SS visited today

I agree 100%. The fact that the SW decided no further action was needed doesn’t mean the HV was wrong to report her concerns in the first place. The HV reportedly said a lot of positive things too, yet the OP interprets these as something negative and holds it against her. The SW saying the OP could make a formal complaint about the HV was probably in response to the OP's complaining about her.

I appreciate that it wasn’t pleasant for the OP to get a visit from the SW but I think it’s great that we have a system whereby a child's possible problems are quickly picked up and further investigated.

I have a similar adjacent example. Friend's dd is hyper intelligent and as a 2 yr old was having some sort of developmental assessment. HV asked her to sing a song, so she chose the Cilla Black Rainbow song, except she started mucking around with the words eg Rod and yollop and plonk and blee
HV made a referral for learning and speech difficulties....

Oh yeah you’re right, I do know who you are from that example 😂

When my baby was about a week old a HV came over....I was a first time mum but actually was finding having a newborn a breeze...I answered the door fully dressed with make up on. I was cheerful, she asked how I was, I said happily "oh I'm fine, a bit tired, obviously" It was a light hearted quip. Are there any women with week old babies who aren't tired?! Anyway I was totally miffed to see she wrote in the red book "mother complained of feeling tired". Aren't all mums tired? I wasn't complaining either. I felt totally judged and was massively irritated by it.

I used to be a social worker in a GP practice and worked with HVs - they all wore "plain clothes".

Not uniforms and not party dresses 😄

ahh i see.

would be better if they stuck to a uniform

Nope they can't only if there is a child protection plan. They can't just turn up. They make contact first . Then if they need to go further and there's a meeting child gos on a protection plan then they can do unannounced visits .

Of course they can!

How else do you think they visit parents/families when concerns have been raised?

HV sounds so unprofessional could she have actually confused her notes about you with another family’s when she wrote her report?

It must have been such a shock when SS turned up. I’m glad you’ve made a complaint. I hope SS do too for HV wasting their time when they are so stretched

Why are you saying her tone is bizarre then?

Frankly it’s bonkers that you can’t interpret that it means that the former cat child is now doing well, that a cat phase is nothing to worry about? Life must be very hard for you.

@sotiredandconfused @Exposingthetruth

Both your experiences are very worrying. What a waste of Social Workers time and what an appalling amount of stress to give to people, due to in one case, a HV prejudice of a sector of the country. Mind blowing

@petitchat I am not surprised that someone referred to SS is annoyed about it. I would expect that reaction irrespective of validity or otherwise of issues raised.

Sorry if this has been said but social services are not allowed to turn up unannounced unless your child is On a protection plan.

No they certainly do not have to justify their role in any way as they are hugely busy and overstretched.

The OP'S tone is not at all bizarre if a false report has been made.
Maybe you would find a false report acceptable but most people wouldn't.

I think it's good that we have a service designed to catch issues. Our HVs were good, even though we never needed it. The first visit, she checked our sleeping arrangements and was immediately satisfied. She left the bedrooms after a few seconds. I didn't mind them checking as I understand they're looking for situations not like ours. Why wouldn't we support that? They tracked the growth of milestones. We have friends who've never seen a HV as the service in their area collapsed during covid. I'm sure their child should have been referred to a paediatrician long ago. Problems are now becoming more apparent. It should have been picked up by a HV years ago. We're in an awkward situation of wanting to say something but knowing it's not our business. The OPs tone is bizarre and it does come across as there being more going on than she is admitting to.

Hahaha. What a desperate stretch your post is.
Comical and ridiculous.

I would go ahead with the complaint and call and advise your opting out of any further hv calls. What are they going to do? Report you? You’ve got a sw ready to sign off on the hv nonsense story!

In Scotland we have health visitors up to 5 as well so it definitely varies from country to country.

I’ve been on the end of a false sw report and thankfully they seen through the absolute nonsense of it and signed me off within 2 visits. They didn’t have any concerns, they just had to do some paperwork etc.

Try not to stress too much about it, you’ve got the sw on your side now. As for cosleeping with Dad, there are single fathers out there who cosleep! It doesn’t become strange just because Mums there. There were times up to teen years I’d be camping with my Dad, nothing strange or untoward when sharing a tent/air bed.

You're easily confused aren't you?

OP has explained what happened, given a few examples, felt the outfit was inappropriate, etc.

What more do you want?
Oh, is it the juicy details you need so that you can pick it all to shreds like a vulture?

From your description of her appearance, it is a very odd choice of outfit. I agree with all those saying that dressing ostentatiously (these days it seems to be mainly around status brands) is inappropriate in HV/SW roles. What she was wearing sounds impractical for interacting with a small child, too.

However, as someone said upthread, when working with older people, reasonably smart and tidy in a muted way is actually more likely to inspire belief in your competence. Changing a bit now as life is less formal, but it's still horses for courses.

Mine wanted to do the one year check up when my 3 months premature baby turned one- but she should only have been 9 months and was supposed to be measured as that for her milestones. It was all about pulling up/cruising/walking etc but she was still only 17lbs and still in 3-6 month clothes 🤦🏻‍♀️

They are nurses. Although I think a lot wear plain clothes.

As a nurse, we have to tell families when we’re going to make a safeguarding referral, unless of course the child would be put in danger.

This.
After my first childwas born I did not let HV enter our home or engage with them appart from one and two year checks at local child centre.

Ones that I met were so incompetent, patronising and plain dumb I could not put up with that. Just useless.
They did not send SS or anything as their service is just that - a service you are free to take or not.

I moved from part of England to another for DH work - with young baby and toddler and went from having vaguely helpful HV to an awful judgemental one - it seemed that moving was a red flag.

It was overall a social economic area of deprived area but we were married well educated 30 year olds with decent income.

Anything useful like even a GP practice to join didn't know - they turned out to be based at - thankfully a local walk meant we came across a just opening children center and women running that was a lifesaver knew everything and told us.

If I didn't immediately agree with HV there were threats of reporting me to SS. She'd barge in call me stupid ring people on my phone get told same as me and act like I hadn't just said same. I lied about co-sleeping - said we weren't anymore.

Phone Mum in tears she'd had awful HV so she and Dad came over for weigh in and appointments as did DH when he could get time off - to show I had support. Kids were regularly seen by children center staff and GP as one had Eczema.

We complained after I year check done nearer 18 months when as it was cold DS didn't want top off and she actually accused us of hiding abuse. Next checks were done by different service at different location anyway. Had same one for third child she lied about not having our information - told me two neighbour with babies had pnd ( she been disappointed hadn't with second and made me do questionnaire every visit) which I didn't think was professional but that was last I saw of her - though she also complained at age gap we'd chosen for our kids.

Incidentally MW service - where many HV started from - was just as awful - they put me and my third child at risk unnecessarily and we had to complain about that as well - and we aren't complainers usually. Many of the MW had worked just down the road in next area which was later caught in one of the national maternity scandal - where staff attitude and not listening to mothers was cited as one reason for many deaths.

You do get bad HV - though reporting to SS is a huge step - it was just a constant threat with mine.