It hadn’t even been a week; and already my son had his first braces injury, which left him with a couple of broken brackets and a cut lip.
Of course this incident would have to happen right before bedtime.
My boys, John, 5, and Matthew, 7, were supposed to be getting ready for bed.
Instead, I hear all sorts of noises coming from John’s bedroom, which led me to believe that they weren’t getting their pajamas on or ready for bed.
As I approached the closed door, which is something I don’t allow my kids to close unless it’s bedtime, I hear them jumping around and laughing.
I start to open the door to catch them and “Boom.” There was a huge smack against the door, which was quickly followed by Matthew running away screaming and crying.
I ran over to him as fast as I could and his mouth was already full of blood.
By this time John is screaming “Mama you hit Matthew with the door.”
I take them both to the bathroom and calmly explain to them that everyone needs to calm down. I tell Matthew that once he calms down him blood will stop pumping so hard and I can see what’s wrong in his mouth.
I take a washcloth and wet it with cold water. I then gently clean up the blood from Matthew’s mouth. At this point, I’m just trying to get the blood out of the way so I can see what’s wrong.
John keeps yelling and screaming, which is making it tough for Matthew to calm down. I quickly tell John that he should go get his pajamas on and then come back. Luckily, he obeys.
While John is away, I get Matthew calmed down enough to see he has broken a bracket off of one of his teeth. Two of his teeth are a little loose and the gums above those teeth are bleeding. I also notice he has a bump on his head and a cut on his lip.
I keep telling Matthew that I am sorry he got hit by the door and I asked him what he was doing when I opened it. Both he and John claimed Matthew was just walking, but based on how hard he hit the door I think he was either running or flipping, which is one of his favorite pass times.
By this time, John is back and he keeps yelling at me. I take a short break from Matthew to calm him down and let him know Matthew’s OK, but I need him to calm down so I can help Matthew better. This seems to work.
I tell both of them we will have to be more careful with doors from now on especially with Matthew’s new braces. I also explain to them that this is exactly the reason why I don’t like it when they close the doors to their rooms unless it’s bedtime.
Once everything is cleaned up, I give Matthew Tylenol for the pain and everyone is calm, I call my husband to let him know what happened. We both agree there’s not much else we can do.
I tried to cover the bracket up with wax to keep it from cutting Matthew’s lip further, but all Matthew does is get upset so I give up on the wax. I sit up with him in bed until he falls asleep. The next day, I call the orthodontists office and get him in. They were able to take the broken bracket off, but they couldn’t put one back on until a doctor is in next week. We wait a week. The night before Matthew’s appointment, another bracket broke off. I’m not sure what happened with this one. I wasn’t home and the boys said it broke while they were just watching TV. I asked Matthew if he had snuck food he wasn’t supposed to eat. I told him if he’s not sure whether nor not he can eat a food, then he should ask. We go over the “no, no” food list again.
The next morning, I took Matthew to his appointment and got both brackets fixed. My fingers are crossed that we can make it a whole week without another incident.
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