Ten Weeks Later and Breastfeeding is Finally Comfortable

We’ve been fighting a rather severe tongue tie for ten weeks now. I didn’t even know he had a tongue tie until he was almost three weeks old because LittleBrother didn’t cry all that much prior to that point. (Don’t hate me. He cries now. Trust me.) I had just been thinking that I wasn’t latching him properly. Well, that was partly true but further compounded by the fact that he simply couldn’t latch. His tongue (lingual) frenulum went all the way to the tippy-tip of his tongue.

For awhile, I worked with the lactation consultant to fix what we were just assuming was a latch issue. Finally, she looked in his mouth and talked about a tongue tie. I had been suspicious about it but I’m not trained in these kinds of issues. However, after doing some research on the internet, I found that many doctors nowadays don’t want to fix it at the infant stage and prefer to wait and see if it creates a speech issue. I ended up freaking myself out and waiting until LittleBrother’s two month appointment to bring it up with our pediatrician.

He started off the conversation with everything I had read on the internet. “If he is gaining weight, we normally don’t do anything.” “It might not help your latch at all. It’s probably just something you’re doing wrong.” “We’ll probably just wait and see.” I let these things go because I had expected them. Then the pediatrician looked in his mouth. That changed everything. We were referred to Children’s Hospital because he didn’t want anyone in our small city to take care of it.

We went yesterday. For what we assumed was our initial consult appointment.

After he was seen by the resident and it was determined that, yes, it needed clipped, the surgery date was set for a week and a half later. Because he was older, it was going to be an actual surgery process complete with no eating after midnight, anesthesia and other scary things. We then sat and waited for the attending doctor while I hit various levels of panic mode.

After he was examined by the attending, we were given an option. While he was ten weeks old and his tongue did need clipped, his frenulum was still rather thin and, as such, the attending felt he could do it in the office, right then, with no anesthesia. FireDad and I discussed the option, asked questions about pain, immediate breastfeeding and bleeding and determined that this was the way to go. A little pain beat out the idea of starving our kid all night and making a two hour drive through rush hour traffic and the scary dangers of anesthesia.

It was over faster than I could grasp. I got a little woozy as he was all bundled up like a burrito and crying when they clamped down his tongue. But as soon as the clip was complete, the nurse handed me LittleBrother and he latched on to our trouble side. And, oh, I finally felt what a good, deep latch feels like! He nursed like a champ and was full of smiles afterwards.

He was a smidgen more fussy yesterday than normal. But the breastfeeding? Was awesome. He ate and ate and ate. He didn’t have issues getting latched or, as had been our biggest problem, staying latched. I got lots of milky smiles. I needed those smiles because I was feeling guilty that I hadn’t gone with my gut and taken him to the doctor at three weeks instead of ten. But it’s over, done with and now my kid will be able to stick out his tongue and lick an ice cream cone. (That said, he actually hasn’t stuck his tongue out of his mouth yet but he’s spent ten weeks not being able to do so. We figure it will take a few days to realize, “Oh! Fun!”)

In short, I have some advice: If you think your child has a tongue tie issue, however minor, go and have it checked out and dealt with as early as possible. We were lucky to avoid the need for anesthesia. Go with your gut feeling!