked. We were told we couldn't get a thinner retainer and that I was out of options. Can't imagine how helpless my parents must have felt.

I'll do whatever it takes to find the money to pay for my kid's braces, it's still something that I am semi self-conscious about.
 
Addicting said:
My wife absolutely should have had them but her parents chose to ignore it. Now as an older adult she has constant maintenance to keep everything healthy.

She has a ton of angst against her parents over the issue. So there really is no decision for me or my daughter here. My wife has dictated the daughter is getting braces.
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I'm in the exact same boat. I had to get a gum graft done on Monday that is caused by having such crooked teeth. It's making my life hell, and it's hard not to be upset that I didn't get braces as a kid when insurance would have picked up the tab.

Now I'm kicking around the idea of getting braces as a near 40 year old. And of course the era of having insurance paying for it disappeared long ago.
 
Addicting said:
@kansasdad
I didn’t realize this retainer thing was a lifelong deal. Does everybody get retainers and what actually happens if you quit using it?
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The last bone in the body to reach full maturity is the mandible (lower jaw). In some folks (mostly dudes) it can continue to growth forward and down up to age 24ish. So if the ortho treatment is done by 14, you have to manage a (slightly) growing/changing jaw situation for up to 10 years.

General rule of thumb for retainer wear for adults: if you skip a night, and put it in the next night and something feels tight or sore, you can't be skipping nights yet. When you can skip a night and not feel soreness/tightness, then you can start to skip more than one night at a time. Eventually when you go multiple nights in a row and have no tendency for tightness, you can get to once or week.

Eventually the dog will eat your retainer, you'll lose it while on vacation, or it will warp in the heat as you left it in the car on a 100 degree day and it no longer fits and you'll decide that it isn't worth a trip back to the office to get a new one made (or the cost seems redonculous).

I'd say that by age thirty almost nobody is still wearing removable retainers, (except for extreme rule followers... @AvidIndoorsman !) And we have conversations with those patients wearing fixed retainers in their late 20's that there can be gum disease and tooth decay issues from a reduced ability to regular remove the biofilm (plaque).

And another thought on retainers.....they can be a pretty decent indicator of your partner's possible interest in bedtime "wrestling". No retainer in as the covers slide down = you've got a better chance that extracurriculars could be on the agenda.
 
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kansasdad said:
I'd say that by age thirty almost nobody is still wearing removable retainers, (except for extreme rule followers... @AvidIndoorsman !) And we have conversations with those patients wearing fixed retainers in their late 20's that there can be gum disease and tooth decay issues from a reduced ability to regular remove the biofilm (plaque).
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To assuage your worries I’ve gotten a gold star after every visit. No cavities, no fillings.
 
I wore braces from age 11-14, retainers after. @ age 20 in a motorcycle crash I broke my mandible into several pieces, each with a few teeth sticking out so they were able to wire it all back together, just not as nice as it was. Uppers came through better, but still, 7 years of orthodonture down the drain.
 
My only regret was allowing my older boys to use the invisiline versus regular braces. My daughter went with regular braces and was done with great results much faster.
 
My wife’s parents never thought it was necessary and she always felt it was. Took two full rounds and twice as long as an adult.

We ended up gifting braces to her baby sister as a graduation present. It was a stretch for us but was life changing for her. We noticed years later that there wasn’t a picture of her smiling and showing her teeth before the braces and every pic after is a toothy grin. It also changed her bite enough that she stopped having low grade jaw pain and clicking.
 
wvhunter304 said:
Have dental insurance that didn't pay any on my daughters braces. $6500 total.
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If you used that same amount of money on a used car, it probably wouldn’t still be in the road by the time she finishes college. Making the Ortho happen should be a lifetime gift to her.
 
Addicting said:
@kansasdad
I didn’t realize this retainer thing was a lifelong deal. Does everybody get retainers and what actually happens if you quit using it?
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Well I had braces 7th-9th grade and “wore” my retainer nightly until my mom found out I lost it my junior year. My parents made me pay for the 6 months of braces I had to get again since my teeth had shifted. I learned my lesson and wore it through college until I lost it again with the move haha but teeth are still straight
 
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