15 months and counting

Hi everyone, It's been a few months since my last post, and I've got a few updates but not much really. I had my lower linguals removed and put self-ligating outside braces on (still rubber band free because that just grosses me out). We made that decision because the lower wires kept breaking and of course if they're broken they're not doing their job. I was getting frustrated with them and wanted to hurry up the process. Dr. Cliff says the outside ones should be about 3 months faster. I won't be changing the uppers because they don't really bother me, and I really don't want visible braces. To be honest I hate the ones on the bottom - you can't see them so I like that, but they are still irritating even after 2 months, I find them sharper and food gets stuck worse in them than it did with the lingual. Oh well, at least the wires are staying put lol. The gaps are closing VERY slowly, it's frustrating but at least we're finally seeing some progress. We've been using elastic ties or power threads to help move them along, and I'm getting back to using my AcceleDent. The front crooked tooth that I hate so much is STILL crooked, and still leaves a nasty dark gap in pictures so my smile is definitely less than stellar haha, because I don't want everyone to see that :s We've also stepped up my appointment frequency to every 3 or 4 weeks which makes me happy, because it seemed like every time we went longer than that my teeth slid back to where they started. I think it's been a learning process for my ortho as well as me, in that adult teeth are a lot more stubborn than child or teenager teeth. I haven't had any new pics taken in awhile so I'll try to get them to do that at my next appointment, and post for you to see my progress. My lower teeth really seem to be straightening out - I've noticed and a few people at work have commented. For those of you worried about it I also have a boyfriend now - we met when I had all linguals and he's been super supportive about everything, including switching the lowers (Honestly I was terrified he'd be embarrassed of me, in hindsight that was stupid). All in all I'm pretty used to the braces, there are still times I want to rip them off and be done with it lol but I'm persevering and hoping that it will be over soon, and will all be worth it!