For those of you who might not know, in August of 2013 Robert was playing at a scrimmage for Colorado Springs Parks and Rec youth football, when another youth player lost his temper and kicked Robert in the face. This broke his jaw in two places, a compound fracture even with part of the jaw bone protruding into his mouth, and landed him in the hospital. Robert had to have emergency surgery and had his jaw wired shut for 6 weeks. This was extremely difficult for Robert and he struggled with not being able to eat real food and living on Ensure and blended food. He lost over 20 pounds during this ordeal, but he has come back and is stronger than ever. He will need braces in the near future to straighten out the misalignment of his jaw that occurred because of the location of the break, right at the joint, it was very difficult to wire it up. It was a difficult decision and not one that we took lightly to press charges against the other kid. He never apologized or reached out in any way to show remorse for his actions and we just couldn't in good conscience let him feel that this was OK to do to another person. And yes he was made aware of the severity of the injury that he caused by the coaches on his own team and still nothing. Robert was shown so much love and support through this from family, friends, the amazing teachers, counselors, and principle at his school, his teammates, and the officers at the CSPD. It was such a blessing to see something that could have been such a negative experience be changed to a positive for my wonderful little man.
