Mouth space and the quest for the perfect bite
My early life was marked by the American Dream. No. Not home ownership. The other American Dream: straight teeth, a stunning smile and a perfect bite. In order to achieve this dream, my mouth needed space. More space than I was born with, apparently. So at the tender age of 7, my mother listened to the advice of an orthodontist, and in one fell swoop, they extracted 10 of my baby teeth.
All I remember from that day is feeling sick from the anesthesia, gumming a McDonald’s hamburger as if my life depended on it, and hoping to hit the jackpot with the tooth fairy.
Just to put it in perspective: the average person has 20 primary teeth. They removed half to make space for the permanent ones. Why would anyone do such a thing, you might ask? Because, they claimed, I could avoid having to have braces, and my parents could save money.
The plan didn’t work.
I had braces for three years. From 10 to 13 years old, my life was filled with long drives to orthodontist appointments, sore mouths, head gears and rubber bands. The worst was when they had to make a mold of my mouth. I felt like I was being force fed cement.
Plus, more teeth had to be extracted for the braces to work. Four permanent teeth sacrificed for that perfect bite. (Much later I had four wisdom teeth removed…
