To think that Health visitors are a certain annoying breed generally?

[Moomin8]

I've just had my 4th baby and the health visitor came the other day. I found her really annoying and rude. First of all she came walking into my living room in her dirty boots and got mud all over my newly cleaned carpet.

My youngest before dc4 is 10 years old and the HV said she was going to therefore talk to me as if I'd never actually had a baby she also wanted to look in my bedroom - I told her no.

Then I thought back to my older dc and their HVs and realised they are all pretty much the same whereas midwives, when they visit are really nice and helpful usually and don't speak to you as though you're an idiot. I'm a 39 year old university educated person and I find these people intrusive and annoying.

What is it with health visitors?

Mine was generally lovely - really helped me deal with an arsehole GP who was a twit about refusing to prescribe the neocate the dietician had told us DD2 needed... to the point she sat in the GP surgery refusing to leave till the GP did it (GP has a history of this apparently).

The system DID miss DD2's "significant speech delay and defect" though - not so much our named HV, but the one delegated to do the development checks who just let it drop off the radar of kids with delayed communication they were meant to be monitoring.

Yanbu. Some are good, others not so much.

I've had a HV who was anti-breastfeeding (endless 'are you still breastfeeding?!' in an aggressive tone & ds wasn't even 1) and loads of them told me that if I breastfed to sleep that he'd never sleep. Ds has slept through from 10 months so they were all wrong. Just pointless scare-mongering.

My friend was told by her hv to take her young baby for a walk of up to an hour and a half every time it was nap time. Completely unrealistic!

When I was a ftm they were full of complete crap and it drove me mad.

Constantly observing how big my baby was. Well I couldn’t shrink him, could I?

They dismissed all my concerns about my son’s development. He’s now got a diagnosis of ASD and there were VERY early markers which they said weren’t.

I’ve not seen them with my second. Waste of time.

Pregnant with dc2 and what I found most intrusive and unhelpful when I had DS1 was daily/weekly visits at first to check on us. I know baby has to be weighed ect but it caused more stress to me than anything else. I just wanted to be left alone and to get to know my baby, not have people turn up unannounced, critiquing what I was doing and feeding. It's the most sensitive time for a first time mum, it made me really anxious.

That's what annoyed me too, I never got told when, a time or anything. Just turned up at my home.

I have a midwife now and even though this is my second she is the most condescending woman on earth, I try so hard to make light conversation, jokes and she is just hard faced constantly. DM and sister has met her and then can't get over it.

Mine was useless, I'd had extended midwife visits due to really bad PND & the fact my BP took ages to go down after pre eclampsia, the midwife didn't sign me off until ds was nearly 2 months old. We had had a rough time as my husband had been diagnosed with MS a month before ds was born & I was coping with a new baby, caring for my then husband who was suddenly badly disabled & had to go to hospital for physio & treatment at least twice a week. We should have been referred to Surestart & been given extra vouchers for milk & vitamins etc, she never did this & kept on ringing to insist I took ds in to be weighed even when I was telling her I couldn't because the times clashed with my husband's treatments which were at the time more important to get him back on his feet. I knew ds was gaining weight as he was growing out of his clothes really fast & I had been checking him on our scales at home by me getting weighed & then getting weighed holding him. She never acknowledged the fact I had PND, asked if I was ok, I always felt under pressure whenever I saw her that I wasn't caring for ds correctly, she ruined what bit of confidence I had & made me very nervous when handling ds instead of reassuring me to boost my confidence.

I hate HV. I had one when my son was born who wanted to see me on my daughters birthday (which was 15 days after my son was born) because I said I couldn’t see her on the day and said I will do any other day! She said she would report me to SS if I don’t see her! I ended up seeing her just because I didn’t need that on my plate and she sat in my house for 2 hours on my daughters birthday!!

With my first two children I had two amazing HVs. I was a young mum and they picked up my depression straight away,. The children had health issues too. They really helped me access the help I needed and supported me through everything. They really cared and were never intrusive.

With my other three I think I saw a HV once, maybe twice. I can't even picture their faces. My previous HVs had retired by then.

I know baby has to be weighed ect
They really don't. You know when they are growing and you see how much and how regularly they feed. That's enough. I've never wasted time with a HV when I've had a genuine concern, I've just gone to see the GP and either been reassured or referred.

With my eldest my first HV was amazing. I can’t remember the second one.

With my second child first HV not great at all but then got an amazing one who was young and did not have children (just putting that out there as it isn’t necessary to have kids to be a good HV).

My friend is a HV and I’m her area they have to ask to see where baby sleeps, she hates doing it but they have to document why they haven’t asked if they don’t. It’s not to look at the house but to risk assess the sleeping area as there are so many products marketed to new parents that are unsuitable for sleep. She is stressed all the time as she tries to do her best to support families. Her area has also been taken over by Virgin Care and she feels very unsafe in her practice due to staffing levels and expectations and the amount of admin required rather than supporting families. They want their HV’s to sit on their laptops during visits ticking all of the boxes.

I think some of it depends on the area. In our old area when DS was born, I saw a variety of HVs who were all, I’m sorry to say, useless, with some verging on dangerous.

Favourite gems included being told my milk wasn’t good enough for DS any more (aged 5 months, complete bollocks and I packed her off with a flea in her ear as I begged for advice on mix feeding for the first few months and none of them could give me any guidance at all - we were mix feeding on medical grounds due to weight loss). Being quizzed/shamed as to whether I was pregnant again already (when DS was one, I wasn’t but none of their business).

Being sniggered at for taking shared parental leave. Being told to talk to my baby when she’d just watched me sing him through a nappy change. Being told all babies should be in bed between 1930 and 2000 and if mine wasn’t sleeping, I must be doing something wrong. I could go on.

Oh, and they completely missed my post-natal MH issues.

New area is different again. Got a lovely one for DS’s two year review, and another lovely one for the antenatal visit for DS2, with perfectly sensible advice around sleep, vitamins and other stuff that may have changed in the last four years, plus groups as am new to the area.

So I wouldn’t tar them all with the same brush but it’s clear that some areas have higher standards than others...

My first HV was really rubbish. I think I saw her a couple of times and I found her a bit weird, she kept giving me leaflets on not smoking around baby even though nobody smoked and never had.

my second one was amazing, she was so helpful with DS, rang to check on me, referred me to a feeding clinic. couldn't be more different.

I hate HV. I had one when my son was born who wanted to see me on my daughters birthday (which was 15 days after my son was born) because I said I couldn’t see her on the day and said I will do any other day! She said she would report me to SS if I don’t see her!

That's disgraceful - completely abusive of her position. In a less vulnerable and exhausted time, you'd do well to call her bluff and tell her to go ahead - say you'd explain to SS the basics about making or rearranging appointments at a mutually convenient time and express great surprise that she (HV) hasn't had experience of this concept before.

But of course, power-hungry people like that know exactly when you're at your 'weakest' point and exploit it for all they can.

Apart from everything else, I can't imagine SS would be too happy at being invoked for a frivolous nonsense like that - like when the police urge parents not to threaten that they'll come and arrest a child for not eating their dinner or going to bed on time.

I’ve seen 2 so far and they have both been lovely, not intrusive and very helpful.
But the maternity services I’ve had have been outstanding throughout so I may just be lucky!

Mine was terrible. Patronising, judgemental and incompetent.
The first one was pleasant but went off on her holiday one afternoon leaving me at home with a newborn and haemorrhaging. I was rushed to hospital shortly afterwards and had to leave baby with my neighbour until my parents arrived.
The second one did everything in her power to undermine or upset. She knew I had a great fear of sids, so when one occurred locally, she bounced in like an excited girl and told me all the details and the fact that the baby had both my daughters names!!
I was out one day when she called unexpectedly. I arrived home to find her waiting outside. She told me the previous family in my house used to refuse to let her in and she thought it might be starting again. Apparently they were involved with SS, She was sure I was looking after my children properly but thought she had better make sure incase I had "picked up" something from that house!
I could write a book about that woman.
If it was now I would have complained, but my children are all in their 20's now .
I was at my daughter's after my granddaughter was born and was told the HV was coming. My hackles rose and I felt ready for battle.
The young woman who arrived was lovely and very professional. A total opposite to the one I had to endure in the 1990s.

Meh, whinge all you like op.
But In a society without a safeguards like health visitors for the most vulnerable tiny babies in society, I wonder how many more horror stories like baby p we would see?

How do you know how many horrors they prevent? I’ve found some helpful and some less so. But I don’t doubt all of them I’ve encountered would have acted if I’d been showing the warning signs that a child may have been at risk.

But, as this thread goes, keep labelling them uneducated, annoying and failed nurses, put a few more people off training..... it’s only babies and children that will suffer without a health visitor.
Is that the outcome you would like? Are you going to speak out for the most vulnerable? I hope so.

@blitzen just wondering what yours did to warrant the wish of a painful death?

Hated mine, my home was too clean and tidy, therefore
, I must be neglecting myself and my baby! No I’m just organised! She told me how I ,use be feeling etc yet had never given birth.. horrible woman

My friend says she gets mistaken for a midwife and vice versa all the time too. And she doesn’t see family’s after 8 weeks now as the later visits are done by nursery nurses.

You know what WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll I really wish I had just told her to go ahead, but at that time I had 3 under 4 and just didn’t want the extra stress. She was saying crazy things like I was “being difficult” and “refusing to let her see the baby” despite me saying no, you can see him ANY other day just please not that date and she said she HAD to see him on that day as she had to see him by a certain day, and she was busy all other days.

Is this normal for them to look round your house? No one has ever asked to look where baby sleeps or at anything in my house.

We had a fantastic health visitor with DD2, who was very proactive with getting the GP to refer DD2 to the pediatricians when she wasnt gaining weight. The GP fobbed us off at first. Turned out DD2 had major congenital heart defects which was why she wasnt growing.
However, we moved when DD2 was 1 and the health visitors where we are are so woefully understaffed they were no support with DD2's ongoing needs. The health visitors where we are now only deal with child safeguarding, not general health and monitoring. (So no weight checks for cardiac patients needing close growth monitoring)

It's been said already on here (by me and others), that the safeguarding aspect of their jobs, is an essential service for society. But then various posters have said that's not what they're here for. If safeguarding is their main function, I don't understand why they need to be nurses or mws. Sort of like medically trained social workers? Why? Is it because their medical training means they pick up on abuse more quickly? I wish it was done a bit more honestly tbh, but then, I suppose if they said "we're coming round to see you in case you're a danger to your baby", parents would naturally be absolutely terrified.

The thing is, weren't SS involved with many of the awful cases like baby p, Victoria Climbie etc? These awful cases where professionals knew the families and still didn't suspect what was going to happen. There is a problem somewhere, but maybe they prevent many more than we know about, as the pp says and the ones that we do hear about are the ones where sadly, children have slipped through the net somehow.

Whatever, when they say "we are here to help and support families and parents" it doesn't add up when so many people seem to find that is not the case and doesn't appear to some of us on here, to be what their priority is...

I suppose as well, it's a job which is open to people on power trips who give the good ones a bad name. I have some friends and relatives in the police and it's the same for them. They get called all sorts, spat at, told they are racist etc.

My health visitor was lovely, very laid back. I knew she was checking in on my mental health but she was very unobtrusive in the way she did it. I heard lots of horror stories from other mums though, it’s like anything you get good and bad. But they do a vital job, I think a lot of people in here probably are more confident than the average first time mum, and if the good ones are able to support struggling mums we have to be pleased with that. It’s just a shame there are obviously some less good at their job, I know how vulnerable I felt after having my baby, you really need the right kind of support.

I had a different one with each of my children and they were both really nice.

I’m a hv. Thankfully my clients are a lot more grateful for the care I deliver. Moms on their fourth I tend to gauge by their reaction whether they want quick and dirty or the full works. We don’t look at your house but we do look at the baby’s cot cause you know babies die from all sorts of paraphernalia we find in them even in the most educated of homes. I’ll go off and retrain as a teacher quite fancy the easy hours and long holidays. Except I would never dream of making sweeping statements about a profession like some on here . Hiding thread now cos most of you are pissing me right off.