No More appointments, for now

Yesterday was the last appointment for the month. Kateri was greatly relieved. With pediatrician appointments for Malachi, neurology and naturopath for me, and hearing aid fittings for Kateri it has been a busy couple weeks. For several of my appointments she has been my second pair of arms, keeping baby happy in the car or bouncing him while I fill out paper work. She's been indispensable and every outing I am more aware how 5 is so much easier than one, two, three, or four were. I even said to Shane the other night #6 does not sound overwhelming right now. Which I don't think I have ever said/felt at the 10 week stage before. But he is a pretty good baby. And Shane has been on paternity leave for a couple weeks. Shane saw right through me and said,

"You just want to see the midwives again, don't you?"

I do. And maybe I'll get to see them soon. But not for that reason.

When Malachi was born the he had a slight tongue-tie and said we'd keep an eye on it. I had never heard of such a thing before. But have since heard of two babies needing the little flap under their tongue needing clipping so I guess it is all the rage and Malachi is just being hip. My mom said both her brothers had a tongue tie.

Well, after a week of nursing, it seemed his was causing a bad latch on one side and they went ahead and clipped it. The soreness got better. But as the nursing continued I noticed some different habits he had whenever nursing on that same side. Like him acting like he needed me to hold it for him. Or else he'd lose his latch and start searching loudly and frantically. Then he'd get a letdown going and pop off because he couldn't keep up, sending milk everywhere. which makes for some very non-discreet nursing. His ear on that side is always stinky. He nurses normally on the other side so it seemed like something was up, not that he was still just getting the hang of it. So to the myriad appointments we've already had this month, I added a visit to the lactation consultant.

She looked Malachi over and said it still seemed to be tight. She ran her finger under his tongue and explained the frenulum should feel like  a little speed bump, your finger just goes right over it. His feels more like a trip wire. She said it could be clipped again but suggested some craniosacral therapy to get him to adjust to nursing normally on that side and we'd give it a week. At least that is what I think she said. The night before I got about 5 hours of cobbled together sleep which didn't even start until after 2am. I realize now I don't want to wait a week. With Christmas next week it will be harder to get appointments and there is no downside and he seems to need it, so why waste more milk?


In talking it over with Shane I  came up with cunning plan. Since Heike did the first snipping it might make sense have her look at him and maybe do the second as well. Right?

I don't know if they can still see him as I think their postpartum care only extends to the 6week check up but it is worth a try. We'll have to wait until after Christmas, but there might be time to get one more appointment in this month.