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Tongue-tie DOES affect breastfeeding!!!

 

Common symptoms that may indicate your baby is tongue-tied (ankyloglossia)*:

 

*Read this article from the American Academy of Pediatrics for full details!

 

 Mother's Symptoms:

·  nipple pain and/or erosions

·  painful breasts

·  low milk supply

·  plugged ducts

·  mastitis

· Feeding take a LONG time (typically an hour or more) and baby is hungry very soon afterwards

frustration, disappointment, and discouragement with breastfeeding

·  untimely weaning

 

 

Infant Symptoms:

·  poor latch and suck

·  clicking sound while nursing (poor suction)

·  ineffective milk transfer

Slow, choking, dribbling when bottle fed

·  inadequate weight gain or weight loss

·  irritability or colic

·  fussiness and frequent arching away from the breast

·  fatigue within one to two minutes of beginning to nurse

·  difficulty establishing suction to maintain a deep grasp on the breast

·  gradual sliding off the breast

·  “chewing” of the nipple

·  falling asleep at the breast havingtaken less than an optimal feed, as proven by “test weight” on a digital scale

 

There are several degrees of tongue-tie.  Some are very obvious.  The frenum is so short and attached to the front of the baby's tongue, so the baby is unable to stick his/her tongue past her lower lip.  However, many tongue-ties are farther back along the tongue, so forward motion of the tongue is possible, but the lifting of the middle of the tongue baby needs to do to effectively breastfeed is not possible. Just because the baby can push his/her tongue forward is not necessarily evidence that the baby is not tongue-tied!!!

 

If you and baby have at least one of these symptoms, and those symptoms are not GONE by the time baby is 1 week old - it is time to see a doctor experienced in the frenotomy procedure in infants - AND also knowledgable about how tongue-tie can adversely affect breastfeeding.

 

Mothers who suspect tongue-tie in their infant are OFTEN told by baby's doctor that "we don't do that anymore" (frenotomy.)  This is simply not true!  Your baby's doctor may not do frenotomy, but many ENTs DO.  In fact, there is a very recent study on how the frenotomy (sometimes called "frenulotomy") procedure greatly BENEFITS the breastfeeding baby AND MOTHER.