*Preface: Not Sponsored by Smile Direct Club. All opinions are mine*
If I could go back time and tell my younger self one thing, it would be not to pluck my eyebrows so much…it will take ages to grow them back. Thin eyebrows will NOT be in forever! But RIGHT after that…it would be to WEAR YOUR RETAINERS!!
I had absolutely awful teeth growing up. My orthodontic journey was 6 years long. I had to have teeth removed. I had to have a top and a bottom expander to make my teeth fit. Honestly, this was probably the worst part. You had to stick a key in the expander device and turn it each day to expand your jaw! And let me tell you, I was a kid. I forgot. A lot. That meant days where I had to turn the key MULTIPLE times. After all this, I had braces for about 4 years.
If you have ever had braces or had to deal with dental work, you know how much this whole ordeal sucks. And to be a kid suffering from the pain and being a “brace face”, you would think I would do everything in my power to make the whole thing worth it. But did I? No, of course not.
The moment those braces came off I felt free. I was done. My teeth were straight, I was 17 and I was ready to be done with it forever. When they said I would need to wear my retainer to make sure my teeth didn’t shift back, I said yeah, yeah, okay. That next day, I remember wearing my retainer to school and having a lisp whenever I spoke. Obviously, over a week or two that lisp would’ve went away, but I never stuck it out long enough for that to happen. I was supposed to be free, so I stopped.
Looking back…couldn’t I have at least settled for wearing them at night??? Ugh, teenage Jen. You did me dirty.
Flash-forward to my late 20’s and I realized that my bottom teeth were crooked again. My saving grace was that my top teeth stayed pretty straight and in pictures that is really all you see. Over the years though, I realized when I talked you could absolutely see the bottom teeth and how crooked they were. I would be distracted in conversations thinking about how the person I was talking to probably was staring at my teeth and being grossed out (I am sure they weren’t, but hey, human insecurities).
When 2021 rolled around, I had decided that this would be the year of finally doing the things that I wake up every morning and think about while I am getting ready. This included getting a nose job (I had a really large bump- check out blog post here), seeing a skin professional about my dark spots, getting Botox, and getting my teeth fixed.
One thing about me, is that I put things off. I really want to do them and they I lay in bed and say, ” Tomorrow, for sure.” And guess what? I don’t do it tomorrow. This is what attracted me to Smile Direct Club. I think we have all heard the commercials on the radio or TV and to me, it was appealing not to have to see any medical professional or make an appointment. The starter kit is set directly to your house with the tools and instructions to make impressions to be sent back to a doctor for evaluation and a plan is made.
I finally ordered a kit. Taking the impressions and pictures were daunting. They have specific times for everything and I swore I was going to mess up. You roll these two playdough looking things together and place them in the impression tray. I thought I followed the directions to a T…turns out, I didn’t. They market this process to be SO easy, but honestly, it was not for me. When speaking to my dentist, he had seen people get results with Smile Direct Club, but often times patients would need to come in and have him to the impressions for them because they had failed so many times. And it takes weeks to know if you did it right or not!
After sending in the first kit, waiting several weeks, getting an email that I would be sent another kit to try again, it really was a long process. When I did received my second kit, the trays were a different size. They were tiny, like for a child. I couldn’t even fit them over my teeth. When I called customer service, they were going to resend the correct size but said they would have to charge me to send another kit out. After much discussion with their customer service and managers, they waived the fee. I was disappointed that they made a mistake of sending me the wrong size and I would have to pay for it. That does not sound like a good policy.
After receiving and sending out the new impressions. I waited. And waited. It had been about two months and I heard nothing. I finally contacted their customer service again and they apologized that someone was supposed to call me because they needed a little background information from my dentist on my dental history. No one had contacted me and it had gotten lost on their end. There was a few months of back and forth from dentist to Smile Direct and finally they had all the information they needed. Reading other reviews, I do not think this is a normal process. My gums tend to get inflamed and I think Smile Direct needed to confirm that I was, indeed a candidate.
Because it had been so long…spoiler alert. I needed to do the impression kit…AGAIN. I felt like I was starting all over again…because I kind of was. Once I sent these in, however, I felt like the entire process was smooth sailing. I actually did the impressions right and I received my trays!
With Smile Direct Club, you receive your entire treatment’s set of trays at once. My treatment was about 4 months and 12 trays. Some you wore for one week and some you wore for two. I hated the two week trays. I found I could NEVER keep them clean, no matter how hard I tried 🙁
Getting the trays in can be hard. I suggest putting them in when you know you won’t be eating for a few hours or need to talk them out. It took me a lot of maneuvering and pushing to get them in for the first time. They all did eventually go in, but there were a few that I had to bend a bit and it really hurt.
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I will be honest, the first week was hell. Everything was scratching everything in my mouth. They provide you with a file to get rid of the spots that are poking you, but that first week, nothing helped. I almost freaked out and threw them across the room several times. This part isn’t to the fault of Smile Direct, after being in Facebook groups about Invisalign and remembering my days with real braces, I think this will always be the case. Your mouth is not used to it yet. By the time it was week 2 or 3, I would forget they were even there. It became second nature.
When I was reading reviews and watching Youtube videos on Smile Direct, the main concern was what the trays would do to your bite alignment. Even though they do say that they take that into account when making your trays, a lot of people had said that their teeth were straightening, but their mouth wouldn’t close the same. A lot referenced their front top teeth now touching their front bottom teeth when they tried to bite down. Because of this and because I didn’t mind my top teeth, I did not wear the top trays.
This is not an option for Smile Direct, so I was sent them, however, I only followed the program for my bottom teeth. If anyone else is thinking about doing this, I want to warn….DO NOT look at their 3D model of your teeth and how they should progress. I did and now I see imperfections in my top teeth that I never even noticed before. I really wish I was still ignorant, because fixing my top teeth was not something that I was invested in doing.
My overall process was very short and I was pleased with the results. I never saw a medical professional and never even left my own home and the two teeth that were causing me so much insecurity, are finally straight. I would recommend Smile Direct, especially for those who have minor changes. It is cheaper and way more convenient.
My friend is currently doing actual Invisalign and it has been a much longer process. The doctors are perfectionists, as they should be, but for what I wanted Smile Direct was perfect for me. I did not want a year long process that costs tons of money. I want two teeth moved that were causing me insecurity and to move on.
The only thing I want to change now is that the two teeth that were moved up to be align with the others are much taller. They were sitting farther back, so I believe they saw less wear and tear. I will be seeing my dentist on options for this and keep you guys posted!
I was given a retainer that I will have to wear at night from now on to ensure they don’t move back. You BEST BELIEVE that I will be wearing that retainer this time!
If anyone has any questions on the process, let me know! This blog post is to share my experience, as reading other people’s experienced helped me SO much with my own!
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