Upper Lip Tie?

[itsnowmyturn]

I went to the place but it turned out to be a baby play group but I spoke to.the bf person there in a private room and she observed a feed n she basically said the same thing, not much I can change other than getting her to open her mouth wider and then the health visitor observed the next feed when I went to get her weighed and she said normally they don't tell ppl to hold the babies head while they are feeding (the back of the head to stop them moving) but she said sophie seems to move her head back and pull off them suck my nipple back in so hold her head to try and stop her doing that. Everyone keeps saying if she does xyz unlatch her and get her to relatch but then she's guna get fussy and take in more air and get more gassy.
I do think sophie will always have feeding issues but ones that we can learn to llive with even if it hurts to feed. I certainly won't switch to formula, she is 2 n half months now so will be weaning onto some solids in another 3 to 4 months so almost half way there and then we have more options.
The hv said to go bk to drs and ask to see someone else regarding gi issues so il call tomorrow and get an appointment. She is only just holding herself above the 2nd centile, if she puts on at the same rate the next time I get her weighed she will probably have dropped below it n then there will be ppl saying I should probably express again but as I said last time I don't want to do that and mask any issues there might be.
U made me laugh with the start of ur post, yeah iv had the comments t she's a baby lol.

 

[_Meep_]

Omg, you have a baby too???? That's so WEIRD! I had no idea I had one until everyone started telling me. I was so shocked to find that out!

If you can hold her head without upsetting her, I guess that might help! Worth a try. It could be her lip that causes her to do that ... if you pull your top lip in so it's over your teeth and try to open your mouth wide, it's far more uncomfortable than if you open your mouth with your lip free (I spend a lot of my time trying to work shit out by doing dumb experiments like this).

Yeah I never did well with 'unlatch and try again' - it was hell enough trying to get my nursing strike baby to latch at all, without making her do it over and over! So I just settled for whatever latch we achieved and hoped my heavy let-down and a bit of breast compression would carry us through. Which it usually did.

Starting solids really helped me to relax. I hope it does for you too. It is so nice to have that to fall back on. Things have felt much less stressful since we started weaning. She seems to like everything so far, which is a relief, but I've been too scared to do BLW as I'm still nervous about her tongue, and scared she might choke. She is on Stage 2 Ella's Kitchen pouches now.

Totally know what you mean about masking issues. I was told to express too as N initially gained enormous amounts, and then gradually she didn't. I believe this was purely due to my aggressive flow and oversupply, plus I'm not sure she realised to begin with that she could refuse - I used to just pop her on the boob every time she cried, so I think I hugely overfed her!

Then my supply calmed down and she started her nursing strikes, getting by on dreamfeeds, and she dropped nearly three centiles. She was born at the 91st and last time she was weighed she was just about following the 50th. She now eats totally normally, but hasn't gone back up to the 91st centile ... so I believe what a paediatrician we saw told us (she wasn't concerned at all) - that N was very well-nourished by her placenta and came out big, but won't be big throughout her life. She's found her own centile.

To look at, she is a beautiful baby. She is long, with just the right amount of coverage, lol, and she's very muscular and ridiculously active. She also has a big head (91st and has stayed there), so I think that contributed to her birthweight.

What centile was Sophie born at? Is she dropping centiles or just following one which is lower than average? How does she look - is she skinny and small or long and lean? Is she a lie-there-and-look baby or one who wants to be involved and won't keep still? There are so many factors the stupid, generalised charts don't take into account and sometimes HVs seem to lose sight of this, looking at the scales instead of the baby ...

 

[itsnowmyturn]

She was actually born around the 50th by her due date she was down to the 9th n now just holding a teeny bit above the 2nd. Height wise she's on the 9th which is odd because all my family is tall, I'm the shortest at 5 foot 10. If she is properly awake she will have a kick about and her little legs go for it but very often she just looks at me and looks around with the odd movement.
The health visitor I have does sometimes make me feel odd, like today she was on about the tt n said she worries about what affect it might have on our breastfeeding relationship due to dreading feeds, I just said I don't exactly dread feeds I just don't exactly enjoy them, I won't ever stop to replace with formula, I do love breastfeeding but I don't enjoy the individual feeds. Sophie was really upset when I git her undressed to be weighed, she always cries when I dress or undress her or change her nappy but she got really really upset n wouldn't settle until I gave her a feed even though she wasn't due one n the hv wrote in the red book that sophie was very distressed, if someone reads that then after she put observed feed, it looks like she was distressed because i was starving he her or something.
She's getting extra fussy recently n really restless, she's not sleeping particularly well except between last evening feed and night feed, poor thing.

 

[_Meep_]

Her weight might be perfectly normal. Who knows? That might just be what is right for her, if she continues to follow that curve.

Your HV sounds a bit of a prat to be honest ... I mean, what baby in the world enjoys being undressed or changed?! 'Very distressed' - what a joke!

As for dreading feeds, I don't see how anyone could expect any mother experiencing breastfeeding issues not to feel any anxiety or trepidation at feeding time. Most people give up breastfeeding altogether because it's so horrible to run into difficulty. I never enjoyed breastfeeding up until very recently and always dreaded feeding times.

 

[itsnowmyturn]

To be honest I'm perfectly comfortable with her weight gain I just keep going to make sure it stays consistent with the problems were having so if she does tail off or lose I can remedy it quickly. If I don't take into account that she took 3 weeks to get up to birth weight she has gained on average 4 n half oz a week, if I take that 3 weeks into account it must be about 6 or 7 oz a week on average which for a breastfed, tongue tied refluxing baby that's really good. My oh is really thin even though he eats rubbish and I was the same up till I was 16 so she may just be like us tw. To me she looks right for her body, she doesn't look too thin, canno bones overly protruding or anything but u can comfortably feel her spine and ribs without pressing hard so to me that's a healthy baby.
I get really annoyed with friends who think they are gods gift to motherhood, I was talking to an old neighbour who's also a friend and was saying I was concerned regarding the possible GI issues and she was like just sounds like trapped wind to me I think ur looking into it too much, then I said about mucus in poo n she was like u look that closely n I just said u don't really need to look that closely to see it. It just annoyed me, even if it is trapped wind I no there's something internally upsetting her and that's bad enough.

 

[_Meep_]

Yeah she sounds perfectly healthy! And you are right, that IS good weight gain, so I hope the HV is taking all that into consideration and not trying to freak you out.

Ugh, other people are so annoying at times - if they've never run into difficulties themselves, it's like they can't comprehend how anyone else might have problems! I also got comments about our problems being down to trapped wind, quite recently actually ... I just sat there smiling and nodding benignly, but my brain was like 'Er no, you fucking moron ...'

Nobody knows your baby better than you do.

Happy Mother's Day to you! Hope things are improving ...

 

[itsnowmyturn]

Happy mothers day to u too
I think in future I'm going to be keeping my concerns between myself n health professionals because like u say other people just don't understand. I'm making sophie a Dr's appointment n I'm just going to list her symptoms Rather than say I think she might have this and then they won't latch onto what iv suggested n only look at that, it might be something I'm missing n something completely normal that would mean mo elimination diet etc for me so obviously better.

Got her second tt appointment tomorrow afternoon, hopefully they'll tell me it's all separated n that will be one issue dealt with

 

[_Meep_]

How did the appointment go? Have you been to the doctor yet?

 

[itsnowmyturn]

The appointment was all fine, basically it'd all separated and she's just stuck in bad habits now and basically iv got to get used to how she feeds which I pretty much expected. I took her to the drs n all I got was keep an eye on things and not enough symptoms/evidence to recommend an elimination diet, I knew as soon as I mentioned possible food allergy they wud cling onto that and just look at that, I mostly took her about the congestion but she said as sophie has a petite face that she probably just has small nasal passages.
She seems such an unhappy baby just lately, screaming so much and seems so distressed and upset.
I took her for cranial osteopathy today just to see if that would help, the osteopath said she was tight all down the left side of her spine and neck, she spent half an hour working on her and then did a little on her head, got another appointment next week but that will be the last one I take her to. They said babies can get a post treatment reaction where they get worse before they get better or they can get a burst of energy or become sleepy. Sophie seems to have done a mixture of the 3, she had a good couple of hours nap with no waking at all a few hours after, then when she screams she really goes for it, and right now she's laid having a good kick around. Really hoping to see an improvement by Monday or il have to take her back to the drs n ask for something for trapped wind on prescription cos I can't leave her in such discomfort.
At least the tongue tie part is dealt with

 

[_Meep_]

You could try an elimination diet anyway, to see if it helps. I did recently - I eliminated all dairy and soya and, although not a lot changed, I did notice that her nose was less snotty after a couple of weeks. I've come off the diet now though as she was still refluxy, though as she's growing, it really is definitely getting better.

N also had cranial osteopathy, which she found very relaxing. It helped her snap out of one of her nursing strikes that she was having at the time, but that was all. I think it's a really good thing that all babies should try though - the forces and pressures exerted on them during birth are enormous.

For trapped wind, you could try something like Infacol? It's quite good.

 

[itsnowmyturn]

Infacol did nothing for her n gripe water only works for a day or so.
I'm taking her to be weighed again Tuesday n will see if I can chat to the health visitor about how unhappy she seems lately, she'll have the odd happy smiley time but most of the time unless she's being comforted in some way she's upset