Audge

Okay. As popularly demanded, I am about to narrate the story of my, Audrey Ogden's, teeth. Brace yourselves (ha...ha...brace..get it..BRACES....lololol)

So once there was a girl named Audrey. She was the first born in her family. Her parents both had some teeth problems, like missing teeth, over-bite/cross bite, un-straight teeth, etc. etc. Sooo, Audrey got the brunt of both of them. She was born missing 7 teeth, had a SERIOUS cross bite, and probably couldn't have had more crooked teeth. So, starting in the 3rd grade, Audrey went to the orthodontist. If only she had known how many times she would return to see this man.....she probably would have objected. So they started Audrey with some appliances. PERMANENT appliances. Metal icky ones. One on the bottom AND top. Those were in for about 8 months. They made me talk funny. Bread would get stuck. They tore my tongue up. And I haven't even gotten to the worst part yet. Imagine in your mind a little piece of metal, in the shape of something like a key. Then, take that key and stick it in the top of your mouth, in that little appliance glued there, ATTACHED to your teeth. Then, oh so slowly, you turn that key down, which in turn slowly, and painfully spreads that appliance out. OUT. Do you understand? It widens your mouth. That, is painful. And imagine doing that every night for 6 weeks, when you are in 3rd grade. It's awful.
Next, you get the appliances off. Your cross bite has been fixed. Amazing huh? Painful yes. But amazing. You then get to go to the actual DENTIST. You get to have 4 of your molars pulled. Because they never wanted to come out on their own. And in order to somehow rework the 7 teeth you are missing, you have to lose teeth. Confused? Yeah, so was I. Then you have to wait months for your big molars to at least start coming in so they could have brackets put on them. And then, yep, you guessed it, braces. The braces are put on. By this time it's 6th grade. You get the braces put on, and you start the 3 and 1/2 year journey of them. In that journey I (yeah, i think it's time to start talking in first person now) experienced rubber bands (numerous times, one time I had three different ones: two triangle on each side, then a REALLY big one that started on one side on my back bottom molar, then went across, on top of my front teeth, and back to the opposite molar.) gum reactions to the metal of the braces (in which I was literally threatened to brush my gums 5 times a day), and oh, pain.

THEN, 3 1/2 years later. It's the summer before 9th grade. I haven't smiled in years most likely. I go to the orthodontist. They take off those BLASTED brackets. I can feel my teeth. I CAN FEEL MY TEETH. Anyone who has experienced braces coming off knows how holy that experience is. But see, I had an extra problem. Remember how I was missing a bunch of teeth? Well, now that my teeth have all been straightened, I have some serious SPACE-AGE going on. My two front teeth sat alone. With giant spaces on either side of them. Problem? Yes. Yes it was. So they fashioned my top retainer with some fancy little teeth to fill in the gaps so people didn't stare, and judge me more. It worked nicely actually. And I'll admit, I enjoyed taking out my retainer and watching people freak out when they saw that I had teeth attached to it. Anywho. So I had the retainer for a while.

THEN, the final stage approached. I go to a cosmetic dentist in Cedar Hills. We decide it would be best for me to get a bridge across the top of my teeth, instead of the implants that we had originally thought of (because, remember how I was allergic to the metal in my braces? Well, they were worried that if they stuck two thick pieces of metal into my gums that something bad would happen.....go figure). They also decided that it would be good to do some gum surgery at the same time. Awesome. Oh, and we're going to whiten the rest of your teeth before hand, so they will match the bright white teeth we are putting in later. Awesome. So it began.
First, the whitening.
Second, the laser gum surgery, plus putting in the temporary bridge. This all involved smelling my gums being shaved down, and, well, you know that little piece of gum/skin that connects your top lip to your gums? Yeah, I don't have that. They took it out. Weird huh? They then shaved down my two lonely front teeth to little stumps (literally, they let me feel it.). And put on the bridge (6 fake teeth across the top of my mouth) that connected and was glued to those teeth, and the ones on the side.
Third, I went back and they removed the temporary bridge and put in the real one. 6 bright white, shiny, new teeth. Amazing.

And with that, it was done. I finally had that $20,000 smile that everyone talked about (technically it was $16,000). I went into 9th grade feeling like a queen. And amazingly enough, my confidence level BOOSTED through the roof. I smiled. And people were almost blinded by my bright white teeth. And to this day I have people ask me how I have such white teeth.........