Adult Palate Expansion, Progress Report. Is it possible to expand the mandible?

Palate expansion progress is going on still. It has been almost a year since I started. I am working with Dr. Gibbs from

260 Jefferson Ave
Grand Rapids, Michigan 49503
Tel. (616) 459-1267

At first we was expanding quite aggressively since most of the changes we were doing to the upper palate. But now since we got to the point where we can’t expand the upper palate any further past the bottom palate,  we have to go slow. Currently, I am doing 1/8 turn on the upper and bottom appliance every 4 days. (1 whole turn is 1 mm) When I was expanding rapidly in the beginning I was expanding 1/8 turn everyday on the upper appliance.

The reason for this is the upper palate has the suture which can be activated and begin to unlock where new bone can form quite easily, the bottom palate aka the mandible does not. If one begins expanding the bottom too quickly, the teeth begins to tip instead of actually expanding the underneath bone structure which is what you want. Because the mandible is not able to form new bone around teeth quick enough. Most orthodontist say expanding the mandible is not possible, however taking a look at some of the molds that I had to take to get my second appliance for the bottom palate since I grew out of the first one. You can clearly see that the bone underneath the teeth had expanding and remolded. Remember bone is a living tissue, not some dead calcified hard thing that you picture because you see human skull models that have rock hard bones. Remember that bone is dead, there is a big difference from the bone that is still alive in your face.

I like to picture bone as more like clay. Moldable and malleable.

when applying light pressure on the mandible, by only turning 1/8 turn every 4 days, its gently leaning on the teeth. the pressure is not aggressive enough to tilt the teeth. When the teeth moves to new, more expanding location. There is cellular communication between the cells of the mandible, the cells know that they need to destroy certain cells, and create new bone cells to continue to support the teeth in new location.

My hope is that I can continue to expand the bottom palate in this manner. and get visible changes in the size of my bottom jaw. However, I am at early stages and at new frontier, I’ve never really heard of anyone doing this besides me, and maybe one other. Time will tell so stay tuned.

On top of doing the expansion. My upper appliance has these springy attachments that tilts and push the front teeth forward, as well as this springy hook that hooks on to my canines to keep the front 6 teeth together while space is created where I had my bicuspids extracted from previous orthodontics. (without this hook on the canines, I’d have gaps all over my front teeth as the palate expands)

My appliance (Biobloc) looks like this:

Remember that it doesn’t look like much expansion has happened in the appliance, these are second set of appliance I am using since starting this thing a year ago. I grew out of both my previous appliances already.

I have self litigating braces on the bottom teeth similar to DAMON braces and we have coil springs to open up the gaps.

Here are the teeth pics.

As you can see…………. reopening extraction spaces IS possible. The world of orthodontics is truly unbelievable, before I found Dr. Gibbs. I went to 8 other orthodontists whom all told me in the consultation that what I was attempting to do was not possible. To me it is crazy to think that someone can just definitively say that something is not possible when they’ve never tried it themselves. They just learned it from an old text book or was told by somebody. or they are entering uncharted territories so instead of admitting that they are clueless in how to do this, they shrug you off and tell you some crazy lines like “if this was possible, it would of been published in all the science journals out there.” or “once you reach a certain age, this amount of change just can’t happen.” It began to dawn on me the level of ignorance I was faced with in the world of orthodontics. And all these orthodontists were all listed as Functional Orthodontists, supposedly orthos “open” to new ways of orthodontics. I can tell you most of them were clueless. But worse, most of them were telling me very matter of fact, that it can’t be done.

Well if you see the pictures above, clearly it can be done. This isn’t an issue of orthodontics I was dealing with. It was the issue of the Human EGO! I was forced to deal with. And boy was it a tiring process. I mean some of those doctors straight pissed me off, and that rage and frustration was used as motivation as well in hindsight.

It is interesting how god didn’t lead me to Dr. Gibbs right away. It took me 8 different consultation visits of heartbreaking disappointments before I found Dr. Gibbs. The key was persistence, born out of great desire which births great will power with a healthy dosage of faith. One way or another I always knew I was going to find a solution. I know there is a life lesson somewhere in all of this drama…lol

You can see the coil spring on the bottom braces where the gap is being opened.

Also the upper front teeth is tilted out for now and creating a slight open bite. This is on purpose. At later stages, different appliance and my lips will bring the roots of those teeth forward and caught up. So essentially we are moving the whole front teeth structure forward in the face.

Going through this process made me realize just how much my teeth had been pushed back from prior ortho work. And how that is really the opposite of what you’d want. As I bring the front teeth forward again, I am getting more lip support for a more fuller lip, which I love. And as you can see below with mouth closed.

New (Aug 2013)        Old (Aug 2012)

the right lips are no smaller but they are scrounged in because the teeth has been so far pushed back, especially the canines to close the gaps where my bicuspids were extracted. Now as the canines are brought forward again, the lip is able to come forward as well, and lips became wider and fuller. and just a lot better in appearance. And I’m not done yet. Later on, the canines will come forward even more.

Also what I notice is that when I smile big I used to have a lot of gums show. Although it wasn’t extreme like some other people I see sometimes. Still it was there. Now as the teeth are brought forward, when I smile big no gums show. now I’m beginning to think that most gummy smiles out there may be the result of traditional orthodontic work where braces were used to push the teeth back. Or maybe some other issues where the teeth did not properly grow forward?

And the cases where extraction was done, the teeth are pulled back even further… and to think pulling teeth out if still widely accepted practice… smh….

or even regular traditional orthodontics for that matter. where braces are used, which means teeth are pulled back… we are in the dark ages still when it comes to fixing our teeth.

this is all for now. look forward to more in the near future. ttys.

-cp