D-Restricted:

A review

of Support and Aftercare

by Dr. P

(June 2018)

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Dear Diana,

Thank you ever so much for your support and apologies for taking so long to send you a review.

I knew fairly early on that something was not right with my second baby. I went through a difficult time both physically and emotionally as it took more than 10 attempts to get him latched on at every sitting and he was constantly sliding off. Having a toddler around who constantly needed my attention made trying to breastfeed even harder.

My husband found Diana’s website online and I am pleased to have met her. She is the reason I am still successful breastfeeding and have overcome all the hurdles I have encountered during this feeding journey. She was very professional and knowledgeable and was able to pitch the consultation to my level of understanding. After a thorough assessment, Diana was able to judge whether the posterior tongue tie was likely to be adversely affecting his ability to latch. She then discussed the pros and cons of the procedure and I made an informed decision to go ahead.

Diana performed the division (at 10 days old) and my baby started to latch on more readily. However, Diana warned me that with a quicker response, I could take a step backwards before leaping forwards again and so not to panic. I am glad diana had warned me about this as this is exactly what happened. I had a set back and started to struggle again with maintaining a latch a few weeks later. Diana’s support did not stop there. Her after care has been amazing! She regularly followed me up with text messages and motivational comments.

She also offered to reassess, where we decided to hold off a second division because it was unlikely to benefit too much. It was easy for me to see that Diana genuinely cared about us and I believe her own personal experience of tongue tie in her own children is an asset in allowing her to truly understand the difficulties similar women face.

At 6 weeks, I was still having difficulties maintaining the latch and had to keep on re-latching every minute to effectively “drain” a breast. At this point, Diana advised me to consider using medulla nipple shields to allow him to latch on more effectively. I was worried about getting overly reliant on them. However, I was desperate to try something new because it was tedious having to re-latch all the time. This worked well and he started feeding more effectively as he stayed on for longer. She again reinforced the importance of expressing to keep up my supply and she discussed the role of bodyworks for alignment issues to help my son open his mouth wider and therefore latch more easily. At first, I had been dismissive of chirotherapy, osteopathy and cranial sacral therapy. However, again, I was desperate so I opted to have cranial sacral therapy and I noted a remarkable improvement as he started to open his mouth wider and readily put his head towards the breast.

Although nipple shields allowed me to continue breastfeeding more easily, feeds took ever so long (1 hr 30mins on average). They were a faff and my toddler kept on running off with them. I decided I had to wean off them. I was very determined and Diana helped me achieve this goal by advising me how to wean off with lots of suggestions. One day, he started to feed without the shield so I slowly started to rely on it less.

In summary, Diana has been very approachable throughout my rollercoaster ride as I tried ever so hard to reach my ultimate goal with breastfeeding after the tongue tie division. She continued to provide professional support and listened to me attentively. At 6 months, I have finally weaned off the nipple shields and my baby is now feeding effectively independently and gaining more weight than ever before.

A Review of Support and Aftercare, Anon

(April2019)

Hi Diana,

Since the birth of my first baby, the breastfeeding experience has been incredibly difficult during the first week. While I had a general knowledge of how breastfeeding should work, I didn't know anything about tongue tie. The midwives have been very helpful in showing me how to breastfeed but despite my protests, it was still excruciatingly painful. I spent hours online trying to find out what I was doing wrong because I really didn't want to give up breastfeeding. I eventually found that my baby simply couldn't do a deep latch. It was then when I raised the deep latch issue with my midwife that she suspected it could be a tongue tie. I needed urgent care and my husband found out about Diana's services online.

Diana has been fantastic from start to end. Diana, my husband and I discussed what I was going through in order for her to diagnose that my baby has a tongue tie. Diana was incredibly supportive and I felt really at ease discussing my breastfeeding issues. With her great expertise on the subject, she took her time to explain about tongue tie - I was amazed by how much information is involved about tongue tie! She made sure we were aware what was involved in the procedure and the side effects. Since Diana performed the very brief procedure, my baby and I learned to breastfeed together all over again. The pain was a lot less than before, my baby has stopped constantly throwing up clear liquid which is the cause of poor latching and my shoulders have noticeably got a lot less tense! While my baby is doing a fantastic job of improving her latching with thanks to Diana, I am ultimately relieved that my baby is able to receive the milk that she need and whenever she need it without me running for the hills!! With the breastfeeding experience being enjoyable and my baby learning to latch on by herself, I have been able to breastfeed in public places and I would have not been able to do this if it wasn't for Diana's procedure. The aftercare received from Diana via text messages was really appreciated, I felt really supported knowing that she is there for me. A huge thank you to Diana!

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