Orthodontics
When I was little, my teeth were in a state, to put it lightly. They were monstrous because I'd been ill as an infant, which somehow wrecked the enamel on the adult teeth forming inside my gums, so when the baby teeth fell out the new ones came in crooked and discoloured. Genetics were not on my side, either. Something had to be done.

...And by something, I mean over a decade of every orthodontic appliance known to man. The worst were the expansion devices meant to widen my upper jaw. They looked similar to this and I had two of them for a total of maybe three years. Every couple days I'd have to use a little metal "key" to turn a wheel in the centre, which would push my jaw apart little by little. The part in the centre was always getting peanuts stuck in it. At one point I couldn't remove the offending nut no matter how many implements I stuck up there, and it started rotting - nasty. The really bad part was, when I had the expander the second time, I started getting terrible pains down the centre of my nose, and I had to get x-rays done to make sure it wasn't SPLITTING APART MY NOSE. Thankfully, it wasn't.

Because the device has to be cemented to some of your upper teeth to keep it in place, it is HELL having it removed. The orthodontist takes pliers and twists and pulls until the cement stuff cracks. I screamed so loud on the second occasion that the next day someone came up to me in school and said, "I heard you at the orthodontist's...you sounded like you were dying."

Then I had to wear an awful tooth positioner when I was at home. It's a giant rubber slab you're supposed to bite into really hard. It worked just fine until my brother made me laugh and I started choking on it.

And of course I had the brace, upper and lower. But that was just a small part compared to all the other shit! However, for a while I had to hook tiny rubber bands onto the brace brackets to correct my bite, which stopped me opening my mouth wide enough to talk clearly. Arse.

Don't forget two different types of headgear to be worn only at night (thank god - look at these monstrosities). The first was similar to this but had a vertical bar running down the centre. It meant that I had to sleep with a bath towel under my jaw because otherwise I would keep stabbing myself in that little hollow between the clavicles. The second was more like this. (No, that's definitely not me in either photo!)

I'm still supposed to wear this horrible rigid plastic retainer thing at nights because I can still feel my teeth moving around a bit, but to tell you the truth I'm sick of it. All those years and they still move around, so what's the point. And for my troubles, I started grinding my teeth as a result of wearing these things. Grrrr. I also have a wire permanently cemented along the inside of six of my bottom teeth. In total, five of my baby teeth had to be pulled because they just WOULD NOT FALL OUT. The adult one would grow in right in front of it, so I'd have two in one spot. And my wisdom teeth were a nightmare to get out - full general anaestheic, thank you very much.

But on the plus side, with some additional sealants and fillings for cavities caused by the weakened enamel, my teeth look rather good now.

No apologies for length...I suffered for it!
( KersaI Missive Free Michael Shields! with Monday's Liverpool Echo, Thu 9 Nov 2006, 5:02, Reply)