At 28 I Got Braces... WHAT?!

     So I'm 28 years old, and on Monday I got braces put on. At the time I was SO excited, I had been wanting braces for as long as I could remember. Little did I know how AWEFUL they truly are!

Getting them on was the easy part, keeping them on and keeping my sanity, not so easy. The first night I was woken up by severe pain that didn't go away until I had taken 2 ADVIL. I am still taking an ADVIL here or there to either sleep or when it gets really bad in the afternoon. The second day I popped a bracket off of my teeth while brushing (this has proven to be the dentists fault and not my own). However, my dentist has gone on holiday and so I will have a little swinging bracket on the lower front wire that is currently driving me batty, until the 18th of February (please note it's the 6th and this happened on the 5th). To add to the injury my husband thought he would take a stab at taking it off for me, which seemed like a great idea at the time, until I ended up with what I thought was a broken tooth and an injured gum. Luckily for me there was so much glue on my teeth that the force of the tool smashing into my lower teeth cracked it off instead of breaking my tooth which already felt as if someone were breaking them slowly, oh wait that IS what's happening.

To continue with this tirade, I have had spacers put on my lower molars (it's 2 bumps of cemented glue) that do not allow my teeth to touch at any point so that I do not bite off my lower brackets. The problem is that now I cannot chew anything as I do not have any back teeth touching. Did I mention that the spacers will be staying on for a minimum of 4 weeks? And yes, I did call the dentist about each of these issues and am currently stuck with a broken bracket for 2 weeks and not eating for 4.

All of this brings me to a single point. I AM SO GRATEFULL! Strange I know, but I am. I am grateful that I can afford braces even if it's taken me years to get to this point. I am grateful that I have been on this diet for 13 weeks and so I have been eating smaller portions and drinking shakes already. If I had been eating like I was and all of a sudden not been able to eat for 4 weeks, I would have freaked out. I am grateful that my tooth wasn't broken and that I can put wax on the back of the bracket to keep it in place for now. I'm grateful that my teeth hurt, so much that I have to take an ADVIL to sleep because it means my teeth are straightening.

     I am so grateful to be me, to be in the position I am and to be married to the man of my dreams. No, him being sick wasn't part of my dream but I will say this, "Just because the dream isn't 100% according to you (or me) doesn't mean you aren't 'living the dream.'" I am doing what I can to change my husbands health. I have the finances and budget to change our diet and to support him in this new way of eating. Some days it's not easy, but it doesn't matter. I'm grateful no matter what and I'm so thankful!