Appliances Belong In A House, Not A Mouth

When you think of the word appliance, what comes to mind? A refrig-
erator? A stove? A dish-
washer? Yeah before the middle of December, me too. Now, it conjures up graphic images of torturous levels of mouth pain. Poor Romney inherited the worst of both Bill and I's teeth, both crowded and crooked. Romney has taken crooked teeth to a whole new level with a permanent tooth coming in several millimeters behind it's baby tooth counterpart. This oral development, combined with an overcrowding problem, prompted the pulling of 3 teeth and an appliance being fitted to his mouth in an effort to try and get his new tooth to line up with it's other "tooth-y friends". Sitting in a dentist in never fun, but lucky for us all, Romney loves his dentist, Dr. Romney. Probably because they both understand their odd Romney humor and "get" each other.

Romney had been hoping to have the tooth moved in time for Christmas and to be appliance free for all the yummy, gooey Christmas treats. But I guess on Romney even his teeth can be stubborn and the darn thing would not move as quickly as everyone thought it should. We granted Romney a reprieve and let him remove his appliance for 24 hours during Christmas eve/day. As promised he remembered without a reminder to put the appliance back in. Not only did he remember, he put it in himself, as well as getting the tricky spring behind his tooth. Well done, motivated little man.

Dr. Romney had mentioned that as soon as his tooth had made it over the "hump" the appliance would be removed because he believed the tooth would slide the rest of the way into place. After several weeks of suffering you can imagine Romney's joy when Dr. Romney proclaimed it had moved past the dreaded "hump", and then you can imagine Romney's anguish as he learned that Dr. Romney no longer felt confident it would move anywhere on it's own volition and had Romney wear the appliance for yet another week. He was stoic as he left the office, but as soon as we got home, there were major tears of frustration as he settles for yet another (at least) week of dental hell.