"Poor tongue tie service"

We presented to A&E with our little boy who was two weeks old... We were referred by our midwife who was concerned he had lost more than the 10% maximum weight loss expected for breastfed newborns, she suspected he had tongue tie and wanted a feeding plan put into place by a paediatrician.

The paediatrician we saw wouldn’t even entertain helping us with the tongue tie / breastfeeding issues and instead we felt bullied into agreeing to give him top ups with formula before we were allowed to leave, despite all of his blood tests and observations being absolutely fine.

We asked if one of the nursery nurses or midwives could come down from the postnatal ward to assist us with breastfeeding but were told no.

Instead of topping him up with formula, we decided to address the root cause of his weight issues and paid privately to see an expert about his tongue tie.

She diagnosed him with a 50% posterior tongue tie and snipped it there and then in the comfort of our own home. Since having it done he is feeding much better and has gained plenty of weight.

I wouldn’t normally have written this, but we had completely the same situation when my eldest son was born two years ago. On that occasion we did listen to the advice to top up with formula, he ended up getting nipple confusion and would not take back to the breast, sadly resulting in the end of breastfeeding for us.

Given that the NHS is supposed to encourage and support Mums to breastfeed, we felt the complete opposite when leaving Lister once again - How disappointing.