Hi Loves,

What you probably don’t know about me is how messed up my teeth have been. I’ve had 13 teeth extracted which did not include my 4 wisdom teeth that were removed after college. I also don’t share the fact that I had a palate expander when I was young. We would call it the “cranker.” My parents would literally crank the upper plate in my mouth to expand my bite. It was torture!

After I had my braces removed in middle school and received my retainers, I thought it would be smooth sailing from here.

What a joke!

After two weeks of having my super cute neon pink retainer, there was a legit food fight in the cafeteria, and my retainers that I wrapped up in my napkin and placed nicely in my lunch tray were thrown across the room. The top retainer was found, but the bottom one was never to be seen.

Unfortunately not having a bottom retainer for over a week shifted my teeth more than I had hoped for. Shortly after I received my replacement retainer, I did a terrible job wearing it. I never lost it. However, wearing it felt more like a chore than a joyous task.

During my sophomore year of college, I noticed a huge change in my smile. My bottom teeth were starting to overlap and my mouth looked narrow. I tried wearing my retainers from middle school, but they didn’t fit my mouth anymore. I panicked and started looking for quick fixes. One of the first things I tried was a spring retainer. I saved up money to purchase one from my old orthodontist, and man was it painful. To be completely honest, it didn’t do much for my mouth either. I was already past the point of no return.

After graduating college, I wrote down my long term goals. At the top of my list was being able to afford Invisalign. It wasn’t cheap, but I knew that I wanted to invest in myself. A good smile does a lot for the soul and for your confidence.

It took me a year to save, but I finally bit the bullet and scheduled a consultation with my orthodontist for Invisalign. I remember trying to weigh out every pro and con to make sure this was a good investment.

Thankfully, at the time my dad had pretty good dental insurance and I was still on his policy. This helped quite a bit; however I had to pay a lot more because of the condition my teeth were in. Most people are typically in Invisalign retainers for 5-8 months. I had to wear them for more than a year.

I don’t regret doing it at all. I think it was one of the wisest financial decisions I have made. If I had not invested in my teeth, eventually due to my poor bite, my enamel would have chipped off from rubbing up against one another just from daily use. Invisalign took my mouth from a narrow “V” shape to a “wide rainbow.” It also taught me a lot about staying consistent and having discipline.

Payment Plan

I was on a monthly payment plan to afford Invisalign. Most providers will offer different options for receiving payments. What I recommend is doing your research, see how much insurance will cover, and then put as much down as possible. I believe I put a deposit down of $1000. Again this depends on your dental insurance provider.

If you are seriously considering Invisalign, please shoot me an email, and I can help you receive $500 off Invisalign using my orthodontist.

The Upkeep

Invisalign is NOT easy.

If I’m being completely honest, your teeth will hurt for the first few days of each new tray. They also glue “buttons” to your teeth that lock into the Invisalign trays. These buttons can be uncomfortable at times. However, I would much rather have the pain of these than the traditional braces. I’ve had both, and braces hurt way more and you can see the wires. Even with the Invisalign buttons on, you can hardly see them.

To see an actual change in your smile, you have to be consistently wearing your trays. My orthodontist recommended I wear them at least 20 hours a day. That means anytime after I ate and wanted to take a nap, I had to put them back in … or if I wanted to work out for a couple hours, I needed to wear them. This is where discipline comes into the mixture.

I worked so hard to be able to afford Invisalign, so I tried my absolute best to try to wear them constantly. I’m not going to lie and say that I was perfect with them. I definitely had my moments where I did not wear them for half of the day. My orthodontist would call me out on it too!

My Results

Here is the state of my mouth before I started the process.

I also want to note the shape of my overall jaw and face. During his time, I was experiencing a bit of depression and weight gain. The overall shape of my smile was very small and narrow.

After Invisalign:

The tooth in the bottom row is in line. My smile widened due to pushing my teeth out into that “rainbow” position. You can even see the difference within my cheekbones.

Words of Advice

1. Invisalign is a big investment, so make sure it is something you will actually keep up with.
2. Speak with a few different orthodontists and find out their pricing.
3. There is such a thing called the Invisalign diet, and it is true when you begin and if they put buttons on your teeth.
4. It’s not completely transparent, so people can tell you are wearing retainers. I recommend taking the retainers out for photos.
5. Purchase denture cleaner to rinse out your trays. After a while they will smell and turn yellow, and sometimes your dentist will want you to wear them for over two weeks rather than the typical 10 days.
6. Your teeth and mouth shape will be moving like crazy during the second half of the process. Be careful with how you chew food and try not to get discouraged if your smile seems wicked. There is method to the madness!

My advice is that it is never too late to change something about yourself that you don’t love. Take the time to invest in yourself. The pay off is life changing.

Until next time, Spread Kindness.

HW