First off, I know that the majority of people on a.cc have nothing to do with professional dentistry and that talking to a read dentist would be the best option. Well, I already have and am not %100 satisfied.

<dilemma>
Earlier today a retainer that was fixed to the back of lower teeth was pulled out by some soft sticky candy. The retainer was installed after I had my braces removed and has been sitting there quietly minding it's own business since I was 16 (about 5 years ago). When it was installed the orthodontist told that when I was 25 we would need to make an appointment to have it removed.

Obviously the fact that it came out early is somewhat of a problem I think; especially considering that I have absolutely no insurance/benefits for at least 8 months. I called the Orthodontist office and they recommended I pay $250.00CAD to have the adhevise (which is still cemented to the back of my teeth) removed and then reapplied with a new wire. They also recommended that I leave the new wire on for life instead of removing it at age 25 like the original plan. According to them it will cost nothing to remove the adhesive.

Something seemed odd to me, especially considering I had braces on both my upper and lower teeth, and there was no retainer installed for my upper teeth and they haven't shifted a bit(;D).

I called my regular dentist who told me that she does not know very much about the possibility or speed of the lower teeth shifting back to where they were and that I should do what the orthodontist says.

My parents have already payed thousands of dollars for the braces to make look nice and neat (eliminate the gaps, crowding and overbite etc) and I would hate to flush the money they spent on my teeth away simply because I didn't want to cough up $250.

Clearly I do not want to pay for something that I do not need. So I don't get it reinstalled and my teeth move a fraction of a millimeter over my life then it wouldn't have been worth my money. However If the teeth move so much that some are forced behind others etc then I'd feel pretty terrible.
</dilemma>

I'm wondering if anyone here has any insights on this subject perhaps based off their own experience with braces and or retainers?

What kind of sticky candy was this? I'd like to have mine removed like that.

Have you had your wisdom teeth removed? My lower ones grew parallel with my gums straight toward the front teeth, so they ended up messing up my lower teeth anyway, regardless of the permanent retainer.

So yeah, as long as you don't let your wisdom teeth do that, my unprofessional advice is that you should be fine.

I think retainers are a scam. I didn't even wear my removable retainer because that was disgusting.

I had braces for the longest time when I was a kid, had them removed and got a retainer, that thing was horrible and I stopped wearing it after a couple of months. Well my upper teeth are fine, but my lower teeth shifted some, so it's almost as if I never had braces on the lower teeth. I never had my wisdom teeth removed however until much later so that has a lot to do with it.

Since I posted this I was able to contact the oral surgeon who removed my wisdom teeth to ask his opinion. He also happens to be my Godfather
<insert music>;D

Anyways, I told him what happened and he said it would be fine. When I told him that the orthodontist told me that they would shift dramatically within 8 months he still thought it should be fine. Apparently what used to happen was kids would get braces and wear the retainers until they got their wisdom teeth removed, after which there would be nothing to really cause the teeth to shift so they would have the retainers removed. He doesn't know why they would recommend I pay to put a new one in. I think he said it "must be a different approach to treatment".

Either way, he told me I would be fine to have the adhesive removed and forgetting about it. If worst comes to worst and I notice them shifting I can always pay the $250 to have the retainer reinstalled. That shouldn't happen though.

So, now I feel much more comfortable with my decision. I have an appointment tomorrow morning to get the cement junk removed. Yay!

I have an aunt in Antlers, OK who is a dentist--or more appropriately, the dentist--in the town. Actually, I believe it was the whole county. According to her, in that town, the standard gift to a someone on their eighteenth birthday is to have their teeth removed and replaced with veneers.

By that standard, even Tomasu's teeth are alright.

I don't trust dentists and I think toothpaste is made to be bad for your teeth in order to bring more work to dentists so they can feed off your wallet.

What you really need to clean your teeth is toothpicks and lots of high quality saliva.

I don't have much quality advice about crooked teeth though. I've been rather lucky in that area, my wisdom teeth is a little tight in the back but not causing serious trouble. So I haven't needed any advanced dental care.

I had a large overbite, which is why I went to the orthodontist. If I recall correctly, it was around 10mm. So I had two top molars removed and wore the modern day torture device: headgear.

It's amazing that it actually works. It's just constant pressure on the upper jaw applied to the rear molars. I ended up wearing the stupid thing 24/7 because it was easier to just get used to it always on than to take it on and off. That, and I only had to wear it for around one year instead of three. The orthodontist said I shattered all of the distance / time records of his previous patients. So there's my accomplishment in life.

I have no problems.

I expected my orthodontist's suicide to at least garner a but I guess you're all 1) not surprised 2) not that concerned, considering our general attitude toward our respective tooth-care professionals...

I was supposed to wear braces back then, due to an enormous overbite. They told me if I don't wear it, all sorts of bad things would happen: My teeth would rot, I wouldn't be able to chew properly, which would screw up my digestive system and with that pretty much my entire metabolism, and eventually, all sorts of diseases would come and greet me.
But by that time, I was already progressing quite well on the trombone, and for that reason refused any of permanent braces, so the orthodontist shrugged and tried her best with a removable thingy. The removable thing, though, screwed up my entire embouchure so badly that after about a year of fruitless treatment (my overbite didn't change zip, but my molars didn't fit anymore, somthing the orthodontist classified as "normal"), I decided to drop the whole thing and just have an overbite.
My teeth are still fine, except for the mark the removeable brace left on one of them, and I haven't developed any kind of disgusting digestive disorders yet.
My unprofessional assessment is that if more than 80% of all children are diagnosed as having dental abnomalities, then something is wrong with the diagnostics. We humans are not a perfect design, but we're not THAT horrible either.

Rough guess based on what I recall from my personal experience of that time.

You've been to my orthodontist's office?