3 Habits to Practice Keeping Your Retainer in Your Mouth
Starting new habits can always be a difficult task. Unfortunately, habit building is an important part of taking care of your oral health after you remove your braces. If you don’t build good habits for yourself, keeping your retainer in your mouth will be difficult.
If you don’t wear your retainer, your teeth could return to how they were, and you might need braces all over again. It would be best to avoid this situation by creating habits to practice, so you don’t forget.
Please continue reading to learn three essential habits. We recommend keeping your retainer in your mouth. Eventually, wearing your retainer will feel like second nature when you follow our tips.
Why Wearing Your Retainer is Important
Wearing a retainer is an extremely important part of keeping your teeth straight after braces. Mouth retainers ensure that your teeth don’t shift back into incorrect positions. This problem applies whether you’re wearing kid braces or adult braces.
However, retainers won’t straighten your teeth. So if you have a child with crooked teeth, they need to get pediatric braces to correct this problem. Then, they’ll need to wear a retainer for a while to maintain their straight teeth.
1. Keep Your Retainer in Your Oral Health Regimen
The easiest way to make wearing a retainer a second nature is to make it part of your oral health regimen. Follow these tips to incorporate your math retainer into your daily routine, so you never forget it.
- Keep your retainer next to your toothbrush: the easiest part of your dental hygiene routine to remember is brushing your teeth. It’ll be easier to remember when you keep your retainer next to your toothbrush. This way, you can put your retainer in or remove it when you brush your teeth.
- Maintain a consistent schedule: the most difficult aspect of setting any habit is to keep a consistent schedule. However, the only way to keep your habits is to do things simultaneously every day. So, think about the things you do daily and incorporate them with wearing your retainer.
Most people brush their teeth once in the morning and once at night. We recommend keeping your retainer next to your toothbrush or mouthwash so you never forget it. However, this isn’t the only trick we have up our sleeve to help you build the habit of keeping your retainer in your mouth.
2. Set Reminders on Your Phone
It’s common for people to keep their phones on them around the clock. Whether at work or home, you likely have your phone in your pocket. You can use the calendar function on your phone to create reminders to wear your retainer, so you don’t forget.
This is a great option for people who struggle to maintain a consistent schedule or travel often. You can also incorporate this habit with others to ensure you don’t forget your retainer.
3. Keep Your Retainer in Plain Sight
We highly recommend keeping your retainer in a spot that is easy to see. For example, if you’re the type of person who needs to wake up with a cup of coffee, then keeping mouth retainers next to the coffee pot is the easiest way to remind yourself to wear them.
Consider the little things you do daily and the spots you look at often. It can be tempting to keep your retainer tucked away in a medicine cabinet, but you’re much less likely to use it if you do so. Think about the common saying out of sight, out of mind and how it applies to your daily routine.
How Long Does It Take to Build This Habit?
After you wear your retainer every day for two weeks, it’ll be easier to keep this habit. The amount of time it takes to build this habit depends on how easy it is for you to practice keeping your retainer in your mouth.
Some people can take up to 90 days to build this habit, and there’s nothing wrong with that. As long as you stay on top of this, you’ll easily make it second nature for yourself. Eventually, you won’t even need to consciously think about putting your retainer in because you’ll do it automatically.
What To Do If You Break Your Retainer Wearing Habit?
Habit building isn’t easy because you need to make a conscious effort to perform a task daily. For example, if you’re under a lot of stress, it’ll be difficult for you to remember to wear your retainer. However, you should not beat yourself up for this.
If you break your retainer-wearing habit, remember that it’s not too late to resolve the problem. Start wearing your retainer again and reboot your habit before you go through the braces process. However, if it’s been a long time since you’ve last worn your retainers, you might want to consult your orthodontist to see if you need to reapply your braces.
Retainer FAQ
Are you nervous about creating the habit of wearing your retainer?
You’re not alone. Plenty of people have similar questions about retainers. We will discuss the most common questions below.
How long should you wear a mouth retainer after braces?
Most patients only need to wear retainers for up to three months. However, you’ll need to speak with your orthodontist for more information. People who’ve had a huge adjustment with their braces may need to keep their retainer in their mouth for between six months and a year.
Is keeping the retainer in your mouth uncomfortable?
Most people experience discomfort for up to a week after wearing their retainer. However, this discomfort fades away as your mouth gets used to the device. So, if you feel pain within the first couple of days, don’t give up on this habit.
How do I stop this habit at an appropriate time?
You’ll be excited to know that you don’t need to wear your retainers forever. Please stay in contact with your orthodontist so you understand when it’s appropriate to break this habit.\
Looking for braces or Invisalign? Looking for an board certified Orthodontist in Central NJ that treats kids, teens and adults? Bordentown Braces serves all surrounding areas of Bordentown, NJ including:
