As many of you know, we have been looking into getting Ellie some sort of dental intervention for a 100% overbite that she has. We did quite a bit research on what would be the best route to go. As we spoke with dentists, it became clear that while Ellie has a major overbite problem even though her teeth are actually very nice and straight. Braces are often used because they can fix both overbites and crooked teeth simultaneously; however they also put a lot of torque on teeth, which can damage the root. Since straightening her teeth wasn’t a concern and we didn’t want to risk damaging them, we decided to look at other options. And thankfully, those options were far less expensive – as in 1/4 to 1/3 the price of braces!
We ended up going with a dentist who uses the Twin Block appliance and today was the big day when Ellie finally got them.
The reason the appliance is known as a “Twin Block” is because there are two “blocks” on both upper and lower retainer that fit together to force her jaw forward into its new position. From our research, it seems this method is quite popular in Europe, but rarely used here in N. America. There’s a better explanation below of how it all works.
Ellie, just after she had popped in her new Twin Blocks.
The overbite! You can see the lower jaw is back quite a bit from the upper teeth.
Over the next 10 months or so, these two little retainers will move her jaw into the correct position.
Here you can see better how the two parts work together to force her lower jaw forward. Right now, she bites down on quite a chunk of rubber or plastic (not actually sure what it’s made of) that is situated between her molars. Every 6-8 weeks, Ellie will go in for a check-up, where they’ll shave down the rubber between her teeth, slowly settling her jaw into a new position and giving her a new bite. In the meantime, she gets to chew her food with those chunks of pink whatever, instead of her own teeth. Makes eating a little tricky, but it’s apparently not as awful as it sounds and she’s been a real trooper so far.
They have the Twin Block set to over correct her bite, since her jaw will slide backwards a little once this is all done. Also, because of those thick chunks of rubber/plastic between her teeth, she can’t actually close her mouth all the way, so in the second picture, her teeth aren’t closed like they are in the first picture, which elongates her face quite a bit. Once this process is all done, she’ll be able to close her teeth nicely.
This was something that needed to be done this year, but it was also something we could not afford! We decided to make an appeal on GoFundMe, and we received 130% of our goal in less than a week! We are so thankful for the provision through God’s people for this appliance for Ellie.
Here is Ellie describing it in her own words, if you can understand them! Turn on the closed captions.