Period pain proof required for school sick days

[Amallamard]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cly4zd8xp74o

Aside from the utter madness about period pains (which im sure MNers will have plenty to say about), is it just me that thinks a cold can be bad enough to need time off? One of mine was off with a cold last week. They ended up on antibiotics and steroids. In no way fit for school. It's no wonder schools are such germ factories when they insist children should come in when they're ill!

But at the same time have you ever tried to get a gp to take period pain’s seriously ?

I have seen ambulances caused for period pain. You couldn't go to a GP and sit in a waiting room with this level of pain. This is lie on the floor immobilised in pain level pain, you cannot make someone go in with that level of pain. They also can't prove it to a doctor either. All they would be able to do is tell the doctor how much pain they're in, hope they believe them so the doctor writes a letter.

There is no medical evidence the doctor would get of the pain other than just the explanation that it hurts which is the same they'd give the school.

Teachers can't force girls to function in this state and denying pain like this exists or happens regularly for some girls doesn't make it go away.

Maybe , just maybe, more girls are having horrendous period pain
Just a thought.

It takes weeks to get an appointment at my GP surgery in the first place.

The period would be over by the time we got there. And how can it be proved to anyone ?

I mean try thinking about childbirth , some do it naturally , some have gas and air , pethidine or epidural…

guess what how people cope with pain is different..

I’ve always been very lucky with my periods, a bit of pain (some months worse than others) but absolutely nothing in comparison to what some poor girls and women go through. I’ve seen kids (when I was teaching) doubled over in pain and white as a sheet. How are they meant to focus on learning when they feel like that??

And this is exactly why they are doing it. Ofsted can mark a school down for attendance, a school with several requires attendance and falling roll is at risk of closure, so the head is trying (in the wrong way) to improve attendance.
Ofsted are not interested in those with 95% and above, but there is a big focus on the 90-95% attendance group.

The FSM level is significantly above the national average, so they will get greater pupil premium funding, but with this comes an expectation that the school will get attendance up especially in the FSM group as this will be particularly closely inspected. As a school governor I have been part of ofsted meetings where they have pulled the head apart for not getting attendance up quickly.

The problem isn't really the head, its a combination of government targets, and increased termtime holidays bringing down attendance, meaning they are trying to bring it back up through trying to make sick kids come into school.

People are trying to tell you that yes for some people it is "unbearable"

I think of I had a daughter at such a place I'd be suggesting that all girls just took the day off, pain or not, whenever they started a period to make a point. There is no way another persons pain etc can be quantified so if be mounting a strike response or of fury.
I've suffered severe vomiting for the first two days of my period for most of my life and have endo and adeno. As a grown woman last week I spent two days utterly incapacitated due to the severity of the pain, I could barely move, my husband had tu deal with children etc, it was honestly as bad as advanced labour. No way would I even get out the door like it and I've been " getting used" to this for 30 years, Imagine a teenage girl being confronted by this and just expected to ignore it. It's close to barbaric and shows total lack of awareness and serious need for education in the headteacher and SLT. Attempting to put standards which are in some cases unattainable on everyone is incredibly short sighted and will cause significant distress and damage to teenagers mental health. It's another unnecessary pressure.

Ofsted aren't telling the head teacher to ask for a gp note for period pain. Utterly ridiculous.

It’s so easy to forget how horrid a cold feels until you have one. Just utterly miserable.

They are telling them to 'get attendance up or else' and they are hoping this policy will improve attendance. Do you really think the head actually wants a load of sick and in pain kids in school because they are just a mean kind of person who gets kicks out of being cruel, or because they are desperate to improve attendance because they are under threat? A school under requires improvement gets a visit every 18 months to 2 years, last one was 2023 so they are due one early 2025 and the inspectors will be expecting to see improvements. Heads have taken their own lives following a difficult ofsted visit, the impact and pressure of them cannot be underestimated. I saw our head have to explain child by child for those with attendance under 95% exactly what she had done to improve it.

And that's not saying that I agree with this, because I definitely don't, I'm just explaining why the school has brought in this ridiculous policy

Thing is, if it's endo it's not always just on your period
I'm 40 and only just diagnosed and I have stage 4, adenomyosis, kissing ovaries, a 9cm endometrioma... still waiting for surgery

Tonight I've taken every single painkiller I can up to the max dose and nothing is touching it, it feels like my ovary is being twisted and yanked. I'm ringing the GP tomorrow to ask about morphine and I'm more capable of coping with pain than a child

And likely to punch the next person who says oh take some paracetamol

I feel like we need a mumsnet campaign on this. It's ridiculous and it's discriminatory.

fwiw I do not have endometriosis or PCOS and my periods since I had children have been fine BUT as a teenager day 1 of my period would always involve vomiting, fainting, diarrhoea, and being unable to move from a fetal position. Day 2 would be painful but I could power through and day 3 onwards was ok. I cannot imagine how much women with medical conditions like endometriosis must be suffering. No one has the right to tell them to power through.

It's part of the wider problem though that time off sick, whether school or work, is often not seen as acceptable anymore. Looking back, I remember being proud of myself for pushing myself to work when I was really quite ill - only to find my company much less impressed when I passed my lurgy to a number of colleagues who were sensible enough to take time off. I ended up getting a bollocking but still didn't quite get it. Later on I ignored a hacking cough for ages under the guise of 'powering through'. It turned out to be pneumonia. Similarly I ignored for too long a headache that turned out to be meningitis. It was all part of a culture of 'manning up' and getting the job done no matter what. Of boasting of never missing a day.

It's caused me more trouble then benefit and I won't be insisting on the same for my daughters. Sometimes you just need to rest and recover and I actually find you get back to work sooner and are more productive for it than pushing on, unable to do the job properly and making mistakes because you're not at your best, and then having to take more time off when you've made yourself sicker than you would have been had you dealt with it straightaway. It's ridiculous.

I get that there are malingerers and people who will take advantage and I don't know how we get around that. A girl at my school was off long term sick but was spotted on TV at that big Smash Hits event thing that used to happen every year, so clearly well enough to have gone to school that day. Period pains shouldn't be used as a get out of school free card but nor should we putting people, particularly children, under this sort of pressure.

As an example today I've taken
Max dose of naproxen
Max dose of paracetamol
240mg dihydrocodeine
Max dose of Buscopan
Herbal pain patch
Heat pad

Virtually no relief. My stomach looks like a balloon and I'm not even on!

Makes me think it's worse than those cultures where you have to go to a special hut when bleeding. I thought that was bad but it's better than being forced to participate when you're feeling appalling. When will any culture learn to respect women and the amazing things their bodies do

Can we have a serious conversation vs what’s been reported as a headline (click bait) on the BBC.

That schools is struggling with attendance numbers. Teachers are not minded/stupid enough to be requesting medical evidence they know is almost impossible to get for children who are otherwise engaged at school and doing well.

It will be persistent offenders.

My dd vomits and faints with period pain, can’t eat anything. It just lasts a day. She has a very high pain threshold which has been commented on so she is in no way not resilient. She has spent many weeks in hospital for a condition that is very gruelling.

There is no way I’ll be bothering our GP (even if I could get an appointment) and in no way is she going in to school when she can barely move.

Periods vary hugely as does the menopause. They’ve recently said menopause needs to be better understood in the workplace but now periods don’t in school. 🤔

The quote is this:

guidance states that in the "majority of cases" a parent informing the school their child is ill "can be accepted without question or concern".

It added: "Only where the school has genuine and reasonable doubt about the authenticity of the illness should medical evidence be requested to support the absence."

But you put period pain in the thread title and it’s as good clickbait as the BBC.

I got sent home from school on multiple occasions when my attempts at powering on through period pain were floundering. This was both as a pupil and a teacher.

I had prescriptions, but as my periods were erratic they didn't help with day 1 because they weren't in my system in anticipation. In one holiday job at 18, I ended up totally incapacitated in the fetal position on a filthy stockroom floor waiting to be found because I couldn't move through the pain. My cramps would radiate through my quads up into my abdomen.

In comparison, while waiting to get to 3cm dilated in labour, I went out for a bar meal. Labour had been confirmed the previous night and at least I only had to shut my eyes and breathe through the contractions every 5 minutes at that point. At least by the pushing stage 24 hours later I got gas and air and wasn't expected to crack on as normal.

5-6cm dilated in a back to back labour hurt less than my teenage period pains!

Attendance policies are fucking ridiculous in schools. DS was marked unauthorised last year for vomiting. He'd used up the goodwill allowance on authorised illness with a chronic condition (that resulted in a 999 call from school) and surgery.

Your comment makes me furious.

I have passed out from period pain and ended up in hospital from over-dosing on pain meds and a hole in my leg from a hot water bottle (the result of passing out from too much codeine and paracetamol) which burned a hole in the bottom of my leg when I passed out, and then it needed packing.

Do you think we are lying? Do you think if someone is in so much pain that they can't function properly that they will actually learn anything despite attending?

Exactly!
And it's being blamed on headteacher being a man. Any policy of that sort is likely to have gone through the governing board (which is likely to be more women than men, most are) before being approved due to knowing there will be pushback and complaints from the parents coming their way.
This isn't about the child with excellent behaviour and generally good attendance having a day off per month with bad period pain, it will be about the persistent offenders using periods/colds as an excuse for termtime holidays etc.

I’m an ex teacher and used to get really annoyed being surrounded by snotty kids who were too ill to be in school. It’s ridiculous! Yes there are those who take the piss but the majority don’t. I had horrific period pains from the age of 12 and would regularly pass out at school. I remember realising something was wrong when we were told in a biology class that the amount of blood lost was equivalent to a tablespoon or something! I wasn’t diagnosed with endometriosis until I’d been suffering for 15 years. My DDs suffered as well and I would never have forced them to go to school. This drive for 100% attendance is unrealistic!

Period pain is a persistant problem if you're affected by debilitating pains. On average it can easily be monthly.

I was lucky. Mine were erratic and I was afflicted only every 6-12 weeks.

It only takes one block of significant illness to become a persistant absentee.

Many schools don't take the length of the school year so far into.account either, so absence in the autumn term very quickly sledgehammers attendance data and it won't pick up until the summer term.