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Dr. Tingling, my daughter's orthodontist, calls it a palate expander. My daughter has significant tooth crowding, owing to the fact that her mouth is too small for her permanent teeth. It's hereditary. I have a small mouth, too. (I'm holding up my middle finger to everyone who scoffed at that statement!) I was shown x-rays and photos and was assured that this apparatus would help correct the space issue. She will later need braces to coax the permanent teeth into alignment.Okay. Sounds simple.
Except that the expander is designed to literally pull apart the roof of her mouth. I was advised that it is best to do it now, before the palate fuses together. If I were to wait, surgery would be necessary to break that suture apart, then she would still need the expander. A friend of mine has a son younger than my daughter, and he had an expander installed and survived. So logic dictated to the vulcan in me that it would be best for her to get it now.
When I inquired whether this is going to be painful for my child, I was told she "might" feel some "discomfort". That is medical speak for "yes". And then he showed me how the thing works, as if that was supposed to make me feel better about it.
Apparently I am going to have to stick a key into this thing twice each day and make it exert even more force upon my child's mouth. I am to be my own child's torturer, and I am paying an orthodontist for the right to do it. I'm not sure I even have the stomach for it. Nevertheless, I sat there in that man's office with my child, and I agreed to this. I don't know how to account for my apparent lapse in good sense, though I suspect some version of the Jedi mind trick was involved.
As we get closer to her appointment, I'm having to fight the overwhelming urge to protect her from the cruelty of this world. The orthodontist is clearly a sadist who has found a way to legalize child abuse in this country. And I am clearly his flunky.
-e
