 Good morning everybody, or good afternoon or good evening depending on when you're watching this. My name is Andrea Cherowski and I am a restorative dental hygienist. I've been a dental professional now for about 19 years, so I've been doing this since I was 19 years old. Well, time sure goes by fast. And in this video, I want to talk to you guys about permanent retainers versus retainers that you take in and out, more specifically talking about teenagers or it doesn't have to be teenagers. It could be adults after they get braces removed, okay? So this is what I posted in my recent blog article talking about why I highly recommend permanent retainers. And I'm very passionate about this topic because parents, I feel, just aren't made aware of the differences between a permanent retainer and a removable one. My stepson is now going through braces now and my stepdaughter, she went through braces a couple years ago. And the recent appointment that I had with the orthodontist with my stepson was they basically feed you all this information, it's very overwhelming. They give you pages of paperwork, they show you things on PowerPoints in their little consult office and they talked to you about this whole treatment. They basically give you the price like, okay, it's going to be $6,000. This is what we're going to do. They go step by step, but you're initially shell shocked at the price. They're going through everything. And keep in mind, you guys, I'm a dental professional, so everything they were saying made sense to me. I can't even imagine what it's like for parents who aren't dental professionals. They're shell shocked with the price and then you have to make a decision such as, do you want your child to have the removable retainer or the permanent one? A, you probably don't know what they're talking about when we say removable or permanent or retainer. You're probably like, hey, what? And then you're thinking, I don't know, I'm not the dentist, I'm not the dental assistant. What do you recommend? So let me give you all of the facts, all of the bases of what you need to know to make that decision. And then I'm going to explain why I wanted my step son to get the permanent retainer. My stepdaughter had the removable one and as any teenager, you guys, they might be all gung-ho and say they're going to do whatever they can, but with the removable retainer, basically what I mentioned in the blog article is retainers are held in place after braces so the teeth don't shift. The teeth will move back after the braces are removed because they're still getting used to being in their new position. The purpose of braces in the first place, right, was to put the teeth in a perfect position, if you will, the most ideal position for straight teeth because their teeth weren't straight before. So two years or three years of braces slowly moves the teeth where they need to go. If a retainer is not worn, the teeth will shift back. How they were before, like not all over the place, you know, crowded, but they will shift. They won't be that perfectly straight, class one occlusion, all of that. And this is what happened to my stepdaughter. So she had a removable retainer that she was supposed to wear every single night, but every night it just simply wasn't worn. Maybe every once in a while, maybe one night a week, but then what happens is even after one week, a tooth will shift a little bit. It could turn around a bit. It could shift this way. It could shift that way. But one tooth at least will shift. And then another tooth will shift. The bone hasn't been taught yet to keep those teeth in the same position. It takes time, which is why a retainer must be worn. And once the teeth shift, they don't just shift back. Even if they say, uh-oh, my teeth are shifting. Okay, mom and dad, you're telling me to wear the retainer I'm going to now. Guess what? It's not going to fit. So they're going to try to put the retainer in either the top or bottom or both, depending on what your orthodontist has for you. And it won't fit in because the retainer was made for those perfectly straight teeth, right? So you need to get a new retainer made for the teeth that have shifted and then hope they're going to shift back eventually a little bit, but it's not just one retainer that has to be remade. It's going to be several to move those shifted teeth back into position. I could go on about this forever. But that's not what this video is about. It's about permanent and removable retainer. So you see what a mess that is. A removable retainer is fine if your teenager wears it every single night for the rest of their life. It's true. I'm sorry. That's the reality of the situation. If they go camping and they don't have it for three days because they forgot it at home, guess what? Their teeth are going to shift and they will not just shift back. There's a series of new retainers that will have to be made or braces need to be put on again. And I don't know any teenager who would be okay with getting braces again, let alone the parents who are paying the bill for braces again. So a permanent retainer, my stepson will be going with a permanent retainer because what it is, and I have pictures in my blog article too, so have a look at that. I will leave the link for you guys down below. A permanent retainer is permanently cemented in on the inside of the bottom teeth and the inside of the top teeth. And what that does is it keeps those teeth in position. It's not the entire inside the front and back teeth. It's not the entire inside because it's those front teeth that you're concerned with shifting the most. Those are the teeth that tend to shift quite quickly. But if there's a permanent retainer placed cemented on the inside of those teeth, the teeth will not shift. You might be wondering, oh, that's not going to look very good. It's kind of like a piece of metal inside the mouth. You can't see it. Can you see the inside of my teeth? No. I don't have a permanent retainer because I've never had braces, but nobody can see it. So don't worry. They will feel the difference with their tongue, but guess what? Everybody gets used to it. And it's permanent. You don't have to worry about taking it in and out. You don't have to worry about anything. It just stays there and those teeth will not move. It's very easy to clean. There is something permanent there. So you do have to make sure to clean it properly, but just as you would your own teeth. You are going to brush every day twice a day front and back everywhere. You I do highly suggest getting what's called a water flosser because it does. It's a high stream pressure water that can clean those retainers very, very well. Using a string floss there is hard to do because there's now a retainer there. So you can't quite go in between the teeth because there's a retainer in the way, but a water flosser is amazing, much easier to use than floss anyway. So this is why I recommend a permanent retainer. It doesn't cost any more in most cases. I mean you're spending $6,000 probably anyway and your teenager and you don't have to worry about the teeth shifting. So that $6,000 or however much you're spending won't be wasted because the teeth will not shift. There's a permanent retainer there. Your teenager or adult doesn't have to worry about it. They don't have to worry about taking things in and out. They don't have to worry about losing their retainer, forgetting it while camping. It's permanent so it stays there. It's there. It's done. Nobody has to worry about it again. So that's the pro. There are literally no cons. If I had to say something, it might be a little bit harder to clean. Like you do have to be diligent about it anyway, but you're going to be brushing and everything anyway. So you're not being any more diligent. You just have to keep it clean. I'm a dental hygienist so when I see clients with the permanent retainer top and bottom, I do have to spend a little bit more time cleaning it for them because it's easy for me to see. It's a bit harder for you guys to see because it's inside the mouth. You have to angle your toothbrush a certain way, but isn't that better than getting a removable retainer, having to clean your removable retainer, having to remember to keep it in the mouth where at every single night it's not the most attractive thing. If you care about that and somebody else is sleeping beside you, you don't have to worry about forgetting it, nothing. So I highly recommend permanent retainers. If you guys have any questions though, please let me know. Like I said, I have seen my fair share of them. Patients are fine with them. I'm a dental hygienist. I see patients all the time with permanent retainers. What I end up hearing about are those people that have the removable ones and them saying, I didn't know a permanent retainer was an option. Parents say to me, I didn't know a permanent retainer was an option. I was never asked about it, or they had said, which one do you prefer, a permanent one or a removable one? I didn't know which one to say. Obviously, removable sounds better because it's not permanent. And I don't know. I just didn't know any better. So with this video, my hope is you guys have, you know what's happening. You can make an educated decision on your teeth or your teenager's teeth. And if you have any questions, let me know. As I said before, my stepson will be getting the permanent one. He's starting his braces actually in about two weeks. So I did have a say on that. So people often ask me, what would you do if it was your own child? Well, that's what I would do. I would get a permanent retainer 110%. So comment below, you guys, if any questions. Thank you for watching, and I'll see you guys in the next one.