What’s the Story of Tongue and Lip Ties?

This is not a new concept, it is recorded a common enough in the 1800’s midwife’s used to keep a fingernail long if a baby could not latch. It fell out of favor to be fixed as the formula movement came to be. Many Doctors were never even trained in this procedure or how to properly assess for tongue tie. This leads us to today. With the call to breastfeed for maternal and infant health and mortality, we are finding a lot more issues related to oral ties as more women choose to breastfeed.

Does my baby need it’s tongue or lip tie fixed and who do I trust?

We base this off of symptoms. Some mothers try special physical therapists who do myofascial releases or other therapies first to see if symptoms are improved, but the general recommendation for treatment depends on the severity of symptoms.

In Lactation, we are trained specifically to look at the symptoms more than the appearance. Some IBCLC’s have received special training to check tongue function and to properly be able to assess for improper tongue movement and function through a suck exam of baby’s mouth. If your provider does not believe your baby has a problem with tongue and lip tie, but you are having issues, always see an oral ties trained IBCLC. I have received this extra training and am a great resource to give you my opinion on what is causing your issues, and making sure nothing else could be the cause. I also know who has had proper training in this area and if a specialist is needed for diagnosis and possibly revision, these are who I would trust to go to for my own baby. Many specialists want you to have seen an IBCLC first and we can also send a referral to the specialist for you. A frenotomy/frenectomy/tongue/lip tie revision is a very simple procedure that only takes around a minute or less to perform. General Anesthesia is not needed (ENT likes to wait and put baby’s under, which is why we typically do not refer there). These specialists tend to be Dentists who use a laser for revision. Book a visit with us for evaluations and recommendations if you feel this could be your issue. Look at the list of symptoms. It is not a comprehensive list and you do not have to have all the symptoms.