AIBU to want to make a complaint about a physiotherapist?

[Toooldforallthisnow]

DH currently in hospital (NHS) after a fall, doing ok, but can't come home yet. He is being well looked after and has a physiotherapist who is seeing him regularly.

I visit DH most days, and I have seen this physiotherapist several times now. I have no complaint about the care she is giving DH and he seems very happy with her, indeed she is incredibly personable towards him - however, when speaking to me she is somewhat aloof to the point of rudeness. I am not one to let this sort of thing go unnoticed, so when I saw her yesterday, I asked her if I may have a word in private.

I told her that I was aware of her attitude towards me, and how I'd done nothing to warrant it, so asked if she could explain the reason for being so curt. She looked me in the eye and said that while she didn't expect me to know who she was, she remembered me from when I taught her in junior school.

I had a very brief career as a teacher during the very late 1980s. I hated everything about teaching, so much that after qualifying and taking a position in a school, I only spent eight months in the job. I left without completing a single academic year. I then retrained into another and completely different field, and moved some thirty or more miles away. I almost never speak of my time in teaching as it was the lowest point of my life, and I went on to make a new life for myself. Teaching was not for me and put it all behind me.

Long story short, physiotherapist said while she appreciated she had been one of the more (to use her words) "lucky" pupils, and that I'd only ever shouted at her, she remembered well how I'd smacked some of the other children, and even thrown someones desk across the room.

I cannot deny this, I was young (26) and although it wasn't technically allowed, smacking was something which still went on in schools. I don't remember doing it very often. I do remember shouting, and I do remember the incident with the desk, after a child had pushed me to my limit. It was soon after that I went on long-term sick. But no matter what, I never had a single complaint made against me by anyone.

I am shocked this woman remembers so much, I even wonder if in her mind she has exaggerated some of it, but regardless of that I think she is using it inappropriately to influence the way she speaks to me. She told me that while she realises she has been abrupt, she cannot forget the way I had been towards a group of children (from memory they would have been aged 9 or 10). She said I was more than welcome to make a complaint about her, but given that I am not her patient and that the reason for her being the way towards me has nothing to do with what she called the "protected characteristics" (I had to look that one up), there wasn't a great deal I could expect.

I have to admit, this altercation has riled me further. I am not denying my past, heaven knows I have admitted it here, but do I really have to be held hostage to it?

YABU - don't complain

YANBU - complain, this is not professional behaviour in this day and age.

NHS professional here.

I didn’t think you needed to have a word with her. She’s treating the husband not you.

She didn’t need to be rude and from a professional perspective she didn’t need to disclose her reasoning for disliking you.

I cannot believe what I have read. You were, by your own admission, a violent and abusive teacher. It's clearly made an impression on her all these years later.

She had been nothing but caring towards your husband and acted professionally towards you and you want to make a complaint about her?

You should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself and thankful she and your former pupils have not made a report about you to the police.

You're lucky you weren't arrested.

I would let this drop because I assume you could still be charged for it.

You have horrified me and to think about making a complaint about a child you abused...

Exactly
You have a lot of excuses as to why you did this and maybe some are valid but you need to realise that you behaved really badly and instead of being ashamed you are considering trying to get this poor woman into trouble.
if she is treating your H well then be grateful for that and wind your neck in

Request another physio … she should have done this because professionally she has conflicts.

request another & say “she was a pupil of mine X years ago, she told me she has negative feelings about me. She cannot treat me with this conflict.”

The only thing physio did wrong is accept u as a patient - should have said she has conflict due to prior relationship,

Sounds like you haven't changed much , If I were you I'd be grateful that she is treating your husband with care and professionalism despite her clearly suffering a terrible at school with you. People never forget their childhood bullies and in this case the bully was you. I'd be utterly ashamed if I was you

She hasn't accepted OP as a patient at all and has absolutely no reason to be transferred.

Have you even read the OP's post?

I began teaching before you, in the days when corporal punishment was still permitted in schools. Even then it had to be recorded in a punishment book. Thankfully it was abolished.

Random smacking and violence in classrooms was never permissable. You are fortunate that your abuse wasn't reported.

If I were the physiotherapist, I would be tempted to call the police to see if I could make a retrospective complaint about your use of corporal punishment in schools. Thank goodness you left teaching.

So, you bullied her as a child and now you want to bully her as an adult. How unpleasant.

Sorry but as someone who was mainly at school in the 70s and smacking wasn't legal then in schools then if you were illegally abusing kids in the 80s why do you think an ex-pupil isn't rushing to be friendly towards you?

Well finally your past has caught up with you and frankly you still sound self-excusing. What she remembers is being an unwilling bystander witness to your physical and emotional abuse of children. I would respect you more if you were honest about that.

If this is in anyway true, you were a child abuser and deserve everything you get. Don’t you think if other people knew this about you they would also be curt with you, even if they weren’t actually one of your victims?

Where is your shame?

Or perhaps you could read the one and only post the OP made in which case you will see she is not a patient. HTH.

You sound absolutely awful.
You treated a group of children horribly and you think it's ok because it was in the past and a low point
The bloody physio should be commended for being able to put that aside and treat your husband so well. If it was me, I would have asked someone else to treat him.

Wow. Did you beat your own children too? I was at school during that time and never saw a teacher hit a child or thrown a desk across the room. I would be embarrassed and mortified if a former student brought this up. If I were you, I’d keep my head down and be grateful I wasn’t being reported for abuse.

This.

I’d be too ashamed to complain.

There was a lot of smacking in those days.

A teacher smacked me on the bum mid 70's.
My Mum went crazy but everyone else seemed to think it wasn't a big deal.
I can still remember it now as I was very upset and it was a one off by a Teacher I liked so I can only imagine how traumatised this poor woman must be.

You abused children. And left them with lifelong trauma.

Anyone with an ounce of decency who hadn't already realised before this incident would have immediately apologised and gone home to reflect on how and why they managed to inflict so much damage of a group of 20 odd children in just 2 school terms....

Im honestly flabberghasted that its taken 40 years for this to catch up with you.

If I had behaved as appallingly as you have in the past, I would think myself lucky anyone was willing to talk to me, let alone expect someone who had witnessed it all to do so. Your blasé tone when talking about it (indeed, even excusing your behaviour) shows that you really don't know anything about people at all or how to conduct yourself normally, so you are unbelievably hypocritical to even question her behaviour towards you, which does, at least, have an explanation. All that aside, the physio is there to help your husband. She is not obliged to have any kind of relationship with you. In fact, when she needs to work with your husband, the polite thing to do would be to go and have a walk, a drink or otherwise absent yourself for the length of the session. But that depends on you knowing what polite behaviour is, and I suspect you haven't got a clue. You are lucky that she is able to ignore you and be courteous to your husband. She probably feels very sorry for him. Hospitals need people like you like a hole in the head. Don't waste their resources. Does your husband even know about your past?

How long ago was it ok to smack a child ?
She still has to be professional but I think had she recognised you then she should have refused to treat your husband and explain why to her employer.

i doubt you’re the terrible person people here are gleefully making out. Everyone loves a pile on and we all feel so good about ourselves, perfect as we are 🙄

So naive. Do you think everyone out there grows up emotionally and takes responsibility for their actions?? This response closes down opportunities for reflection and for the OP to (hopefully) develop some much needed insight. YABU does not equal 'I don't take account for my own actions'.

The defences in this post. & the shame projection (onto the physio)? 'I am not one to let this go unnoticed' - yes I bet you aren't. but when others signal their right to their legitimate feelings this has to be denied to make you feel better?

It's never too late to grow up OP.

You asked someone what her issue was, then when you found out she was a victim of your abuse your instinct is to get riled up? Do you still have anger issues??

Guarantee OP won’t be back