Casey's Braces

Casey, all of 7 years old, has a severe "reverse bite," meaning that with his mouth closed, his top front teeth come down behind the bottom teeth. The worry is, that this will prevent his jaw from growing, so after a couple of weeks of laying the groundwork, he had braces applied to his teeth yesterday. He was also outfitted with a retainer. The retainer is removable; he can take that out to eat or to play strenuous sports.

He was a good sport about the whole thing yesterday, and it didn't seem to bother him much at the time. Of course, today, his mouth is a bit sore -- even though he's had the retainer out since waking up. He complains that it hurts to eat: couldn't eat his breakfast cereal, managed to eat only part of a grilled cheese sandwich at lunch, apple slices drove him to tears, but he and had no trouble at all eating an ice cream cone after swimming.

This morning, after waking up at his usual 7 am, Casey actually went back to sleep until 8. And this afternoon he had a two-hour nap. I think he's really wiped out from the whole thing.