Le Leche

Little Benji Boy was born with a tongue-tie, a small flap of skin that connects his tongue to the bottom of his mouth. I would have posted a picture of what a tongue-tie actually look like, but this picture of him is so much more elegant. When he sticks his tongue out, the flap of skin keeps the center part down, creating the heart shape you can see. To see a picture of what it looks like, you can google it.

Some people who are tongue-tied grow up and never have problems with it, but others can have eating and speaking problems that manifest themselves later on in life. Being tongue-tied can also cause problems for breast feeding. Because the tongue is restricted by the flap of skin, the baby can't extend it and can't suck properly, thus resulting in frustration for the baby and pain for the mother.

While still in the hospital, I was told that normally they just clip the skin before the mother and baby leave the hospital, but because of recent legal issues, the policy had changed and my hospital no longer did it. So I started using a breast pump and feeding Benjamin bottles. It was a lot of work and a lot of bottle washing, but I figured a pump was cheaper than formula and better for my baby, so I was willing to do it. I had heard that the act of breast feeding releases hormones that help create the nurturing bond between mother and infant. But I was pumping, so does that mean my breast pump and I had a special bond? I admit, I never had any tender embraces or loving gazes toward the pump. It looked like a miniature factory, not a plump, adorable little newborn.

I tried nursing occasionally, and even vowed once to never use a bottle again. It was breast feeding or bust, pun intended. It was a two day experiment that resulted in lots of crying, screaming, and thrashing about of limbs, and Benjamin wasn't a big fan of it either. I think I single-handedly raised the Google search count of MY BABY IS GOING TO TAKE A CHUNK OUR OF MY NIP to several thousand.

So back to pumping it was. There were benefits of pumping. Other family members got the opportunity to feed the baby, and they love feeding him. I must have over done things too, because I was soon pumping way more than my baby would eat, and storing it in the freezer. My sister started calling the frozen bags of milk "breasticles" and singing "99 Bottles of Breastmilk in the Freezer" whenever she opened the freezer door.

I talked to Benjamin's pediatrician about his tongue tie and she referred me to Primary Children's, where they set up an appointment to clip it. I decided to have it clipped, not only so he could breast feed, but also because if it was going to cause problems in speech and eating later on in life, I would prefer to have it done now.

So two weeks ago, we took a trip to Primary Children's and Benjamin had a quick little surgery. He was so tiny that when they put him in his hospital outfit, he only had to wear the top, which drowned him like a child's night gown. The procedure was less than ten minutes and he was put under with anesthesia for it. I went back to see him afterward, and he was a tiny little body on a huge hospital bed. It broke my heart for a minute. He wasn't crying and there had been no bleeding and the nurse reassured me he had done very well. When I tried to nurse him, he screamed bloody murder and I was saddened when I ended up giving him a bottle. "Does breast feeding hurt him?" I asked the nurse.

"No," she said. "Babies cry right after because we've messed with their feeding system, and they're angry that they'll have to get used to something new."

Since then, it has become a lot easier for the both of us. There are still a few kinks, but we are working on them. Benjamin has to wean himself off bottles, and I have to wean myself off the breast pump. Too bad too, because we had created such a beautiful bond between the two of us.