Tongue tied!?

Because I am still having problems getting Benjamin to comfortably nurse, I made an appointment with the hospital's lactation specialist RN today. It was weird (and nice) being back at the hospital for something not scary.

The lactation specialist was great, and she spent more than an hour and a half working with Benjamin and me. The conclusion we came to is that between my anatomy and his desire to tuck his lower lip in, instead of out in a pout (which is how it should be), together we only have a few millimeters of room for error for non-painful nursing. Benjamin also tends to almost immediately slip off of a "good latch", which means that even when find that perfect milk-providing-non-painful spot, it usually doesn't last longer than a minute (at best). (She even said she was impressed I had stuck with breast feeding given all the issues we have!) Now, of course, I CAN continue to use the nipple shield that they gave me when Benjamin was born, but it is quite annoying to have to have that on hand when ever it's feeding time.

The big ah-ha moment we of the afternoon, however, is that the lactation specialist thinks Benjamin may have a slight tongue-tie (the evidence of which is in the squared shape of his tongue and his inability to keep latched on correctly). In its worst forms, tongue tied-ness can give someone speech problems and keep them from doing things like licking a lollipop. The lactation specialist doesn't think it's enough of a tongue tie to give him problems enunciating later in life, but it could easily be keeping him from staying latched on correctly. Apparently the surgery to correct lasts only a few seconds, and often immediately afterwards the baby is able to nurse again.

The lactation specialist suggested I speak to my pediatrician about it (we have an appointment with the pediatrician in about a week and a half), and see what he says. She also said that often pediatricians only focus on the child, and since Benjamin is gaining weight okay, he may not think surgery is necessary; however, if the tongue tie is making nursing too uncomfortable/ineffective, we wouldn't necessarily need the doctor's referral to get the surgery done.

.....So..... that's a lot for me to take in and think about. In the meantime she had some suggestions for making nursing more efficient and better and I have an appointment with her next Tuesday to see how he's gaining weight and how her suggestions are working.

In other news, last night Benjamin was as angelic as he was demonic the previous night, giving me plenty of sleep. Clay's been looking up fussiness, and read that it can have to do with food allergies. The most common of which are milk and cruciferous veggie (like broccoli and cabbage). So next week I'm going to try no dairy or cruciferous veggies and see if it helps get rid of the evening screaming fits that Benjamin seems to enjoy having every night starting around 7 or 8. (Although I've read, and the lactation specialist confirmed today, that evening fussiness is very normal.)


Also, I've lost another two and a half pounds in the week and two days since I weighed myself!