slow weight gain, infatfini, breastfeeding issues

[iwanttobeadragonthisyear]

don't really know where to start dd has had slow weight gain from birth,I seemed to have milk, but tried everything to make more, fenugreek, fennel, domperidone etc

dd dropped 6 centiles from 50 to 0.4, she was 10.3 at 14 weeks.

been on infatfini for 5days weight is now 10.12

so question is, is my milk the problem? I've had lots of people saying feeding looks fine but no specialists (nhs wouldn't refer me to lactation consultent) peads & dietitian say she looks good healthy, just tiny.
do I put her on formula full time now? or if I continue breastfeeding how do I increase my supply? I have an sns to feed from on order (due tomorrow), fenugreek, domperidone, fennel and a good double pump, anything else that can help? or just giving up, so I can enjoy my baby a bit?

sorry for lack of caps/decent grammar/paragraphs, on phone

Thanks

infatrini* mis spelt once & my phone decides to spell it that way lol

Has her tongue been checked? We had similar with DS1 & no-one could tell us exactly why. DS2 came along & I was a lot more knowledgeable about tongue-tie so insisted on getting it checked. Once it was cut his weight gain picked up again & we're still bf-ing now at 10.5 months!

I'm 99.9% sure DS1 also has a tongue-tie that was never diagnosed. It doesn't seem to be causing any issues now but I'm sure it's to blame for his lack of weight gain. We did manage to get to 8 months mix-feeding before he wasn't interested but it was a lot of hassle.

I'm not sure if you'd have much luck getting anyone to cut it if your DD did have a tie, given her age, but at least knowing about it might put your mind at rest that there's nothing wrong with your supply! There are a couple of fancy specialists who'll divide ties with laser for any age but they cost quite a lot!

I'm all for bf-ing where possible but if it becomes so much of an issue that it's detrimental to your relationship with your baby then formula isn't the worst thing in the world! There's always the option of mix-feeding or just allowing her to comfort-suckle even if she's not getting much sustenance from it.

I agree with Agnu and what she says about your options. Seems the cause of your dd's slow gain is intake. You have prob been round the block a few times with more frequent feeding day and night which is the basic first step for this. You also need to do switch nursing and breast compression but by 14 weeks I bet you have done these. Hope you reach a decision you are happy with. It's a difficult situation.

Please, please have your LO checked for a tongue tie. Classic sign of a tongue tied baby is a problem with weight gain despite regular/constant feeding. You need to see a lactation consultant who will look into the mouth and assess the tongue action and movement and see if there is a tie. You can not always see by looking at how a baby is latched on from the outside whether or not there is a tongue tie!

Who will not refer you to see a lactation consultant? If it's your GP then you can get a referral via your Health Visitor. In the meantime please look at the following leaflet by Dr Mervyn Griffiths at Southampton Children's Hospital who is, in my opinion, the guru on this topic! We ended up travelling a long way to be seen at his clinic to get a second tie cut when no one else took me seriously. We've had major improvement since.

www.uhs.nhs.uk/Media/Controlleddocuments/Patientinformation/Childhealth/TongueTieMrGriffithsthoughtson-patientinformation.pdf

hi, yes, I have done compressions, switch feeding etc, nurse looked for a tounge tie and said no, but yes dd ticks all the boxes for a tounge/lip tie. but not the obvious ones lol, she can stick out her tounge but I've read this doesn't mean much.

thank you for support, ill ring for a breastfeeding counselor again, but no one seems to have answers. I'd be willing to go private to check & snip a tie, but I havent a clue where to start, Google just confused me (im in a village near reading, if anyone knows a place near that will check properly)

thank you... sorry for the self pitying post lol, just confused. again. I don't know how breastfeeding became so important to me, always said it didn't matter If it didn't work

I too said it wouldn't matter to me whether I breast or bottle fed but when my DS' problems became apparent I was absolutely determined to get them sorted.

If you look at the following link there are some details of lactation consultants (who you need to see in order to assess the mouth and tongue and who snip ties) in Berkshire:

www.lcgb.org/consultants_local_south_east_england.html#B

Two of them work privately. Could you try them?

You are not a million miles from me - my DS had a hidden posterior tie that was not spotted by the first lactation consultant we saw and I found out about Dr Mervyn Griffiths in Southampton. Even though it was a good distance away I went to my GP and begged for him to make a referral to Southampton, which he did and there we got the second tie clipped. They told me in Southampton that either GP or Health Visitor could make the referral - is your HV supportive? In Southampton they are very passionate about tongue tie and helping babies with ties to breastfeed. You could get in touch with Dr Griffiths here:

www.uhs.nhs.uk/OurServices/Childhealth/Tonguetie/Tonguetie.aspx

Finally this is an excellent service staffed by lactation consultants. You could ring for more advice and support:

milkmatters.org.uk

Good luck

got a breastfeeding hv (whatever that's called) coming friday, we spoke for a while, and she said she will check for a posterior tie and lip tie for me, really had to argue my point though, she said she will refer me to Southampton if she spots anything, so thats a major plus. rang a lactation consultant from nearby (from the link.. thank you) who said to ring my hv first to see if I can get NHS to check, just cause it will mean a referral ASAP, with private I would have to go to a gp after and ask for a referral

anyone know how to make SNS less fiddly!? lol, really want to keep her nursing as much as possible, cause of its just a tie then maybe there is still hope for breastfeeding, rather than mixed (probably dreaming here I know)

thank you all

Stupid question! Does Upper lip tie generally mean there will be a tongue tie? Do these things come more often than not as a pair? Just reading and they seem to be talked about together a lot, so just wondering.
If this Is anything to go by, DD has a class three lip tie. Was looking at ways to figure out if she had a lounge tie and ended up confused again lol

From what I've read, it's uncommon not to have a TT if there's a ULT. Certainly both my boys have both.

Don't give up if the hv says they can't see a tie. I first saw an 'infant feeding specialist' at the hospital who smirked at me & said there was no tie, ULTs don't cause feeding problems & it was just a positioning problem. She was wrong on all three counts, as confirmed by the IBCLC she shared an office with who I demanded a second opinion from! Don't even get me started on the GP I saw. She just went on & on about how difficult it had been for her & said she knew nothing about TT... This was at his 6 week check & she'd been asking questions about how feeding had been going! How is she remotely qualified to assess feeding if she's clueless about basic problems like TT?!

Even if the first person who looks can't see it DS2 had a sneaky posterior tie you can get a second opinion. You have options!

Sometimes, what is forgotten in these discussions on mumsnet, is that there is a range of opinion about tongue tie and its diagnosis, and its various forms.

One HCP not recognising a TT of some form is not necessarily being ignorant or disgracefully incompetent or negligent. Same applies if another HCP maintaining that a particular anomaly is not the cause of difficulties.

These differences of opinion reflect the lack of research in this area, and the fact that there are no really consistent standards in diagnosis and in treatment. Of course there should be, and without them, mothers and babies lose out.

Sometimes, mothers become convinced their baby has a tongue tie and they get it treated...and their problems still persist. Now, maybe the baby did not have a tongue tie. Or maybe the baby had a tongue tie but it wasn't actually affecting the feeding.

We are far from out of the woods regarding tongue tie. It is possible for well-intentioned and informed HCPs to have a disagreement, and for some equally-well-intentioned HCPs just not to have been trained in diagnosing.

In a few years, things might have improved....hope so.

In the meantime, it's today's mothers and babies who are suffering. But when one HCP says 'your baby has no tie' and another HCP disagrees, it doesn't always mean the one who said 'no tie' was wrong.

I just want to know my chances of fixing things, getting things back to exclusive breastfeeds, pinning my hopes on something like a tie that is fixable.

Baby has most of the symptoms, but its taken me so long to get anywhere with anyone, that it could be too late to BF only.

ULT seems quite obvious, but reading today seems to show that alot of the HCPs dont think they make much difference so to get it checked and a (maybe) TT found, i dont know how likely it will be.

Hate trying to explain myself to my HV cause her answer is always that i am just not feeding her enough i have tried everything, any none of her info made any difference! MN, Kellymom, Dr jack newman, are all amazing though! Thank you

The other problem with tongue tie is that some ties can be completely hidden and it can be pot luck finding them! When I was in Southampton recently having my DS' second tie snipped I asked a lot of questions. It's going to be very difficult, perhaps nearly impossible to get proper research done as who is going to want to be the parent who doesn't have their child's tongue tie snipped for the sake of research?

Anyway - best of luck with your appointments and please do persist until you are satisfied. My DS also has upper lip tie - from my own research it would seem that where there is a lip tie then there is a tongue tie, often posterior, in a vast number of cases. With regard to feeding I persevered even though I was in agony and it has become way more successful since the second snip, but will never be textbook. I hope you get some answers soon.

she didn't turn up. I have no idea how to deal with anything, off to curl up in bed early with dd instead of trying to work out anything else at this time on a Friday.