I hate my health visitor - rant

koalamummy

This one does irritate me immensely if parenthood causes the transformation into all knowing earth mother/father then there surely would be no need for children and family departments within social services?

However the flip side of this also irritates me. I find the assumption that simply because you have a child you will know and understand everything about children almost as irritating! Aside from the basics of care which are generally, but not always universal, most parents knowledge of child related matters comes from their direct experience.

bigmomma051204

On a personal level - i loathed and was scared of my HV. I was 22, had recently moved back to parents from an abusive relationship, had no friends (they had all deserted me) couldnt get out and around as had had c-section so couldnt drive and lived in a very rural location. I was isolated and very scared. I was ticking ALL of the boxes for PND (looking back) and my relationship with my father (who i was living with) was horrendous. I had a pulmonary embolism (blood clot) shortly after my c-section.. HV hadnt given me surgical stockings OR listened to me when i gave ALL of the symptoms of a PE (which i know now, but didnt then) I almost died And lost weeks of bonding time with baby to boot whilst in hospital. My mother, the only support i had, then 2 weeks after my PE, had a serious car crash and was in intensive care for many weeks during which i was unable to visit as my father refused to take me, citing that it was my fault she had crashed as she was tired from helping me. The health visitor visited twice during this time (and in fact during my sons life as we never saw her after those 2 visits!!) she ignored, as i said, my PE and PND sypmtoms, ignored what i can now see were pleas for help to get some support regarding my abusive ex and emotionally abusive father.. i can remember crying to her and she simply told me that i was a parent now and needed to be strong. The only other advice that she gave me was on the second and last visit - she said that both times she had visited, my son had been sleeping in his car seat.. (because he literally wouldnt sleep anywhere other than in my arms or in car seat and i needed to have an hour or so a day when he was asleep..luckily this only went on for first 6 weeks!) She said if i continued to let him sleep there that he would get curvature of the spine, be unable to walk without a hunch and she would be forced to call social services if ever she saw me letting him sleep in it again. (this was only 7 years ago so hardly the dark ages!!) BAD HV! On a serious note, i am professionally shocked at how terribly this HV let me and my son down in such an extremely hard time for me.

On a professional note, I work for Childrens Services and have done for some time .... Unfortunately I have seen VERY little to convince me that HV's are worth bothering with They, as another poster mentioned, are very quick to refer to other professionals and stomp their feet but the are loathe to do anything else! They pick on some families frequently (sometimes for valid reasons... often not) and then other families who are in desperate need of support, they do not bother with! Also, why is it that the majority of them are childless? There are 6 in the area i work in and 4 of them have no children.... and it has always been the same in other areas i have worked.... weird!!:cool: Its not that you cant be good at your job if you arent a parent - my best friend is a childless social worker and is amazing!!!!! BUT i have always just found it strange .....

sweaty_betty

In my experience, the HVs weren't particularly helpful. They didn't criticise, but at the same time couldn't offer any particularly helpful advice when asked specific questions (about sleeping, crying, colic, etc) so after a while I stopped bothering. I decided that perhaps their role was to help people who obviously needed it, like the girl in the dr's waiting room who I watched pouring vimto into her 3 month old's bottle...

However, I do remember a couple of incidences where I took LO to be weighed - the first time he was about 3-4 months old and had put on less than 1/2 lb in about 5 weeks, the HV took me to one side and asked if everything was OK at home because he obviously wasn't thriving. The second time I had been taking him for taster sessions at nursery and he wasn't settling, so I asked if the HV had any advice to help him settle - she told me to take him to a different nursery as he obviously didn't like this one. I'm sure both times the HVs meant well, but I found their advice/questions both unhelpful and upsetting - as if it was me and my decisions which were producing the situation I was concerned about. I feel that new mums especially have enough anxiety without this.

I think next time around I shall have minimal involvement with them.

pigpen

bigmomma051204 wrote: »

Also, why is it that the majority of them are childless? There are 6 in the area i work in and 4 of them have no children.... and it has always been the same in other areas i have worked.... weird!!:cool: Its not that you cant be good at your job if you arent a parent - my best friend is a childless social worker and is amazing!!!!! BUT i have always just found it strange .....

I think it is because they are so scared of having someone like themselves come and criticise and ridicule every little thing they do and belittle and undermine them and scoff at them when they don't magically know the answers.

And I don't think they are as bad as midwives!

bigmomma051204

pigpen wrote: »

I think it is because they are so scared of having someone like themselves come and criticise and ridicule every little thing they do and belittle and undermine them and scoff at them when they don't magically know the answers.

And I don't think they are as bad as midwives!

Haha - funny, i used to dislike midwives but they now work alongside me on an almost daily basis and actually MOST of them are really lovely and down to earth.... SO extremely different from our local HVs!!!!

nikki2804

I loved my midwife. She was ex army and gave good advice. None of the 'new fangled nonsense' as she put it.

The HV was a PITA. My LO was colicky so I asked about baby massage classes. The block had ended and it wasn't starting again so she offered to get the girl to come round to my house to show me some moves.

Sure enough she arrived. First words out her mouth? 'You HV says you can't cope' The door was shut in her face!

Person_one

So did you not do the baby massage even though you had wanted to?

nikki2804

The class had already started when I first enquired then didn't restart so unfortunately no.

My HV got an earful from my mum as she admitted she 'referred my details on' as I was a young mum (21). LO is almost 4 and is perfectly fine so I can't have been that bad.

Wonder if i'll have the same HV this time? Hmmm.

meritaten

sorry - I cannot resist saying this - ask mum or grandma for advice before asking HV! its not that we have brought up kids - but in most cases we have had the time to reflect and realise where WE went wrong! and its our mistakes we would want to prevent the next generation from making!

meritaten

baby massage is lovely - and not new. my nan used to say to me for colicky baby 'put him face down over your knee and rub/massage his back'. you know what? it worked!
my third son was a live wire - and the only thing that calmed him was a foot massage - he loved it - it sent him to sleep!