Braces: Personal Accounts from the '80s

In the 1980s, braces were more common than they were in prior decades, but they were still worn by a minority of young people and mostly in cases where really needed. Wearing braces was still not at all as typical as they were by the late '90s and '00s, and it was very common for only one member of a family to have braces, and their siblings not. As a teen in the '80s, I was often aware of a friend having braces while his brother didn't, or of another braces-free kid talking about his sister having to wear braces and headgear. It was not yet something many kids wanted, and it still brought uneasiness to be told you might need braces, but I think there were some few who began to think they were kind-of cool.

In researching the net for braces-related material from different eras, I found an interesting article prepared by a student at Valparaiso University, a 1983 report called "What It Means to Wear Braces." The writer calls himself "a veteran brace-wearer " who has worn them for three years, and gave an account of what it was like to wear braces during the early '80s. His account is divided into sections about the orthodontic experience before, during, and after treatment.

First, he mentions what it was like to await getting braces, knowing you are about to get them:

Before you have them put on, wearing braces especially means dreading the pain of the procedure. It means being nervous about how you'll look, being afraid you won't be able to eat or brush your teeth, and wondering how long you'll be afflicted with them. While some kids vow never to smile again, others are eager because they consider braces to be fashionable. Yet others know that having straighter teeth will improve their looks, so they don't mind a year or two of inconvenience. Those whose teeth are so crooked that they may cause health problems realize that wearing braces is a necessity.

Then, he described what it was like to wear braces:

Now that you have them on, wearing braces means getting called great nicknames like "metal mouth," "tinsel teeth," or "Jaws" after the bad guy in recent James Bond movies. Your visits to the orthodontist come about once a month and you dread them because you're normally in pain for a few days after each visit. 

If you're as lucky as I was, you get to wear all sorts of neat contraptions to pull some teeth this way or push those back (I never really knew which). First was the headgear--a thick wire hooked into the top braces and strapped around the neck. Then on one trip to the orthodontist I got a bag of cute, tiny rubberbands and four new hooks fastened onto my wires.

Finally, the writer mentioned that "Most of all, getting your braces off means wanting

to smile all the time to show off your new pearly whites," and that "It can really help you feel like a new person."

Another enjoyable account of wearing braces during the 1980s comes from the graphic novel Smile by Raina Telgemeier. Although the book came out 2010, the account of orthodontic treatment which it gives takes place in the late 80s. Its my understanding that the 1989 California earthquake is even featured in the account.  Here is an excerpt of the book, courtesy of Google books: