Currently I'm doubled over in pain from cramps and feel so sick and nauseous. On top of it all I'm hella emotional. So yesterday I went to see a specialist about my dental situation. When I was about 15-16 my orthodontist discovered that one of my teeth had fused to my jawbone and was impacted. This was after they had spent years trying to pull the tooth up using a chain on a bracket placed on the impacted tooth which ripped the inside of mouth apart. They finally removed this tooth after years of it getting infected and years of me being in pain. When they removed this tooth they told me a implant would be simple but I would need to wait until my face fully matured and finish growing, roughly around 21( the age I am now). I had finally gotten my braces off after 5-6 years of having them on. Initially I was supposed to have them off in a year and a half. A year later they discover my 12 year molars and wisdom teeth were also fused to my jaw, those were taken out as well but won't need to be replaced. Turns out the implant is not so simple. After my appointment which I left in tears and cried most of the way through, the dentist( who was really nice and I think felt bad for me) told me that there's no way that an implant would be successful in my mouth's current state. There isn't enough bone in my jaw where the tooth was and in order to build up the width in my jawbone it would require a series of bone grafting surgeries. BUT WAIT! That can't be done until I fix my cross bite, which I was told was the hardest kinds to fix which would me more braces or Invisalign. I know it seems selfish and petty but the thought of more orthodontics makes me so scared and gives me flashbacks of having my initial braces and all the pain I went through. I had braces on until I was a sophomore in high school, I was one of the last to get mine off and remember how ugly and awful I felt, and the problems were never fixed( I still have a large gap between my front teeth). I know Invisalign is supposed to be invisible but I can't get the image out of my head that everything will be the same again, painful and long. And I can just imagine graduating college with orthodontics, I'm going to be going right back to where I started and feel ugly and juvenile as I try to network and enter Grad school or the work force. And what if it doesn't work again and I have to start all over again and again. I'm sorry for venting but I'm so scared.