Tongue tie division, ENT referral experiences …

[jadexxxx]

My first post as I am just at my wits end and so desperate for help and mumsnet has helped me so much over the last 6 weeks.

My DS is 6 weeks old wednesday. From 2 weeks of age he has been so unsettled and in so much pain with trapped wind and reflux. I realised myself when he was around 3 weeks (when breastfeeding started to become increasingly painful) that his tongue appeared heart shaped and spoke to HV. Seen at tongue tie clinic today and he has a posterior tongue tie, 5mm thick and midwife said she isn’t happy to snip due to thickness and needs to refer to ENT.

I can’t continue to put my baby through such pain which I feel I am causing through breastfeeding much longer :( has anyone else been in the same position where they have been referred to ENT? If so, how long did it take to be seen? And were ENT happy to snip tongue tie? Midwife made it sound like ENT generally don’t feel tongue tie causes any issues therefore very reluctant to do.

I am just at my wits end with how unsettled DS is and the pain from feeding.. I so very want to breastfeed but not sure how much longer I can go on. Also going to look into going private but midwives I have spoke to also reluctant to do if NHS midwife not happy due to thickness.
Any advice or info welcomed, thank you so much.

I went private as would have to wait too long on nhs to be seen and was warned they wouldn’t do posterior. We are 9 weeks now, feeding still not great, been a week since tie was cut so maybe early days. Baby not in pain/distressed just lots of work expressing and topping up 😞 I wasn’t told thickness so not sure about that. Have you tried breast compressions, fipple method? Good luck it’s rubbish when they don’t feed well, thought 3rd would be a breeze!

Tongue tie can also cause issues with bottle feeding.
Can you afford to go private? We paid £200 for feeding consultation and snip.

www.tongue-tie.org.uk

We had my son’s done yesterday at our local dental hospital by a max fax surgeon (I’m not sure why there and not by a midwife tbh), it took 3 weeks from the referral, we could t afford to go private

In the meantime I was using a shield which helped both him and me during feeds- could you ask your local bf clinic for some support and if a shield would be appropriate whilst you wait for the ENT referral?

I hope things get better for you x

We went private at 7 days old.
Our baby was referred to the nhs tongue tie clinic on the day he was born by the hospital and now at 10 weeks old we have yet to hear back from that appointment!! Luckily, we were in the position to be able to afford and travel to a private tongue tie/ lactation consultant. It cost £200 and was worth its weight in gold. I went from crying in pain at every feed with blistered, cracked nipples, to being pain-free by the following day and being fully healed and feeding well a week later!
The procedure itself was very quick. Baby cried briefly, but soon settled when he went on the boob afterwards.

If we had had to wait for our nhs appointment, I'm 1000% certain I would have had to have stopped breastfeeding, purely due to the pain!!!