Tips For Dealing With Braces Pain After Braces Tightening
A COMMON QUESTION we hear from patients is “will it hurt?”
First of all, modern braces are much more comfortable than they were 20 years ago. So don’t listen to silly stories from your uncle Fred. However, your mouth is a very sensitive place, so some patients experience a little bit of discomfort in the beginning or after their braces are tightened.
But you do want to know what kind of discomfort is normal, and what you should be talking to your orthodontist about. Sometimes, what you are experiencing means something is wrong, and your orthodontist can take a look to fix it.
If you are experiencing discomfort for more than 2 or 3 days, you may want to reach out and ask your orthodontist if you could come in for them to have a look.
So What’s Normal?
Everyone feels different. You may experience a mild aching pressure. Some people feel like their teeth are loose, and others can be irritated by the hard brackets rubbing against their cheeks and lips.
Usually, people feel that their jaw is sore and tight like they have done a workout for their teeth. Others feel more of a sharp jabbing sensation when they move their jaw. It all depends on the person, and how tight your braces are.
The good news is, all of this gets much better VERY quickly.
When you get your braces put on, those first few days after placing braces may be the hardest. It may take a week or two for things to feel normal, and it can take up to a month for you to get to the point where you don’t even notice your braces.
For the first weeks of having braces, you may experience rubbing from the braces on your cheeks as your mouth adjusts to the addition in its environment. The discomfort that comes with starting braces is different than tightening.
The discomfort with tightening lasts longer while new braces may take more time to adjust to.
After each tightening appointment, you may experience a day or two of discomfort, but it will go away quickly the longer you’re in braces since your teeth are put into their place, there is less movement to be made, so soon enough you will be a tighten pro!
What Can You Do To Minimize Discomfort?
- Plan meals with soft food for when you start treatment, and each day that you go in for a tightening. Some great soft foods for tightening days are pureed soups, yogurt, smoothies, cottage cheese, pudding, Jell-O, and baked or mashed potatoes, among others. Prepare your meals so you do not have to eat a steak or a chewy meal on the day of your tightening and the days after, as well.
- Don’t be stingy with the wax. Use it to cover a bracket or hook that’s rubbing against sensitive skin. The spots where the braces are rubbing and causing discomfort is where the skin is too soft and uncalloused. The wax will help prevent pain while the rubbing creates tougher skin in that spot.
- For pain and headaches, we may recommend taking a mild painkiller like Tylenol. The tightness in your jaw that comes with the tightening of your braces can cause temporary headaches, so combating that should be a tool in your toolbox. Some may take a mild pain reliever like Tylenol or Advil (make sure you are not allergic to any of the ingredients), while others will wrap their head in a hot or cold towel (depending on your preference.)
- DON’T pick at your braces. This can greatly increase your treatment time if you cause damage to them. (plus, that will make them cost more, too.) It can be hard not fiddling with them especially when they are bothering you, but resisting the urge to pick at them can prevent you from having weeks, if not months, added to your timeline.
Here are a few more tips about curing the post-tightening blues!
You can try massaging your jaw to loosen the tenderness in your muscles that surround your jaw. Doing this can help to relax the pressure, and disperse the lactic acid build-up that causes muscular soreness. Easing this bothersome feeling can help you speed up the timeline of getting rid of your discomfort.
Everyone who has had or currently has braces knows the annoying parts, especially the tightening. If your friends have braces, talk to them about it! Give them a call and ask them what they do when they feel sore after a tightening. Sometimes the best remedy for discomfort is talking to someone who is going through it too.
If your parents went through having braces as a kid, ask them about their experience, and what they did to help ease their discomfort during tightening days. If your mom or dad had braces, they will certainly understand the discomfort you may be experiencing, and they can sympathize with your situation and help support you through it.
Or maybe go and tell someone (like a parent, close family friend, sibling, or friend) that you need to complain for a minute, and just get all the annoyance off your chest! Letting it all out can help your mood, which might help you to forget about the bothersome tightness.
Hang In There! It’s Worth It!
If you have just started with braces and you’re feeling uncomfortable, hang in there— it will get much better! And if you are seasoned alumni of braces, let us know your take on braces discomfort below. Do you have any tips to add?
At best, tightening is another orthodontist visit. At worst, it is simply an annoyance and then a bit of discomfort. Do not panic over it, you will learn how to handle it in no time!
Once you get a handle on how to prepare and deal with tightening days, you will feel like you are in control, and your braces experience will be much easier. The plus side of all this? You can eat Jell-O for dinner once a month!
Braces are hard to deal with overall. The worst feeling is right after an adjustment. You can get a painful ache in your jaw when you put pressure on your teeth, or just in general. This is my third day after an appointment. My teeth and jaw still hurt, I need suggestions on how to eat foods that are hard. (I have to eat what my parents make).
I just got my new braces yesterday, and it’s super hard to eat regular foods like cereal. Try chewing with your back teeth, or your front teeth, or if you’re having something like omelet or a gummy bear, try sucking on it until it completely deflated and then swallow. Soup and Jello are good choices of food to have if it’s difficult to eat the hard food. I haven’t tried it yet because my teeth feel oh so very sore
Mine too
I am 44 years old and this is my second time having braces. I am being prepared for jaw surgery. I would suggest cutting food into smaller pieces and chewing more on your back teeth and switching sides when one side gets over worked. Chew slowly also. It’s a pain, but it does get better in time. My issue is that I have stoppers on my teeth that keeps me from closing my teeth together. That’s very hard, but I also take smaller pieces to chew at a time. I hope this helps.
my mouth hurts really bad i use wax, eat soft foods, and take medicine. i have one week left until school does anybody have any suggestions?
I’ve had braces for 20 months now. My baby canine teeth never fell out on their own, so I had to have my baby canine teeth pulled out, braces put on & oral surgery done to expose my adult canine teeth from my gums & bone. Once exposed, they attached a chain from the adult canines to my braces & slowly pulled both teeth down with the chain. They are about 1/3 of the way down & today they finally removed the chains & completely connected the wire to my adult canines brackets. I’ve been missing my canine teeth for the last two years, so I’m really ready for them to just be completely down so I have at least somewhat of a proportionate smile & not missing teeth on top of having braces! It’s been about 7 hours since this new adjustment & I’m extremely exhausted & sore. I do seem to get really tired for several days, everytime I have an adjustment, though. I’m sticking to eating healthy popsicles, chicken broth, different kinds of soup, cottage cheese mixed with canned albacore to keep my protein intake up, oatmeal with butter, cinnamon, & milk, & fruit smoothies. This process has been quite fascinating, watching my mouth slowly transform, but extremely exhausting. I was told that my estimated time with braces on would be 28 months, so if all is well, hopefully I will have them off within 8 months. I still have to have them put on the bottom as well, to line my bite up. This is an agonizing process, but I’m confident it will be worth it in the end.