Prolonged

Welp, for future reference to anyone out there, AcceleDent is not effective. It was such a waste of money and now that my surgeon says my teeth won't be ready until May 2015, I've stopped using it all together. I hate being swindled and I hate incompetency, and now I'm fed up with this whole orthodontics process. My teeth are yellow, my gums are ulcered to the extreme at certain points, there are random gaps in my teeth, I'm paranoid about cavities... It's a stressful process and the fact that it's been prolonged by six months is frustrating.

As a side note though, I have noticed more people than you'd expect to see with braces, so I'm not really sure what their stories are, but it's interesting. I'm not sure if I notice them because of the fact that I'm more attuned to noticing braces based on my situation, or if there really has been an increase in college-aged kids with braces.

Braces

Well, I can't say that I'm happy to have braces again. They keep me from biting into apples and chewing gum, so that's a huge downer. Also they're the 'clear' ones, which makes them a  whole heck of a lot dorkier in my opinion. If anything, I feel having colors would make them better, then I could at least be seasonal The only thing that concerns me is not so much the braces on my teeth changing my visage, but rather the chance that food will get stuck in them and I won't be aware of it. But in all, I have made my peace with them, meaning I accept the fact that they are now a part of my mouth.(Update: I got to choose colored power bands for my bottom teeth! I chose blue.)

Here's a picture of my skull from October 2013 - The spiral is a piercing

I suppose I'm just that much closer to finishing this process though. It's actually really difficult for me to justify these braces to myself, if that makes sense, because my teeth were straight and I wasn't in pain, no TMJ problems, nothing. And there's this part of my mind that thinks what if this is just a ploy for money? I mean, I'll never truly know what would happen if I left things as they are now and I'm still not completely convinced that this surgery is necessary. Yet I'm at the point where the braces are on and I'm moving forward/there's no turning back. At this point it's happening, but I'm just still really doubtful. Excuse me while I go brush my teeth.