For your baby’s jaw and airway, and the full body, to develop adequately for health, breastfeeding is essential. Let’s take a look at a few things for those moms who really wish to breastfeed, but are having difficulty. Breastfeeding should not be painful. It should be a comfortable experience for both mom and the baby. Mom feeling pain and discomfort, the baby getting tired easily after one feeding, or just obvious difficulty for both mom and baby are all indicators that the below should be checked immediately.
Some possibilities
lip ties, tongue ties, cheek ties
was given milk based formula before breastmilk
holding the baby incorrectly
Solutions for each problem
have a lactation specialist, a board certified one for a comprehensive evaluation, check the baby
baby may need releasing of the ties to free the tongue, lips, cheeks to latch on mommy’s breast fully
releases must accompany stretching exercises before and after for an adequate amount of time. mom would work with a myofunctional therapist if the lactation specialist is not able to adequately guide
sometimes, an airway-centered dentist may be able to perform a more thorough evaluation and diagnose ties which may have been missed. if release is done and baby still does not feed, you can consult the airway-centered dentist
make the effort and keep trying until the baby slowly gets used to mom’s breastmilk again.
if released ties and unable to breastfeed due to baby not taking the feeding
keep doing stretch exercises to prevent tie re-attachment. breastfeeding is one of the best exercises for post-release
get a second evaluation by lactation specialist and/or airway-centered dentist
lactation specialist will guide on how to hold the baby for feeding to be more effective
If you are all grown-up, and you know this was your infancy, then talk to our airway dentist for options on redeveloping the jaw and airway naturally without surgery or pain, with our orthodontic methods.
