Can I refuse to see my health visitor again?

[magicturnip]

I have posted comments before about my HV and have really got to a stage of sleep deprived demented anger where I really don't want to see her again. I have absolutely no confidence in her knowledge, common sense or ability and feel her coming around is a waste of my time. She shows no ability to respond to the individual circumstances of my son and me. I want to refuse the six month visit and all other visits.
My son wakes repeatedly through the night and I told her he was waking 5-7 times but she refused to offer advice till he was six months old. His sleep is now even worse and, even worse still, I seem to have developed a type of insomnia where even when he does sleep I take a long time to get back to sleep myself. I am getting sleep in 30 to 60 min chunks and totaling about four hours a night at best. I really feel I can't function anymore.

He feeds about 15 times a day. I asked for advice about what sort of routine he could be expected to have but she just said 'all babies are different'. I have now found the info on what typical could look like in a leaflet by paediatricians and dieticians and I am angry she wouldn't give this info. She has done lots of other rubbish things such as not telling me about support in my area, not leaving messages to say she has called etc,. not telling me that my son's weight growth had sharply dropped.

What will happen if I refuse to see her again? I don't mind them sending someone else - just not her.

You can ask to see a different one I think, I don't know.

Tbh what you describe with your baby is TOTALLY normal, it is hard work I know, but it is normal.

btw are you BF or FF?

You can ask to see another one no problem

but what your baby is doing is normal
babies are hard work

Also have you tried sleeping beside him on a bed?

I find I get the maximum sleep this way. He might well be teething too, this can make everything seem a lot worse before it gets better.

You are under no obligation to see a hv, I'm suprised you are seeing one so frequently tbh. They must habe lots of resources in your area.

I saw mine once at the initial visit then she told me where the weigh in clinic was and I just went there when I wanted to (once or twice for weighing, and for his immunisations.)

I didn't bother with the 6-9 month check as I had no concerns.

If there are concerns about dramatic weight loss then you should have some hcp input.

Re the terrible sleeping I've been there (twice!) my son particularly was a terrible sleeper waking a lot and feeding to sleep (bf) we eventually did cc at 16 months it worked cery quicky (within days) and he was sleeping through. wish we had done it a lot earlier it would have saved a lot of tears as desperation! Especially as I want back to work when he was 7 months and as I was bf I got up in fhe night many times then had to get up for work at 5:30am for a 12 hour shift!

You should be able to ring the HV local office and request a different one, if you don't want to speak to her directly. Just to let you know though, my DS used to wake every 2hrs at night and my HV wouldn't offer me much useful advise until he reached 6 months, something to do with under 6months being too young to try sleep training or controlled crying.

My DS settled when he was in his own room and we did start leaving him to cry for slightly longer periods, not too long so as he was inconsolable but sometimes it was long enough for him to drop back to sleep....good luck x

Bf as he is a bottle refusenik. I am not seeing her regularly. We have a co sleeping cot and I took him into my bed last night but made no difference. I have had paediatrician and dietician input.

Good advice in this book- your baby week by week.
Easy to read for sleep deprived person.

it sounds like you are having a really hard time and it is not at all suprising that you feel shit tired. You can refuse to see her or ask for another health visitor, but i think they wil tell you the same things, you are not supposed to do any form of sleep training on a baby less than 6 months and until weaning they are fed on demand, all babies are different some get into a routine others never do. She definatly should have told you about the weight drop. Have you got anyone who can have your baby for a few hours in the day so you can have some sleep at least?

How old is your baby?

He is now five and a half months. I last saw Hv a few weeks ago. He feeds regularly after having reflux so he has learnt a habit from being unwell. It s not nec. Normal for him. There is no one to help in the day. His nights were getting better till four months, then regressed and have stayed regressed.

I think when you have got a baby this age, you are probably best to roll with what they do, even if it is quite inconvenient.

I don't want to sound like I'm not taking you seriously. I am, and it is a horrible situation when you are really not coping on the amount of sleep you're getting.

But it almost sounds as though you have expected things to be very different from how they are - you feel like you ought to be able to solve his sleeping, as though it were a problem in itself, not just something babies do iyswim?

I think you are putting massive pressure on yourself.
I don't know if this is possible but is there any way you could say to yourself, 'this is not my fault, there is nothing I can reasonably do about it, it will pass soon enough' and then kind of try to stop thinking about how you could solve it?

The thing is it isn't an actual 'problem' as such, well, not one that anyone has the answer to. We have all been there, (mine is now 8mo, but my older ones were the same). It does get better.

It's not the HV's fault nor is it yours. It's just a baby.

I hesitate to suggest it but you sound like you might be really depressed. Would it be worth going to see your GP and asking for help for you, or do you think this is all only a result of the lack of sleep? I don't pretend to know either way...sleeping less can make you suicidally unhappy, OTOH it could be PND which can be sorted xx

Btw some HVs are shite. I have had a few dodgy ones. Yours sounds hopeless.

But I don't know if that is the only issue. You could ditch her and see if another one helps you feel a bit better, it can make all the difference having one who understands the way you operate.

I'mnot depressed but Rooney your reply made me feel a bit depressed. It is a sodding problem and no hippy shit 'just roll with it' bollcksis going to change that or the effects of months of chronic sleep deprivation. For example my house currently stinks as I have just burnt through he second pot this week after forgetting about it. I have almost had bad accidents with ds as I am too tired to observe, thnk and react properly. We did not evolve to have vulnerable dependent babies looked after by be chronically sleep deprived person.
Sorry to be blunt and even rude, I'm too tired to observe normal social conventions

Actually Rooney your second reply made me feel better.

thing is magicturnip it is not hippy dippy shit, some babies do not sleep, I really really sympathise my youngest didnt sleep for more than an hour until she was 9 months old and you must feel like absolute shit nobody can ever understand how bad it feels until they are in the middle of it. what you need to do is find a way to cope, anyway at all that works for you (and I am not saying you have to I just couldnt think of a different way to phrase it, advice is just that take what is useful to you and ignore the rest), you say the pead and the dietician are involved, what do they say? Have they had any helpful advice for you? I ended up on ad's and I can tell you now I wasnt depressed I was fucking tired.

All that said if you dont want this health visitor request another one, or find out about drop in's in your area, childrens centres usually have them or your dctors surgery.
I really hope you can get some sleep soon :)

Aw the hippy shit was worth a try

Look seriously what I meant was this.

You can change what the baby is doing.

Or you can change how you respond to it.

It's up to you. Changing what the baby does is, some would say, a matter of a few days/weeks of unutterable stress followed by a tentative 'routine' that is fucked by any sort of event - teeth coming in, a holiday, illness or a night out, and has to be done from scratch all over again.
Others would say don't even bother at this age, it isn't worth it (or fair on the baby come to that)

Changing how you respond is somewhat less of a problem, and it is only temporary. I try not to arrange anything else, try and have as few expectations from other people as I can, and delegate to my children (who at 10 and 6 are fairly helpful at times - I am single).

It makes a huge difference and the baby gets my attention and it works for us. Nothing else gets done though and the house is a tip, usually.

There are always compromises.

Also worth seeing GP and asking for blood test for anaemia and thyroid function, both can be messed up by pregnancy. I had low thyroid after dd2 and felt truly awful. Easily fixed though.

Try no cry sleep solution - helped with mine, but unfortunately not really sleeping through until around 3/4 years. Hope it gets better soon. (And some hv are really bad)

magic yes of course you can - my experience of 3 babies and HVs is that they are generally a waste of time. Go straight to GP and then to a paed for anything like reflux.

Does all sound normal, esp for a reflux baby - hang in there, it will get better. My ds3 had terrible silent reflux and I went to the HV who refused to take me seriously at 5 months and said it was "failure to thrive" (very poor weight gain due to the reflux, below 2nd percentile). We then ended up at casualtly one night when the screaming was so bad and saw a junior doctor who had just finished a paed rotation and immediatley saw it was silent reflux. Referred to paed the next week, on ranatidine straight away, everything started to get better after 6m with the medication and weaning. Turns out he is dairy intolerant but is now a chubby, happy toddler.

Avoid the HVs now you are at this stage - they will only infuriate and upset you which you don't need at the moment. Hang in there, see medically qualified people if you need to and it will start to get better soon, I am sure x

Firstly Rooney, I want to apologise. I was rude and I feel bad about it now. It was nice of you to tak the time out of your day to post.
My house is a tip and I don't do much or see anyone much or even get time to chat on the phone really. The problem is that it's not just an attitude thing. There are real practical repercussions. As well as totalling pans, this week alone I have smacked ds head against the wooden head board of our bed because I was so sleep deprived I misjudged a distance and almost dropped him when I tripped over detritus on th bedroom floor. He is not safe with me. Neither is our house which I might burn down.

Hello.
You sound close to breaking point? Do you have a partner or close friends nearby? Even if they could take your baby for a couple of hours so you could sleep? Alternatively look at homestart

I found that even those not closest to me were willing to help if I asked. This was hard for me to do as I'm normally the one who helps not the other way around!

If I was with my daughter she would feed alot. She had terrible reflux and we finally stopped medicating her around 14mths, Quite frankly it was hell on earth. It made me depressed as I felt I was poisoning her with my milk and I couldn't just enjoy being a mum.

I did the only thing I could do to get sleep. Co sleep and sling her in day.

It did improve over time. The GP rang the Paed team and prescribed Domperidone and Ranitidine. This really did help. Every 6 wks or so I went to HV for weight check and rang doctor for revised dosage.

I would suggest you try another HV if yours isn't helpful. Please don't feel like you are making a fuss. Simply say I feel our relationship has broken down because of x y z and I want to see a different HV.

I didn't like one of the HV and would avoid. If I had to see her I would just make it clear that I wasn't evidence based info not opinions.

If you then don't want to use the HV service withdraw with or without explanation.

You need some respite. Can your other half take a few days off work? You can get a breather that way and a rest while he does the baby care. Worth persevering with the bottle, most babies will take one off someone else if your dh keeps trying it. The feeding board might have tips fir you on that.

i had a non sleeping baby. I worried i might have depression at the time but really it was sleep deprivation and i had the insomnia too. This can lead to depression, get the support you need before you reach that point.

Also have e copy of no cry sleep solution but that's prob not helpful as you are too tired to read.

Will baby sleep in day at all. Can you feed it to sleep and rest?

Im sorry you're having a difficult time op. ive been exactly where you are and its shit. DS was a terrible sleeper, refluxer, had other health issues and I really struggled to cope.

For me, the insomnia was the beginning of PND. Even when he did sleep for an hour or two I would be lying there awake. It was soul destroying.

I would try a get another HV. I went to my GP and got allocated a good one (they save them for the desperate) who was supportive. Couldn't fix the sleep problems but at least I had someone to talk to. He came weekly to see me at home.

Can you afford a cleaner? Is your DP supportive?

Yes you can refuse to see HV but you might find you are " flagged as a concern" if you do this, especially if the relationship between you and the HV hasn't been smooth before .

Don't get angry about this but be aware. Your situation seems very normal and sleep deprived understandably, and the HV is a bit not helpful.

Withdrawing from medical contacts/reviews and wanting to remove a child from surveillance can be seen by the authorities as a marker for a child at risk. Certainly it's been flagged as an issue in some high profile cases. Not saying at all you are going to have soc services on your back or what ever but someone may just ask why you are doing this, and it's worth having a rational quiet together reply up your sleeve ready.