Sunday, May 22, 2011

Ankyloglossia


Reed during last summer's backyard art project

Ankyloglossia.  About a week ago, I didn't even know what that was.  It is the technical/medical name for "tongue tie".  Our Reed has been doing in-home speech therapy sessions for a few months now.  A week or so ago, Reed's speech therapist noticed his inability to move his tongue around in order to produce certain speech sounds.  After a talk with our pediatrician and a consult with our ENT, it was determined Reed is definitely tongue-tied.  When he sticks his tongue out, the small tissue underneath (frenum), actually causes the tip of his tongue to curl under.  Tongue tie is usually discovered when infants have trouble latching.  But amazingly, Reed was a breastfeeding champ, and we had no problems at all.    

Bright and early Monday morning, we'll be heading over to the hospital for Reed to undergo a tongue-tie release procedure.  The procedure itself is pretty minor - just a snipping of the frenum.  If Reed was an infant, the procedure would have been done in office.  But since he's 4 years old and not apt to let strangers stick sharp metal objects in his mouth, he'll be under general anesthesia (the scary part for Momma!).

Please keep our sweet Reed in your thoughts and prayers Monday morning!

UPDATE:  Reed is back home from surgery!  The procedure went well and he's resting now.  Still a little groggy from the anesthesia.  Thank you for the prayers!

Mary Ellen 

3 comments:

  1. Oh, poor kid. Hope all goes acording to plan.
    Wish you both speedy recovery from this procedure.

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  2. I hope all goes well and I'm sure it will. It is hard for us mothers to see them go through things. Blessings and prayers to you all.

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  3. Mary Ellen: my brother also had this. Mom discovered it when he couldn't stick his tongue out at me. The doctor grabbed his tongue and snipped and my brother said his first words and hasn't stopped talking since. (BTW, this was back in 1958).

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