'I was traumatised' Jersey mother speaks out about lack of tongue-tie support for her baby

• Video report by Annie Knowlson

A mother from Jersey has spoken out about the trauma, both herself and her baby went through, when her daughter was born with a tongue-tie.

She is now calling for more support to be provided on-island.

Gabby Mehigan says she immediately knew something was wrong when her daughter would not properly 'latch' when she tried to breastfeed after her birth.

"The first time she latched I could see she was having trouble staying latched and with the way her lips were - it didn't matter what I did she couldn't get the top lip to uncurl."

Gabby was concerned Ophelia had a tongue tie - a condition where the skin joining a baby's tongue to the bottom of their mouth is shorter than usual and restricts movement. It can affect breastfeeding and cause speech difficulty, among other issues.

"They were saying it was nothing to do with tongue-ties, it was that I had too much milk, it was the size of my breasts, they were too big, her mouth was too small, she was lazy. They kept saying 'try different positions.'"

"Looking back on it - not a single one of them actually correctly knew how to assess for a tongue-tie, none of them held her in the right position to have a proper look in her mouth or anything so they just didn't know what they were looking for really."

Gabby says more needs to be done so health professionals know what to look out for:

"They say it's about 10% of babies and I think it must be so many more because so many people don't know what to look for. So I think it's just the training that really, really needs to be there. It's all well and good them saying they support breastfeeding and breastfeeding in the workplace and all of those things but if you're not supporting it from the root and the main issues then it's not going to make a difference really. "

Symptoms of tongue-tie include:

• Difficulty attaching to the breast or staying attached for a full feed

• Feeding for a long time, have a short break, then feeding again

• Being unsettled and seem to be hungry all the time

• Not gaining weight as quickly as they should

• Making a "clicking" sound as they feed

• Colic

• Reflux

Tongue-tie can also sometimes cause problems for a breastfeeding mother, these can include:

• Sore or cracked nipples

• Low milk supply

• Mastitis

Anterior tongue ties are located in the front of the mouth and can often be treated by a simple procedure.

Posterior tongue ties are found in the rear of the mouth, which makes them less visible. They're often harder to identify and diagnose and are known as the "hidden" tongue tie.

After projectile vomiting each time she tried to take in milk, the situation worsened until Ophelia refused to feed for a week. She would then only feed in a darkened room for small amounts of time, leaving Gabby struggling to cope:

"Begging people for help while I sank into a really deep depression and felt like my baby hated me because we didn't have that bond that you should have with breastfeeding because she was traumatised by the experience. I was traumatised by the experience and no one seemed to care about any of it, and no one here knew what to do about it and no one here could do anything about it because they weren't trained in it."

Gabby researched the issue and took Ophelia to see Dr Malcolm Levinkind, who is based in the UK, for posterior tongue-tie treatment. Since then she has recommended him to six other families in Jersey who have had the same problem. The Specialist Pediatric Dentist says the current guideline on tongue-ties that the UK and Jersey follows are more than 16 years out of date:

"To answer why people from the islands are coming across - basically they're finding it difficult to access the service. The other thing is the NICE guidelines are more than 16 years out of date with the net result they're trying to treat things or they're not treating things the way they could be treated because they all work according to the regulation which is like tying people's hands behind their back."

Jersey Ear Nose and Throat surgeon Dr Russell Cathcart insists all surgeries can be provided on-island but say the different types of tongue tie - like the posterior tie - are not recognised by many medical professionals:

"The NICE guidelines that we go by don’t describe a posterior tongue tie as separately, they just say dividing the tongue tie is safe regardless of the cause. It’s also a procedure which is not done in most places or recognised in most ENT units or paediatric places in the UK either. It’s the private practitioners that seem to deal with and recognise this posterior tongue tie and what postulates is because that’s their specialty."

There are plans for health visitors to get more training so they can refer families to the pediatric team or the Ear, Nose and Throat specialists.

Jersey's Infant Feeding Coordinator, Deborah McCoy, says it's important that more is done to help mothers and babies easily access the help they need.

"We know there are problems out there and we want to give the best support to our mums and babies - we want to make sure our mums and babies can breastfeed for as long as possible because we know the health benefits of that are vast."

More tongue-tie support information can be found here.