Third Set of Teeth

Factual Questions
1

I’ve heard from time to time about someone growing a third set of teeth, but all of my internet searching yields little concrete information about it. My girlfriend seems to think that it is fairly common in advanced age, citing two common mentions of the phenomenon.

Firstly, Creationists claim that the “fact” that people will grow a third set of teeth proves that various patriarchs could have grown into the multi-hundred year range. Okay, so that’s not the most reliable source, but that seems like a sort of strange claim to just fabricate out of thin air.

The other was in a book of ancient Chinese poetry, there’s a mention of getting another set of teeth after you see the Emperor, which is supposedly because at that time if you made it to some advanced age, you were deemed to be doing something right and you were given an audience with the Emperor. Although she says that the age was something ridiculously low by modern standards, like around 65-70.

Does anyone have any modern medical accounts or any other reliable information about this?

2

I had a third set of teeth, or at least there was a third set of two of my teeth.

Around the age of 10, I had two teeth on the top row removed because my canines were coming out in front of the first bicuspids like fangs (this was in the early 80s, and my orthodontist referred to these teeth as “first bicuspids” but I just checked Wikipedia and apparently, they’re now referred to as “maxillary first premolars”). Either way, these teeth were removed to allow the canines to settle back into correct alignment with the rest of my teeth.

Around the age of 13, all of my permanent teeth were in and my wisdom teeth were starting to poke out. My orthodontist noticed a strange shadow in high in the gums above the second premolars. Over the course of a year, many x-rays were taken and the shadow kept getting darker until it was evident that another tooth was forming.

My orthodontist was concerned that these teeth were going to push my current teeth out and screw up 4 years of orthodontic work and recommended that I have the new teeth surgically removed. There was some precedent for the surgery but it was extremely rare. At this point, my braces had been removed and I was using a retainer (sometimes).

I really didn’t like the idea of anybody doing anything to my teeth and I had just endured 4 years of traumatic orthodontic work and I all out refused to let anything else be done to my mouth.

As a result, my retainer became a permanent fixture of a spare drawer in the bathroom and I didn’t see a dentist again until I was about 20.

The orthodontic work went straight to hell…my teeth fell into misalignment, though far better than if I had never had braces at all.

When I was about 20, I had a visible cavity and went to my regular dentist to get it taken care of and x-rays were taken. The “phantom teeth” as my dentist called them, were still there but hadn’t progressed at all.

The last time I had x-rays taken, I was about 27 and the images were exactly the same.

God only knows what would’ve happened if I hadn’t fought my parents tooth and nail against that surgery. To this day, I believe it would have turned out really bad.

The “phantom teeth” have remained a mystery and will remain so unless something major changes over the course of my lifetime.

3

I’m another person who had 3 sets of teeth. I lost an upper molar when I was 12, it just fell out. Went to see the dentist and found out that another tooth had developed underneath and the old tooth had been resorbed just like a milk tooth. Over the next 12 months I replaced one molar each side top and bottom the same way.

Then when I had my wisdom teeth removed, age 25, the dentist also removed two small teeth that had developed at the back of the upper jaw. These teeth were about half the size of the canines, and had grown on the inside of the wisdom teeth. They never caused any problems and apparently if they had sufficient space would have developed into normal molars. So I had 6 wisdom teeth removed in half an hour under local aneasthetic.

4

I am 37 years old and miraculously grew in a third set of teeth. Not just one or two an actual third set on the top of my teeth. They are growing out of the top of my gums. I feel like a new born baby teething. You not only can see the teeth coming through I can feel them coming through my gums. I have heard its extremely rare in the US to have a whole set of teeth come in but apparently it happens. My mouth can barely fit the ones that are in their now. The doctors have seen it the dentist is about to see it and the oral surgeon will be the one to remove them. I’m not quite sure how they are going to handle this but my doctors have described in detail the process. I will know better after I see the sergeon how accurate my doctors are regaurding this rare phenominon. This is what I have been told about my specific case. The dr. Will break my jaw open my mouth wide enough to extract the set of teeth on both sides. They will remove 2 to 4 more teeth in the back making room for my already over crowded mouth to straighten everything. They will pull out my jaw a bit on the bottom because apparently I also have a slight overbite. After they fit everything properly they will reset my jaw and wire my mouth shut for 1 to 2 months, more than likely the 2 months. Jokingly my family has said I’m part shark. Lol… You can feel these teeth on my cheeks that’s how many and how prominent they are. They are all different sizes but I can tell you at 37 this is definitely new to me but with out a doubt 100% possible., rare but possible. After I see the oral surgeon I will let you know how accurate my doctors were in there account of procedure. Its March 2012 now they are looking at mid April to early May of taking care of this. I want pictures of this freakish mouth of mine. I still have no idea how or why this occurs but it does.

5

Take a picture with your cell phone and upload it to the internet. In this day and age getting your picture taken isn’t really something that needs to be a big deal.

Besides. I’m calling bullshit in this. If you put the name user name into Google it takes you to the same username on another board. (That person is also located in North Carolina). That person has a Yahoo! messenger ID. If you google that Yahoo ID it takes you here.

So yeah, lets see that freakish mouth of yours.

BTW, the only thing that tipped me off is that it seems like whenever an old thread like this gets bumped by someone that just happens to be afflicted with the rare problem we were discussing, the grammar is terrible which leads me to assume it’s just a drive be posting.

But I’m willing to be proven wrong. In which case I apologize in advance.

6

Excellent work sir. Granted, it probably wasn’t a tough uid to track down, but you actually did it rather than rage about bots, trolls, spam, etc.

Even more important, you took a moment to look at the time stamp. This place is huge and a bit scary. If one day it were to be manifested in the physical world, it would feel like a Home Depot the size of Manhattan. So when we see an unfamiliar thread, we don’t think much of it, especially if it has multiple responses already.

Personally, I’m trying to get into the habit of looking at timestamps especially for a thread I’m visiting for the first time. I know that once I do it will become a barely conscious reflex. I can’t get there fast enough.

7

Anytime I’m reading a thread and all of a sudden stumble upon a post that looks like it was written by a 14 year old I always check the time stamp. Poor grammar is usually a zombie’s signature.
This one is odd though since it’s pretty clearly fake. I’m not really sure what she was after other then just making a random post for the hell of it…unless those pictures are several years old…but is there really something that difficult about taking a picture that she can’t just go ahead and do it?

8

Hi guys,

I really am new and a real person!! I was actually originally interested about the teeth but became interested in the possible spot of a drive by post. I thought I would add my two cents:

  • I coudnt access the yahoo link…what does it prove?

  • I don’t think the fact that an old thread was pulled up means much. I came in off google and it’s 2014 now, i was interested in the original posts from 2008 so that 37 year old poster could be doing the same.

  • I think it’s not too suspicious if they happen to have the same problem as this post came up pretty high and statistically it’s possible with google.

  • I sort of get the feeling it’s a drive by and because it seems relevant it is prolly not a zombie. But the only reason I suspect it is because of the bunched up text and poor grammar. But it could just be poor grammar and not using paragraphs.

  • I don’t think it’s suspicious at all for someone not to share pictures. People can be very shy, perhaps it’s not how you are but I know I would refuse

  • then this mystery may never be solved but it’s a learning experience for me. I have a few pet theories. It could be a computer which is so sophisticated and a random post to this thread. If it is a human, then it could be a forum
    Post used to justify a product or sell something somewhere else. Alternatively it could be mischief as a motive.

9

Zombie means the thread is resurrected past its prime, not anything about the poster. It often is a drive by. He could be trolling (or some variant) or genuine, but from experience the former is common. It is usually frowned upon because sometimes the original poster(s) are not around to respond and other reasons. There is no hard rule, as generally “updates” are tolerated, but Mods usually only get involved it is truly irrelevant.

Some people share on Facebook, which is a privacy-breaking thing, but there are plenty of anonymous websites. My excuse would be that I’m too lazy. And if he were interested in talking about it, he’d make more than one post.

We have people who find a thread with google and make an account and post once. Often the username is ultra-specific, like Mr. 84 Teeth that isn’t relevant outside the thread (not in this case of course). Then we have people like you, who come by out of genuine interest, some of whom stick around because (some of) us interesting!

I too am curious about what the sleuthing showed. Some pay website to access profile archives?
ETA: I think I see that they don’t have any Yahoo presence really as it’s a 2-hit googlewhack?

10

I had the most unfortunate event of having my adult front tooth kicked out by my brother on accident and 6 or 7 months later another adult tooth came in to replace it. Two years later i had another unfortunate accident with a croquet ball that bounced off a slide and knocked 2 of my lower adult teeth out, a year later 2 more adult teeth grew in not exactly in quite the right place. Over the following years until the age of 17 I had a total of 8 adult teeth that grew in and several small baby teeth. I was a medical marvel at the dentist. As the second set was coming in underneath my other adult teeth or to the side of them, they had to be removed. I still have 4 that I had needed. At the age of 25 I had all 4 of my wisdom teeth removed and now at the age of 34 both of my lower wisdom teeth have come back in. I have kept all of my dental records and now face the issue of having my wisdom teeth removed again at apparently some risk.

11

This zombie is like the teeth: keeps coming back.

12

How many times can the process be iterated? Can you grow back a lost tooth a 4th time, or a 5th time, 6th time . . . ?

Could it be just like the story of The 500 Teeth of Bartholomew Cubbins ? (PDF file!)