My paradise: 2015

Removing braces & getting retainers

Hey guys! So just a small little update about my teeth/braces.

Today I went to get my retainers and they are super annoying to take off! haha It's just hard to take off since of course, it's a super tight fit. The orthodontist ladies said that I'd get the hang of it soon. Like there's a little technique to take it off quickly. I'm hoping that I learn the technique soon! I'm just that the plastic retainer itself might break or the my teeth will be pulled out. I know that my teeth won't get pulled out but the retainer is just that tight of a fit so it feels like it. And when you're wearing the retainers, it feels like you've got a mouth guard because even though it's not that thick, it's still thicker than not having anything there. :P

This is what I look like with the retainers on:

And what I look like without them on:

So it's not really that much of a difference. When I've got the retainers on, it just seems it seems a bit waxy/shiny if you look at it up close. But who even looks that intensely at teeth unless you're trying to purposely spot it. It also makes my teeth seem whiter in the photos but I'm pretty sure it's just because of the lighting. (Sorry about the up close ugly photo)

I just went to clean the retainers for the first time and it honestly felt like I was cleaning dentures. Also, another thing with retainers is that you get a lisp! They told me that it'll only be the first few days though, so I'll update you guys if the lisp disappears. :P

Another thing that I forgot to mention in the previous post is that the process of removing braces is so incredibly quick and seems easy!? I thought that I might take the same amount of time as getting the braces on. But nope! The time take was more like a usual appointment where they change out the elastic/brackets. (I'm not sure what the technical term for these are.) The most time consuming part was washing my teeth because they carefully and thoroughly cleaned every single tooth. It felt nice though, my teeth felt really smooth(?) haha. That was probably also because there wasn't any braces in the way anymore though. :P

Love,
Elaine

21:33
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A week with a retainer

braces

12:42
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Bye bye braces

before and after

Hey guys! It's been such a long time since my last blog post but I've just been super busy with starting uni and just life in general.

Anyways, I'll talk about that in another post later, maybe at the end of this year to talk about my first uni year. Today, I want to talk about my braces! I finally got them off! I got them taken off yesterday (29/06/2015) and go back tomorrow to get my retainers which they said I have to have them on pretty much 24/7 for the next six months. I could blog about them If you'd like. :) It feels like I've had them my entire life and it feels weird not having them anymore. Not having anything rubbing against my lips. I'm not sure if it's because they cleaned it thoroughly but they are really slimy/shiny? It's a weird sensation. You'll understand if you've had braces before. I haven't been able to feel my whole teeth for the last few years due to the metal brackets taking up so much space.

Having braces wasn't even that bad in my opinion. The only time that it hurt (and on my pain scale it would only be like a 1 out of 10) was the day when they tightened it. And the pain only occurred when I ate food. It definitely didn't help that most of the time I got my braces tightened, that my mum had planned to have steak for dinner. (Honestly a coincidence) So she didn't exactly cook the softest food for dinner. Like on the worst days, I'd make noodles but not be able to eat the, because they were too hard and chewy to bite. They were already the softest that they'd go by the way. Another painful thing is getting little cuts on the inside of your lip. They hurt so much, especially since you can't prevent it asap, once it's cut, it's there for a few days. So it just stings throughout the day. You can put this wax thing on but that makes it annoying having to take it out whenever you eat or drink. The wax thing was given to me by my orthodontist. I'm not sure if every orthodontist does it though. I personally didn't even use much of it. I only used it when my lip was badly cut because it helped a little, but having it on made it difficult to talk so I just had it on for a short while. Which in all honestly, barely helped. But hey, would you prefer to not have a cut lip every once in a while or have a cut lip every so often and get straight teeth out of it. :P

Apart from having my teeth hurt a bit a few times and getting cut lips, getting braces aren't so bad. Oh, another bad thing is always being worried that food is stuck in the braces. After realising how embarrassing it would be if I had something stuck in between my teeth/braces, I immediately tell my friends if they have something stuck in their teeth because I know how embarrassing it is without knowing that you've got something stuck there for the rest of the day. (Or until you look into a mirror to check of course.) One product that has definitely saved my life (not literally) is the little brushes. The ones that I used are these:

I'm honest not sure if NZ sells another brand that does the same job but I've just always bought these ones. I've only had to buy 2 or 3 packs though, within the 3 years that I had the braces on for. Which is pretty good. They're fairly cheap, definitely worth getting them and keep one in your bag at all times! No matter what the occasion is because you might not plan to eat anything but how often does that plan flop over? Bring them so you won't regret it later! Sometimes I just get small things stuck in between my teeth and these little brushes helps get them out really easy. I think I'm either going to continue bringing one of these brushes with me everywhere, or start carrying dental floss. I'll figure it out and update you guys on that in another post! (Not an ad, I just honestly haven't seen any other brands in shops). The orthodontist actually gave me something similar, does the same job but I think I lost that one somewhere, that's why I bought these instead.

Overall, I would choose to get braces again if I could turn back time. Although it is annoying getting the pain, it's worth it in the end. However, don't get them if you've only got like one tooth that's slightly not aligned. That's just a waste of money. I'm not saying that people without super straight teeth aren't beautiful! I'm just saying that if you're already considering it, you should just do it as long as you have the money and time. (Time would somewhat be a factor to consider because you need to go in for appointments every so often. My appointments were every six weeks.)

Three years ago, I blogged about getting the braces on and you can find my before braces photo on the post too! Just click here. Such a big difference!

Here's photos of me just before the braces were taken off and just after it was! I probably doesn't seem like a huge change to you guys, but in my personal opinion, they seem and feel way bigger. Haha that's such a weird thing to point out but it's true! Considering the fact that braces were in the way before so it felt like way less teeth surface? I'm not even sure if that's the right words for it haha.

Bye to all the braces buddies and hello to the brace-less gang. :P jk, we can all be friends, braces or not. ✌🏼️

Love,
Elaine

21:58
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2 Ingredient Pancake- UPDATE

banana

11:47
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New Healthy Lifestyle Goal

blogilates

Hey guys! During these holidays, I can honestly say that I haven't gotten skinnier and probably gained quite a bit of weight too. It's mainly because I've been lazy and when I don't go out with friends, I'm at home, on the computer, watching tv shows or just going on tumblr. Which is so unhealthy but hey, at least I enjoyed it. haha It's great being lazy and knowing that I won't be having any big responsibilities for the next two months. Buuuut now I'm starting to regret it. Well not really regret, but I'm going to start changing my lifestyle to hopefully result in having a healthy lifestyle! :D

Firstly, I'm cheap and would rather attempt to get fit by spending a minimal amount of money. So I'm doing blogilates. At the moment, I'm following the Blogilates beginners 2.0 calendar. I'm only up to day 4 but 4 days is almost a week so I'm almost there. Almost done with the 4 weeks.. kinda. I'm not 100% sure that I'll get skinny from doing this beginners calendar but working out for like an hour a day makes me feel more energized and it just makes me happy with myself for committing to this.

For those of you who's doing or have done the new beginners calendar, then tell me if you guys did the head stand one from day 4! I found it impossible because I wasn't able to let my legs go up haha. I can do handstands and cartwheels but head stands are much more different. My legs and body and mind just wouldn't let me lift my legs to get onto the wall so I attempted it a few times but gave up. However, I did do some hand stands to make up for it because I used to be able to do cartwheels and handstands really well (when I was young and not scared about breaking a bone) and I can still do them but I haven't done them in a while (not including today) because I don't live on a property with a nice field to do cartwheels and handstands on. And doing it in the house is just scary. Like scared that I'll get unbalanced and hit something. Hopefully I'll be able to do a headstand (with the help of a wall at least) sometime in the near future but for now, I'll just work on hand stands to strengthen my arms and get used to being upside down.

Oh! And remember that failed attempt at those banana pancakes? Here is a photo for that..

How disgusting does that look! haha I think I know where I went wrong though. I'm pretty sure that I set the temperature for the pan too high so the egg was burnt while the insides didn't have enough time to cook properly. I'm going to try it again though! I will not give up in making these pancakes haha! I just have to try again. The batter seemed right, just that the temperature of the pan was too hot.

Speaking of foods, I've set to change my diet. I'm going to cut down on junk food and eat mostly healthy foods. Currently, the only junk food I'm eating is those Mamee noodles. I'm sure fellow Asians know what I'm talking about. Those delicious snack noodles. I don't think that they're as bad as chips and since the Mamee noodles are fairly small for each individual packet, it's like not as guilty as eating half a packet of chips all at once.

This isn't really a new years resolution but it'd be good to have a healthy lifestyle to make myself happier and of course, healthier.

Love,
Elaine