Everything Families Ask Me, Answered

Think of it as physical therapy for the mouth and face. I teach a series of gentle exercises that retrain the tongue, lips, and facial muscles to rest and work the way they were designed to — tongue up in the palate, lips sealed, breathing through the nose.

When those four things are in place, the improvements ripple outward: better sleep, easier breathing, more stable orthodontic results, and less tension in the jaw and neck.

The ones I see most: mouth breathing, tongue thrust, snoring and sleep-disordered breathing, TMJ and jaw pain, orthodontic relapse, thumb and finger sucking habits, and recovery from a tongue-tie release. In children, I also watch for the effects on facial growth and development — catching those early makes everything downstream easier.

Anyone age four and up — there's no upper limit. My youngest patients are kindergartners; my oldest so far is seventy-two. Young children get short, playful sessions built around games and rewards. Adults are often surprised the muscles can still be retrained at any age. They can.

They're cousins, not twins. Speech therapy focuses on how you produce sounds and language; I focus on how the tongue and facial muscles rest and how you breathe. The two work beautifully together — correcting tongue posture often makes a speech therapist's job easier — and I'm happy to collaborate with yours.

No — you can reach out to me directly. Many families are sent my way by a dentist, orthodontist, or ENT, but a referral isn't required. When another provider is part of your care, I coordinate with them closely (and often attend appointments with you).

A truly comprehensive evaluation — top to bottom. We start with your full medical history, and I go all the way back to the beginning: birth, how you or your child fed as an infant, and how the face and jaws grew. We review past dental and orthodontic history, sleep apnea and sleep-disordered breathing, TMJ pain, and things like ear infections, tonsillectomies, and adenoidectomies — which are often connected to how the face developed.

Then comes the oral evaluation: I assess the tongue's range of motion, evaluate arch width and how it affects breathing and tongue placement, review current and past orthodontic treatment, and run several tests to determine whether a restricted frenulum (tongue-tie) could be holding therapy back. Before you leave, we discuss any referrals that make sense — so you walk out knowing exactly where things stand and what happens next.

Yes. I see clients in person across greater San Antonio and the Hill Country, and by secure video anywhere in Texas. Therapy translates remarkably well to video — the exercises are demonstrated, practiced, and checked the same way.

Most insurance plans don't yet cover myofunctional therapy, and I believe in being upfront about that. I accept HSA and FSA cards, and I can provide a superbill you can submit for possible reimbursement. When we talk, I'll lay out the full cost of your program before you commit — no surprises.

The signs parents notice first: sleeping with the mouth open, snoring or restless sleep, waking up cranky, lips apart during the day, messy or picky eating, a lisp or other speech concerns, or a thumb or finger habit that won't quit. Any one of these is worth a conversation — a quick evaluation can tell us if the muscles are part of the story.

This is where I have the most fun. Sessions for children are short, playful, and built around their wins — sticker charts, games, and lots of celebrating. Kids succeed fastest when quitting a habit or learning an exercise feels like their victory, and I set it up so it does. Parents get simple coaching for the in-between days.

Sucking habits are completely normal in infancy — they become a concern when they continue past about age three, because that's when they start reshaping the teeth, palate, and even the airway. I help children let go of the habit in a positive, non-threatening way, and then retrain the muscle patterns the habit leaves behind.

Most of my programs run about three to six months. The honest variable is practice: the exercises take about two minutes each, morning and evening, and the patients who do them consistently are the ones who finish sooner and keep their results. I'll always tailor the timeline to your goals.

Braces move the teeth — but the tongue can move them right back. We swallow hundreds of times a day, and a tongue that pushes forward with each swallow is a force no retainer can fully resist. When I retrain the tongue to rest up in the palate, it becomes the natural retainer it was meant to be. That's why orthodontists refer to me: it protects the result they worked so hard to create.

Yes — and ideally before and after. Pre-release exercises prepare the tissue and teach the tongue what to do with its new freedom; post-release exercises support healing and prevent reattachment. I can also attend the release appointment with you, so you're never navigating it alone.

Families call it the "Dental Doula" approach. I'm a Registered Dental Hygienist with nearly two decades of experience, and I don't just hand you exercises — I walk the whole journey with you: coordinating with your dentist, orthodontist, ENT, or sleep physician, attending appointments alongside you, and translating everything into plain language. You'll always know what's happening and why.