A few years ago, a thirteen-year-old girl came to our dental office with a speech impediment. She could speak satisfactorily, but she slurred some sounds and there were certain letters she could not enunciate clearly. Her speech had sounded the same her entire life, and it wasn’t nearly as good as it could have been. We discovered the cause of her speech impairment was due to her being tongue-tied. The muscle below her tongue was so taut that she could not enunciate certain
sounds as clearly as she should have been able to.
For years she had been unsatisfied with her speech but had done nothing about it. After years of self-consciousness and being constantly embarrassed by her speech, we performed a small and simple procedure of cutting or detaching the muscle. This simple surgery allowed her tongue to move much more freely. The procedure took less than ten minutes and was covered by her insurance carrier. She returned to the dental office the following week extremely happy. She called her new speech “terrific,” and she felt her English was much better and much clearer now.
What if she had never come in to be evaluated? What if she never would have had this procedure performed on her tongue? She could have come in years earlier, but she didn’t. She and her parents waited, and I am not certain why. But what’s most important is she finally came in to have her speech altered and improved. She was finally able to make necessary corrections, and it transformed her speech into normal, clear tones. It took her much longer than it should have, but in the end, the decision to come in was an absolute blessing in her life. She had delayed, but now she is delighted with her decision.