SMILE LIKE YOU MEAN IT… AND GOOD THINGS WILL COME
Talking about smiles. Doesn’t that kid on STRANGER THINGS have the greatest smile? You know who I mean, the one with the curly hair and missing front teeth?? He certainly has used it to his advantage— teeth or no teeth !
As a dentist, I began wondering why his teeth haven’t grown in over 2 seasons?? I feel for him. Then the other day on an episode of The Doctors (a favorite show of mine) Gaten Matarazzo told his story. I feel for him. In the series, and in real life, he has been bullied. It turns out he is really 15 years old and has a condition, since birth, called cleidocranial dysplasia, CCD. It’s a genetic condition where many bones are incompletely formed and the teeth do not come in properly. Baby teeth are not lost and permanent teeth are not coming in on their own. Gaten spoke very candidly about it and did say that he thought he lost jobs because of it. Well, good for him… he never gave up. It has been used to his advantage this time… the producers of STRANGER THINGS actually wrote the toothless part into the script!
In real life he is doing something about it. He’s a native New Jersey kid who really wants teeth. Gaten is being treated at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia by a special team of doctors and dentists so his 15 years old mouth wont look like a 6 year old much longer. He’s had multiple surgeries and wears a dental appliance to pull down his permanent front teeth. If you are wondering… the teeth he now has on TV… are fake.
So smile like you mean it… no matter what. Good things will come.
