Clipping the Tongue Tied

[fruitful womb]

Has anyone ever tried to breastfeed a tongue tied baby? A LC told me to clip the frenulum. Not me personally but have an ENT doctor do it. They numb the mouth with baby origel and make one tiny snip. Apparently babies need to use their tongue in order to thrust. Liam, my newest little one, sucks SO hard in order to compensate. My let down is very forceful because of this. Its hard to get a proper latch on.

[belatina]

It is a quick process to clip the frenulum and you can nurse right afterwards. You will probably notice a huge difference immediately. If his tongue tie isn't too bad then it may stretch naturally and not need to be clipped but that is not often the case. Babies do need their tongue to suck effectively and then as kids and adults a tongue tie can affect speech, teeth, etc. I have seen some really good talks on the topic and everyone I have heard suggests clipping.

[Momalea]

My son has a tight upper frenulum so although I don't have personal experience with a tight tongue frenulum, I have done some reading on this. It sounds like if your babe is having issues with bf it's the best thing to do. Quick, painless & it'll make life a LOT easier for you both. Do a search here at MDC under "frenulum" or "fenulum" for more posts.

[onelilguysmommy]

my son was born tongue tied and i did not have it done...i thought it sounded wrong to do that to him and so i put up with the pain and problems. he sucked VERY hard to make up for it nd caused me to have bleeding, and crcked, etc nipples while what he was doing was perfect, he nursed perfectly from birth it was ovecompensated because of the problem and caused the issues.

[Justmee]

My dd#3 had a tounge tie. It was clipped at 5 months in teh office and nursing got MUCH better for both of us.

[quirkylayne]

big thread on this over in breastfeeding

http://www.mothering.com/discussions...d.php?t=703034

[turtlewomyn]

My DD's tongue tie was bad enough that it was affecting her weight gain (my supply) and causing damage to my nipples (I screamed in pain every time she latched on for a while, until we got it fixed). I had ped's tell me it didn't affect bfing (yeah right) and my OB told me to pump and feed because my nipples looked so bad. I went to a pediatric surgeon and an ENT and both also told me that tongue tie did not affect nursing. They were both willing to fix it though, but only under general anesthesia.
Finally I found an awesome FP who specialized in bfing ( twofloridadocs.com ) she has an article on tongue tie on her website. She snipped it (with no anesthesia) and dd was bfing right away. I could feel an immediate difference. It did take another month for her to correct her latch completely (we had been nursing with the tongue tie for a month)
So, I say if you found a doctor that will doing it without GA, and you think it might be affecting the latch, go for it.

[3babiesin2years]

I pretty much had the same story as turtlewomyn with my 3rd baby. Unfortunately it was too late for my supply. We finally ended bfing at 9 months but had we not clipped the tongue I know we wouldn't have made it that far. We clipped at 3 mos with just some topical oragel.

[Beating Earth]

nak
my LO is a month old and has a tie. We have no problems nursing at all. In the beginning she put on 9 oz in 6 days between weigh ins.
she nurses like a pro and has from the beginning. I think it depends on the babe and how they are nursing.

[LotusBirthMama]

dd's was snipped at around 8 weeks and made a dramatic and immediate differance. ds2's stretched on his own and was not noticeable by 4 months.

[2tadpoles]

My oldest was tongue-tied and had no problems nursing. The pedi said that as long as nursing was going well, to just leave it alone. He didn't really speak until he was 2.5yo, but that's not unheard of, either. He's never had a speech impediment, once he started talking.

We did end up having his frenulum clipped....when he was 13. His tonsils/adenoids needed to come out (sleep apnea), and they snipped him during the surgery. If he tried to stick out his tongue, his frenulum would get caught between his bottom teeth and would get cut. So we figured they might as well clip it while they were already in there.

[doudat]

My eldest (also named Liam ) had a tongue-tie. I had some real problems with milk supply from about 2mths, but I didn't know why. He wasn't gaining a lot of weight, he was fussy at the breast, would pull off crying. Finally at 6mths I wrote to dr Newman who refered me to a bf clinic here. When I went in, they checked him, saw the tongue-tie and refered me to a plastic surgeon who did the procedure with only topical anasthesia (it took less than a minute). Because of my supply issues, I was on Domperidone from 6 mths to when ds weaned at 21 mths.

I would definitely say clipping was the best thing we ever did. I just wished we would've been diagnosed sooner. All the doctors ever told me was to start formula. Never did they check his frenulum. I got dd clipped when she was 6days old cause I knew the problems that could arise and did not want to wait till too late and be stuck taking Dom for over a year.

[Nan'sMom]

We did this with dd1 and it helped immensely. I also used arnica 30C for post-surgery healing.

[Three~Little~Birds]

Both of my children were born tongue tied. We didn't notice with the first and we were having a huge problem breastfeeding. Her latch was poor, she was not getting enough milk and was losing weight. I was nervous about getting it clipped, and cried a lot. Once we finally had done, it made an immediate difference. I didn't regret doing it. She didn't cry, and didn't even seem to notice it. I was able to nurse her until she was 4.
With my second, I had him clipped as soon as I noticed that it was causing a problem.
Trust me, I am not into 'interventions' at all and am very natural-minded. For me, though, breastfeeding is so important and the thought of having a compromised nursing relationship was not worth it, given the ease of the solution.
HTH.

[*guest]

My daughter had an extreme case, and we had the procedure done under general in the ER. We saw a ped ENT who was also a DMD, and he felt this was better due to her particular anatomy and the chance for blood loss due to having to cut/remove more tissue. I really doubted myself, but there was just no way she could get her tongue over the bottom gum line, and my nipples were shredded, even when adding in a nipple shield. Everyone but the LC acted like my pain just shouldn't even be a factor, but I can say we would be EPing or not breastfeeding successfully today due to the amount of pain I was having. I am only sorry we had to wait until 4 weeks to find someone willing to do it. The difference was immediate and dramatic. Feeds took 15-20 minutes instead of 45-60, and her transfer ability from the breast improved as well. It took her 45 minutes to get barely 2 ounces prior to the procedure, but she got close to 4 in 20 minutes the next time around. So suddenly I had a satisfied baby instead of a perpetually cranky one. She also stopped choking when trying to swallow. Her tongue was restricted enough to not flip the milk back correctly for swallowing either.

[DklovesMkandJK]

Jack was tounge tied also. We pumped for the first month of his life because the poor thing just could not latch. I was told to get him clipped but our LC had me get a few nipple shields and they worked perfectly! We used them until he up and decided at about 4 months that he could do it himself and that was the end of it. We are still happily nursing at 14 months and have never had any issues because of it.

Good luck!

[eepster]

DS was severly tongue tied as well as being tiny. We had his tongue clipped at just 6 days b/c the pediatrician was concerned that he needed to gain weight and was nicely invested in breastfeeding. He was badly enough tomgue tied that I had to supplament with bottles the first couple of days even thouh I had tons of milk .

For some time I wasn't sure it had been the right decision. It felt alot like I was doing it for my comfort and if I would just be more stowic my baby wouldn't have needed this. Then at a few months old he had his tiger-tiger toy and was exploring it by licking the satiny part. Suddenly I realized that he couldn't have done that if we hadn't had his tongue clipped. He wouldn't be able to lick a lollypop or an icecream cone. I had been told he would have speach problems too but hadn't really believed it at first.

Anyway, it was scary and made me feel guilty at first (exhaustion, general hard pregnancy anxiety and run of the mill hormones contributed) but I now see that it was the right thing to do.

[joannejoanne]

My 3 and 1/2 weeks old DS was tongue-tied at birth. We have had him clipped twice (the second time to give him more range of motion). He still cannot latch to my bare breast but will to a nipple shield. But we were all for the clipping from the start. When he was born and up until the first clip, we never saw his tongue outside of his mouth. He could not get it outside of his mouth! So, I definitely think it was the right thing to do. And every day now, we see him moving it around more and more.

Also, the doc who clipped his tongue looked at mine (as it is often a hereditary thing) and I am actually mildly tongue tied myself. I never had any problems BFing or speaking but when I stick my tongue out, my frenulum often gets caught between my front two bottom teeth and that hurts! My entire life, I had no idea that was not a normal thing until the last few weeks. Imagine!

-Joanne