Jaye and Robin,
  I believe I have had about a dozen babies with tongue-tie in the past 
several months. I have five right now!!! Two just clipped (one needs 
reclipping), two scheduled for early next week and one was given a 
nipple shield by another LC (see below).

  I have a theory as to why this is happening, but haven't fully pulled 
it together yet.

  In the meantime, I do not use a nipple shield--I arrange for the 
babies to have the tt clipped. I actually think the shield is a 
dangerous introducton b/c it often delays the clipping while the baby 
continues to compensate and overdevelop/underdevelop musculature. The 
other thing I have noticed is that babies will actually develop a 
greater oral aversion after clipping if the clipping is not done 
completely. When the tongue was anchored at the anterior, the baby 
could not manage the flow, but also could not push anything out of his 
mouth--once the anterior is clipped, he has control of the front, but 
not the back of his tongue. He still often cannot manage the 
suck/swallow/breathe pattern and still often feels like he is drowning 
and has to compensate, but now he can defend with the front of his 
tongue. I have a baby doing this right now and am trying to get the mom 
to see someone for a more thorough eval and further clipping.

  I actually have stopped referring babies to the ENT I used to use, b/c 
he refuses to clip posterior tt and those babies actually will do worse 
after he sees them. I think we all need to become advocates in our 
communities for peds to become educated and trained in clipping. I am 
so grateful we have a wonderful ped available here.

  Jaye, I also refer every single baby with a tt for CST after 
clipping--helps to quickly release overdeveloped muscles, wake up 
underdeveloped muscles and release patterning.

 Jennifer Tow, IBCLC, CT, USA
 Intuitive Parenting Network LLC
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