Smiling is something I always hated doing from a young age, I hated my teeth a lot and being called goofy constantly didn't help. When I was 15 I managed to chip one of my front teeth. I was in Spain sunbathing topless, I put something over the front of me and sat at the end of the bed. The sunbed decided to flip and this piece of fabric came off of the front of me showing everyone my boobs. I was mortified and got myself so worked up, I needed to cool myself down so I went to shower, my sister was making me laugh so much that I started swinging the shower head around (messing about like a silly child) and it smacked me in the tooth which chipped it. It's safe to say I will never be doing that ever again. From then on I learnt how to speak without showing my teeth and I always covered my mouth when I spoke and people would think I was just being rude.
We all have something that makes us paranoid or uncomfortable about our bodies, I have a long list of things but my teeth was the biggest thing I hated. I was told by the dentist I needed corrective jaw surgery as my jaw sits further back and isn't aligned with the top of my mouth. I haven't had it done, I was thinking about it last year but it's a painful operation and an expensive one too. Because of my chipped tooth I was first given a cap on it that lasted all of a day, it fell off so easily, I was gutted about it. Then about 4 years ago I finally had a veneer fitted on my front tooth, unfortunately, it cracked and fell off. I was so upset because I had to stick it back on with this stuff called toothypegs, luckily the tooth stayed on until my dentist appointment.
The dentist told me that she will be replacing it with a crown instead of a veneer as veneers aren't as strong, I was fine with that as I didn't want it breaking again and I was worried that I was going to have months of pain after like I did with my veneer. Before she could fit my crown she took some moulds of my mouth and put the ugliest temporary tooth on. I was back to covering my mouth for two weeks, everyone was reassuring me that you can't really notice it so not to worry. I was so so pleased that the two weeks went past so fast, I'm really happy with my new crown as it looks perfect with my, I feel more confident now than I ever have about my looks. I'm normally very critical of the way I look but now I'm not so hard on myself. When people compliment my smile these days I feel so so happy because of how many years it's taken me to get a somewhat nice smile, it's not perfect but I don't care, It's good enough for me and that is why I love my smile.
Elle May x
