Yep, I've had two of them.
It depends. My ortho was some Chinese dude my dentist referred me to. He was not a big one for pain killers, so he gave you a local and a few advil. I was like WTF man?!?! and almost walked out. But he used some jedi mind trick bullshit on your while he tore open your gord.
It hurt like hell. Afterwards, and I only had some dull painkiller, Codine I believe, to dull the pain. I was pretty much fine w/i a week. I did have a little swelling, but nothing like the horror stories people talk about where you look like a grapefruits growing out of the side of your head.
But, in hindsight, my experience is the momentary pain's a lot easier or better than dealing with constant days, weeks, months of pain. Kind of the pulling the bandaid off quickly theory.
