Patience — What dental Invisalign thought me during the pandemic

Being patient. Honestly, for me being an incredible impatient human being patience sucks. It seems impossible for me to be patient. The pandemic makes it even worse. Salary negotiations seems far away, climbing the success ladder or even get a step up in the ladder is getting harder and harder. I want this stupid virus and all the discussions of potential lock-downs gone.

Being at home teleworking again and again. Having again the dual roles of being a husband, wife, mother, father, paid worker, etc is hard. Lets be honest, it is not easy and with Christmas coming up and screwed Eastern, the prospects are not the best. Am I the only one being super impatient currently, hoping that everything will turn out good and back to “normality” again?

As I am getting more and more impatient with the whole situation. I wondered, what does being patient mean? So I googled and voila “The noun “patience” refers to the ability to wait or endure hardship for a long time without becoming upset.” Interesting without becoming upset? Can this be? Waiting for something without being upset, who could do this and how? I am definitely not one of them and I guess a lot of human beings are feeling the same.

So I started to think when was the last time I was patient. Is it really not possible to be patient? But then I remembered. During the beginning of the year, in January 2020 I started Invisalign, a cosmetic dentistry technology. It is a virtually invisible method of straightening your teeth. The so called “aligners” will gradually cause your teeth to shift their position slightly over a period of weeks. As the treatment progresses over the following weeks and months, your teeth will straighten into their proper positions.

Since years I had one tooth which was really annoying me. I was at many different dentist who had all kind of proposals how to change the teeth. From getting a second teeth over the one teeth which annoyed me to having a complete surgery on my whole face to change my jawbone to straight the teeth. Each time when I went out from a dentist, I thought well okay that seems reasonable and I will consider it, I just need to figure out how to much I personally have to pay, besides insurance coverage. Well time always flies and so other parts were more and more important and I was too scared to get a surgery, so I waited. But I was getting more and more upset with the situation.

Then finally after at least four years, I moved to another country within Europe and landed a job, where the insurance also covered Dental regulations at least bigger parts of it. So I went again to a dentist and he suggested to remove two molar teeth and then I am good to go with the invisalign. So I did.

Finally in January 2020 I started with my invisalign. Being impatient, I couldn’t wait and dreamed of having perfect teeth within days and weeks. But of course this is not how it worked. Instead it works each day a little bit. The teeth are getting more drawn in the right direction. Each day and night. But you can’t see it, you feel it a little bit, but not enough to be reminded everyday. I made pictures each month and started to notice minor changes. Now after 10 months I compared old pictures and I think wow, I really had skewed teeth.

So the changed happened silently without knowing, feeling or being consistently reminded. This was for a impatient person like me incredible. It learned me that change can happen. Slowly but consistently. Because you have to wear the aligners each day at least 21hours, meaning you are not even realizing them anymore. They become part of you.

My best learning out of this time is to make Yourself Wait but go each day a step in the right direction. Upload that post, starting a side hustle, waiting to buy something. I realize that I have to transfer these new learnings to the pandemic, learning to make yourself wait. Waiting that better times are coming, but take each day a little small mini step, so small you can’t even see. Practice what you already have in you.

Each day a mini change and you will see big results in the end.