Bad habits from tongue tie

[LuzXX]

My baby had a posterior tongue tie which wasn't diagnosed until 4w. It has had to be snipped twice due to reattaching after the first attempt. She is now 8w and I am really struggling with getting a comfortable latch because I can't get her out of the habit of a small gape (from tongue tie restricting mouth) and not tilting her head back. If anyone has got any suggestions I would really appreciate the help because I don't know how much longer I can carry on BF!

Same problem here. Snipped at 12 weeks. DD has started to open wide - I kept taking her off and waiting until her mouth opened wide.

Also with putting the head back - try other positions. Also in the cradle hold, try making sure that your baby's nose is in line with the nipple so she has to put her head back to get boob in (I kept putting her mouth in line with the nipple so she slurps it in).

Another thing to try is putting your finger above the areola and pulling slightly so your nipple is tilted up so when she goes on, the bottom lip hits the areola and top lip just hooks over the nipple. My boobs are a bit big so I have to put a rolled up muslin under to lift it as well as tilting the nipple up to get it in.

Finally go to a BF group and get them to watch you latch on because you both will have developed bad habits.

Thanks Iggly. Seems to have helped a bit. Did your DD feed with a chewing action as well, seems to be a problem on one side especially and as a result the latch gets shallower and shallower because still clicks occasionally.
I feel like I've spent weeks in BF groups but hopefully the tongue tie won't reattach again and we'll improve! Nice to hear someone else has the same problem :)

Hi LuzXX, you could try a (good) cranial osteopath. It's a pity that most TT dividers don't recommend this but (a) it helps the baby learn to use muscles in a way it hasn't before after the division and (b) the feeding difficulties (particularly if one-sided) may not be as a result of a TT but due to strains and compressions suffered prior to or during birth.

Not everyone's cup of tea, and you need to find a good one.

Yes she did chew a bit - left boob which she's now outright rejected!! she doesn't click so much now though which is good but still working on the latch.

Both my dc's latch improved considerably once they were a bit bigger, and could physically open their mouths wider. You may just find it improves with time.

Have you been shown an exaggerated latch? (also called flipple). If you have b/f support hopefully they will be able to show you - otherwise there is quite a good animation here. If you do a search for it you will come up with lots of posts on it! It took us a few feeds to get going with this, but it saved us in the end (TT wasn't diagnosed until three months).

Hope things improve soon.

another vote for a good cranial osteopath. Also biological nurturing position really helped me after tt snip at 20 weeks (so ds was very set in his ways)