The Expander is OFF

I've had an expander in the top of my mouth for a little over 5 months. It caused me great pain for 12 and a half days after I got it because I would have to turn the little screw in the very top every morning and every night one complete turn. It would stretch out the top of my mouth and hurt like Hell. After those 24 turns, it didn't hurt as much anymore. However, I was limited on foods I was able to eat. I couldn't eat stringy things without them getting stuck on that bar and I could eat things that were too hard because they would break my brackets or hurt my teeth. Well, today I got that demonic tool out of my mouth. I was able to keep it as a souvenir. That made me happy to keep it. I'm going to put it in my scrapbook. Or maybe wear it on a chain or something.
The process of getting that damned thing off of my teeth was fairly painful though. I hated the whole thing. My orthodontist began to pop it off and when it was fully off, the gums around the two teeth that had it anchored in began to bleed profusely. The back of my throat began to fill with blood and it was really nasty. That's one of the few things that can make me sick. Teeth bleeding just makes me want to vomit. I didn't though. I was TOUGH! Then she drilled all of the cement residue off of those teeth. That was alright. Right after that, she began putting new metallic bands around the two teeth. That only made the irritated gums bleed more. After all of that, she cemented those new bands on to those teeth. I hate all of the excess cement that is left around my teeth. That will come off in the next few days and I hate it. It all tastes bad. I actually still taste like blood and it bothers me a little bit.
On top of all of that, I got a new archwire for my bottom braces. It's stainless steel and is really tight and my teeth really ache. That was one of the really painful things. She was pushing on that stupid little wire so much I thought my teeth were going to break in half. She couldn't quite get it inside of my brackets. After a few minutes of pushing, I heard a snap and she said "That one's in!". I was thinking about how crazy in was that all of that time was for one stupid bracket.
Anyways, I'm very happy to have it off and be able to touch the roof of my mouth with my tongue.