Ramblings of a Brace-Wearer: A Popped Button

It is inevitable: when you wear braces you are bound to have a button pop off occasionally. The 6 brace buttons undergo strain and tension throughout the day to support your pants from the constant pull of gravity. Yesterday it happened to me: one of my brace buttons popped off on my jeans. I was wearing a pair of jeans that I only wear with braces, so I shouldn’t be surprised, but I am!

I was walking in the kitchen when I felt my left brace strap suddenly shifted to the left. I looked down to find a button on the ground and a dangling brace tab. Fortunately I was wearing inverse-V brace tabs so the change in brace tension was minimal. The braces continued to support my jeans. If I had been wearing braces with inverse-U tab, the strap would have been ineffective to support the pants. Here's the result:

My popped front, inner brace button

The button that popped off was the front, inner button on the left side. I’ve mentioned in a previous post that the front-inner buttons are frequently under a lot of strain; hence they are very likely to pop off. Now I’m wearing lopsided braces until I spend the time to sew on the button. What an inconvenience!

Where the brace strap should be

Braces are designed to be attached to pants or skirt with 6 buttons – 2 on the front left, 2 on the front right, and 2 in the rear. Any less than 6 buttons and the equilibrium is thrown off. Brace wearers will feel that the pants/skirt isn’t correctly supported without 6 buttons. Because the left strap is further to the side and not as taut, the strap has started to slip off the shoulder. I should sew on this button soon.

A few days later I decided to wear clip-on suspenders with another pair of pants. I haven't worn clip-on suspenders in a while, so I thought I'd try them out again. This was a mistake: within 2 hours of wearing them 3 of the 4 clips had snapped off. I was constantly reattaching them. I wondered why I was even wearing suspenders, as they were not keeping my pants up! 

Button-on braces attach and stay securely attached to pants much more than clip-on suspenders. Even though I didn't have all the buttons attached, I was not constantly reattaching clips. I will wear button-on braces over clip-on suspenders any day!

Given my particular situation, I think it’s fitting to explain how to sew on a brace button in my next post. Stay tuned!

Discussion time:

• Have you popped any buttons? How did it happen?
• Which button(s) do you find pop off?