I don't see only tongue ties, but I do see quite a few every month.
Posterior tongue ties are not clipped in my area. I see it, feel it,
note the tongue's range of motion, explain to the mother how babies
all come with different mouths, and work to find a way to compensate
that protects mother and milk supply.  I often see babies who start
having a drop in weight gain at about 2 months because of poor milk
transfer, mom spacing feedings with a pacifier because baby wants to
nurse nonstop to get enough.  I have seen more than one tongue tie to
the tip, quite a few actually. These babies were sent home with their
tongues literally tethered to the bottom of their mouths and they
could not latch!  Bottle feeding was not even easy for them.  I have
seen the tongue so restricted and the nipple damage so severe that mom
could not put baby to breast for weeks.

Those who say they have seen thousands of babies and never a problem
with tongue tie, did you follow these mothers for months?  What was
the duration of breastfeeding? I do see moms past one week, and they
did not suffer too much in the first few days at the hospital if their
baby came early and had a week suck in the first place.  Was there no
nipple pain at all?  None?  And, if so, can you maybe share why you
think the mothers where you are from do not have nipple damage, pain
and wean and the moms where I am from have text book damage.If we
could understand what is being done differently with babies who have
tongue tie, moms have no pain, and duration is not affected, weight
gain is not affected, etc. then we could help other mothers get there
too. I only occasionally see the baby with tongue tie who breastfeeds
well, but then again, if I am seeing a mom chances are good things are
not going well.

Tongue ties interest me.  Another post commented that we survived as a
human race, etc. and well, not to be too unkind, but natural selection
likely weeded out those babies who could not feed, not to mention the
mothers who could not conceive.  Since we no longer want to leave
nature to its own devices, we do feed our babies even if they have
anomalies that make breastfeeding difficult, and they do not get
weeded out. And, we help our mommas have babies now too. So, we can't
use 'nature has it' as our only reason why tongue tie should not
effect breastfeeding. I am not saying that babies should be able to
feed effectively with a restricted tongue and moms should feel no
pain, I am just saying I don't see that here and I am wondering what
is happening that is different and can we do something to get our moms
and babies to that place where tongue tie is a non issue for feeding?

Enjoying this thread...
Pam MazzellaDiBosco, IBCLC, RLC
Florida

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