New plan for surgery

Gosh, I feel like it's been so long that I posted about my braces, dental work or surgery. I apologize! I know what it's like to look forward to updates about progress and I've been slacking. 

To bring you up to speed, I'm at the last few wire stages with my braces before surgery.  I was booked to have my CT scan for surgery at the end of April, but that, too has changed.  When my surgeon booked me for the scan, we had thought it would mean (calculating forward 3-4 months from scan date to implant delivery) that put me in August for surgery.  But because the hospital only gives him 1 day/month in July and August, and the # of patients ahead of me who already have had their scans done, I'm really looking at the fall to have the surgery.  This means that if I have the scans done now, the implants will be ready and sitting waiting for me for a couple of months - months during which nobody can touch me because my bite can't shift one bit before surgery.  So the new plan is to get a bit more work done before I schedule the scans in May or June.  This should not slow down my surgery timeline, but will allow me 1-2 more months to get some work done before surgery, rather than after.

I have to tell you, when I got the date for the CT scan, I completely lost my mind.  Like, LOCO crazy, for real.  I had no idea it was going to affect me that way, but this journey has been so incredibly long and hard, that even the thought of another root canal is enough to send me over the edge.  I'm not kidding - for someone who truly loves her dentist (and I mean real, deep love - she is one of the best people to come into my life) I get extreme anxiety going to get any work done. So - jaw replacement?  I just couldn't even handle the thought.  I wanted to jump off a bridge, cancel the surgery, scream out loud...howl at the moon...whatever made the anxiety go away. I'm not sure how I'll cope when the next scan is planned, but hopefully a lot better when I've got some new teeth in my head! (How I'm preparing mentally is the subject for another post.) 

The work that is planned to be done is some more teeth straightening (I had another wire change on the top that wasn't supposed to happen) and my teeth are looking even better as time goes on!  I can't tell you how great that feels.  I also can say that, generally speaking, the wire changes are becoming a little less painful as I get further into treatment.  Of course, I'm several weeks out from the last one so it's easy to say that - I do remember there being a lot pain after the last one that really stressed me out because it was in the top front 2 teeth.  I'm deathly afraid of (and too close for comfort to) losing these teeth, so any pain there puts me at a constant DEFCON 3 level. 

Another thing that my dentist (Dr.T) and orthodontist (Dr.O) came up with is to do the top front 8 crowns before surgery.  There are a couple of reasons for this - to get them in before I potentially lose my accident insurance coverage, and to get them done now instead of after surgery when I'll be recovering.  They also thought (how incredibly sweet of them) that if I could get these nice, perfectly shaped, white permanent teeth on, I'd feel a lot better about myself psychologically before going into such a hard surgery and recovery.  And I have to say that I agree.  

So that's the new plan for now!  If you have any questions, feel free to ask.