The medical term for a tethered oral tissue is a frenum, a tongue tie is medically known as “ankyloglossia”. A frenum is a small piece of tissue tethering different parts of your mouth together- tongue, lip, cheek (known as a buccal tie). Frenums are completely normal and we all have them. The issue becomes how attached the tissues are- if a tongue is tethered to the floor of the mouth more toward the tip, this is known as a tongue tie. It causes many issues as the tongue is a muscle that should be able to move freely! Lip ties tether the lip to the gingiva or “gums”. If this attachment is very tight or connected low between teeth issues arise as the lip is unable to move away from the gingiva.