Holy Drastic Diastema, Batman!

There’s a good chance that anyone who happens to read this knows that I’m getting braces.  If not, let me get you caught up. My teeth have always been really crowded and crooked, and, over time, I’d gotten used to it.  I just accepted it and moved on happily with life. Last fall, my dentist suggested I get braces to fix the crowding, as that crowding was likely to cause problems later in life.  “Pay for it now, or pay for it later.”  We opted to pay for it now.  With such severe crowding, however, my orthodontist felt it best to create more room by palatal expansion (tooth removal was deemed unacceptable).

So, to faciliate this palatal expansion, I had a “minor” surgery called a LeForte I Osteotomy, in which they make an incision in my gums along my upper jaw (almost ear to ear), cut the bone connecting my upper jaw to my skull (though it’s still attached along the nasal septum and at two points in the back), then, using an osteotome, or a “fancy word for a chisel”, and a mallet, hammer away at the osteotomy (?) along the roof of my mouth. The expansion is then accomplished by an expansion appliance cemented to my teeth, spanning the roof of my mouth, one crank per night, resulting in the aforementioned diastema. Which brings me back to my point.

After a week and a half of expansion, I have a HUGE diastema.  The oral surgeon told me that I’d have no problem winning a watermelon seed spitting contest once the expansion was complete. Right now, it looks like I’ll have no problem winning a watermelon spitting contest. 😛 Once the braces go on, that space will be filled by moving my teeth around toward the front, but, right now, I don’t know if I look more like Madonna or Mike Tyson. 😛

Some have suggested another alternative.