I did the bulk of the work while Stephen was on a business trip, and whenever Stephen is out of town, I have the bad habit of staying up wayy too late. By this point I felt like I'd seen all the photos in the slideshow at least 100 times, but then one night morning at about 2 AM I came across this one (yet again) and -- it sent me into a laughing fit. (You may have witnessed this event via instagram stories 😂😂😂)

Can you guess why?!

I'll give you a hint...

I was one the of the few in my friend group who never had braces or retainers to make my teeth perfectly straight, so I guess you could say over-analyzing my smile was a fairly common pastime.

When I got to college, however, I started worrying less about that tiny gap between my two front teeth and more about the coloring of my teeth. I would often compare the brightness of my smile with other people's and get really self-conscious when it didn't measure up.

A few months ago, I was approached by a teeth whitening company called Smile Brilliant, that offers a professional teeth whitening system that can be done entirely from home. As someone who tends to avoid the dentist as much as possible (😬) I thought this was a great option for me! It had been a little over 5 years since I'd done any teeth-whitening, and I was excited to try something new. Smile Brilliant was kind enough to send me all the materials needed to provide me with a whiter, brighter smile from home!

You can read more about how the process works by visiting the  Smile Brilliant Website, but to sum up my experience, I have been extremely pleased with the results! (I particularly loved feeling like a dental assistant at the beginning of the process when I got to take impressions of my own teeth, and fulfill my life-long dream of having whitening trays that look a lot like retainers (although serve an entirely different purpose), hahaha. Stephen thought I was being a little ridiculous with how giddy I was when I put my whitening trays in for the first time and was expressing my excitement about how my voice sounded while I was wearing them. 😂

I really enjoyed my experience with Smile Brilliant's teeth whitening system. I found it was very effective and I only had a few, very minor issues with teeth/gums sensitivity (although I know that varies a lot from person to person). The hardest part for me was simply remembering to put the trays in! I typically delay getting ready for bed until the last minute possible, but to get the best results with this system you want to leave the whitening gel on your teeth from 30 minutes-2 hours, and the desensitizing gel for an additional 30 minutes, so Stephen would often have to help me remember to start the process shortly after finishing dinner. 

One thing I think is important to mention is that your teeth will look a little speckled after applying the whitening gel. This worried me initially because I thought the speckled parts would stay whiter and my teeth would look that way permanently. I emailed the company and was assured that this was normal! It turns out that the whitening process temporarily dehydrates the teeth, which can appear as white spots or patches. When your teeth remineralize and re-hydrate, the speckles go away! (The desensitizing gel that comes with the kit also helps re-hydrate your teeth.)

Although it doesn't look like anything drastic, I've definitely been able to see a whiter smile develop over the past few weeks! 

If you want to try out Smile Brilliant's teeth whitening System for yourself,  enter my giveaway!  
OR use the code 'merryhappyblog' to get 10% off a system of your own! 


...Now if only I could say that was the end of all of my insecurities... 😏😅😂

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han.