First steps

I am journaling my experiences of getting braces in a blog because although I think the process will be emotional and sometimes intensely personal, it will be important to recognize the journey. Only people who care about me or who may be doing a similar drastic change during their midlife will be remotely interested.
The first step occurs this Friday the 13th. I am getting two perfectly healthy teeth pulled to make room for my front teeth. That will be interesting.....Took the day off. Might do something fun before.
The drawing above is close to what my teeth look like - i will upload the actual photos later.
I have an over jet and an overbite (sever malocclusion) an overjet is more extreme than an over bite. Most people's teeth meet in the front at a 100 degree angle. My top teeth a. don't even remotely come near my bottom teeth and b. are at a 130 degree angle. Then my bite is one whole tooth forward (the overbite). I also have a cross bite BUT the great news there is the crossbite involves one tooth being pulled so that issue resolves quickly. You see, never in my life have I been able to bite down with both sides of my teeth. it is either chew on the right or chew on the left. I have often said I chew like a cow - round.
When I do bite down my bottom teeth meet with my soft palate and have been doing tissue damage for 50 years.
I have adapted a complex method for not ever showing my teeth. Try finding them in a photo. I have managed an acting career with terrible teeth, which will become much harder with age. i would like to be easier to cast. I would like to smile for the first time in my life in a resume shot. But mostly I cannot wait to bite down on a hamburger with more than two or three of my teeth involved.
Rather than getting standard braces, my parents got me inexpensive experimental braces called Crozat that my dentist (not orthodontist) managed. They were removable and both the dentist and my mother told me I was a failure because I must have taken them out too much. I was a kid - of course I took them out! they didn't work.
At any rate, my lovely new orthodontist, Dr. Forche, just smiled at me and said that the Crozat was the failure and they were taken off the market pretty quickly. He also said they would never ever have actually worked for what is wrong with my bite. The relief and other oddly mixed emotions about this are sort of confusing at the moment.