Five Reasons Your Retainer’s for Life, Not Just for Christmas
We Take a Healthy Smile Pharmacy Bite Out of the Importance of Your Retainer and Lifelong Retainer Care
You slogged it out teeth straightening.
You partied in the car when the orthodontist waved you goodbye (no offense meant, Dr. Tooth-Hurty, but, you know ...).
Now, you’re permanently up close and personal with your fixed retainer and your removeable retainer’s waiting for bedtime.
And your motivation’s high.
1. It’s early days: let the tissues settle
Psst, here’s 5 things the orthodontist might not have told you, but we will ...
Spare a thought for your teeth, gums, ligaments and jawbone. These wonders of nature busily adapted to the stressors your orthodontic appliance put on them. Your retainer continues to support new tissues adjusting to a newly remodelled mouth and smile to celebrate.
But it’s still early days. Help your mouth out by staying faithful to that nighttime partnership of you and your removeable retainer. Wear it!
2. Keeping it clean
Removeable retainers take a little bit of specialist care. It takes a special type of person who wants to pop last night’s dried up saliva back in their mouth. Ew!
But, for the rest of us, keeping removeable retainers clean, fresh and odour free is a breeze with a Retainer Care Kit:
- Quick brush of the retainer ...
- Pop in a glass of water or soaking bath ...
- Stick a VITIS Effervescent Cleaning Tablet in...
- 15 minutes ...
- That bad boy’s good to go to bat for you again tonight!
Show a brother some love! Don’t forget to care for your fixed retainer, too ... He’ll brush up nicely with a Monotip Brush and you can banish bacteria from lurking under the wire.
3. Wear and tear
If you didn’t know you chew in your sleep until now, your retainer will bring you the evidence! Over time, little rough patches, even holes, can start to appear in your removeable retainer. Your regular dentist can take a new mould and fixed you up with a fresh one. In a lifetime, you’ll go through this process several times. But your smile’s worth it. Many happy returns!
Fixed retainers can malfunction too. Cement can fail and you could be left with a sudden piece of sharp wire poking your tongue. Orthodontic wax is a hero and will save the day until you can get to see your regular dentist. They’ll snip the offending wire off. Ooh, that’s better.
But it will mean it’s time for a new fixed retainer. It truly is a lifelong commitment, see? Keep smiling!
4. Tight lips
If you’ve inherited tight lips (gee, thanks, Grandma Pat), while you’re sleeping, they can exert a force on your teeth. Having moved your teeth in place millimeter by millimeter with orthodontics, the last thing you want is for your own mouth to unpick the hard work.
Your retainer works towards preventing this. But only if you keep wearing it! Turns out, your lips are for life, too, so help your retainer maintain its battle stance. En garde!
5. Bone Density
It’s never too late to think long term. As we age, our skulls shrink due to a natural losses in bone density. It’s one of the reasons some people start to get crooked teeth in older age. You can keep up your bone density by keeping up resistance training. Incidentally, you might be more likely to commit to this if you’ve had your teeth straightened as it goes hand in hand with improved body image. You can read more about the surprising benefits of teeth straightening treatments in our helpful article, The Crooked Path to Wellbeing.
In years to come, your retainer could help combat the effects getting older has on your teeth.
All in all, retainers looks like humble pieces of kit but they’re a ride or die kind of friend for life!
