I really don't know what to do for the best.
My dd is 8. Has always had alot of time off school since she satrted at 5 as she has always contracted every bug going. She particularly gets every cough going round and it would floor her. As a baby/toddler she had asthma, and would cough night after night, so i just think she has a weakness there iyswim.
She has had alot of emotional stress in her short life, again particularly in the last 3 years. Her father dipping in and out of her life, and his treatment of her has cuased many sleepless nights, upset, depression.
She has imo been pretty fragile mentally and physically at times. Ongoing sadness, and has had to work hard with my help to be positive and not let him ruin her life.
She has had counseling.
ok.
All thru this the school have been quite understanding. Yet i have always felt a bit of an outsider, that dd somehow was looked at as 'different' and that different doesn't fit. Yet i have always assured HT that dd will be in school when well. I have never allowed her to be home unless she is not well. My parenting is as thorough and as steadfast as i can manage. i don't allow her to get away with things.
Its a close knit country school, not a small school, but one where i used to feel there was a sense of 'family'.
Academically dd is bright, in fact she is G&T.
She lacks confidence though and gets very stressed if she can't do something.
A couple of comments from her year 3 teacher irritated me last year, that dd was 'protective' over me? That is was best not to allow dd to be seen as 'different from the others' 
. This was about 3 days into term when i went up to the teacher to say look dd is here with me this morning but she is ill(i had tried to jolly dd up to go to school although she looked like shit).
The teacher took one look at dd and said 'yes she looks really poorly, this wasn't the best time to have this conversation' I was like what are you angling at, i don't know what you mean.
Nothing more was said.
So at the end of year 3, dd got a hip problem. Was in hospital, was much documented on here. Had nights of agony, took weeks to diagnose, and even then no 'cure'. She was off for a term, with a problem that didn't look likely to be going away.
I kept the school informed the whole 3 months. I was distraught by the whole thing, but kept strong. The school never once contacted me to see how she was. The head never spoke to me off his own back about support for her schooling. I asked for work but never got any.
I managed to speak to head once and he had the EWO at school that day and sent her round to me.
EWO was good, said she would ring back in a week to see how we were doing.
She never did.
The summer holidays came, and during the hols dd's hip clicked back into place. She returned to school in septemeber, but caught a virus that felled alot of kids and was off for about 5 days in total over the space of 2 weeks, as it kept coming back. I'd send her in, then she's get rough again. I thought nothing of it, as i knew that others were off, that extra staff had been called in etc...
October came and i got a letter from the EWO. They saw that dd was back at school now, but that her attendance was still poor.Could i come in for a meeting.
I was pretty shocked. I had heard nothing from the head. As far as he knew dd could have been off with her hip problem, but she wasn't it was the virus. I was shocked because i had heard nothing form the school for 6 weeks and the EWO had never got back to me when dd was off in June.
The meeting was awful, the head had called the EWO in, not the other way around. 'What was i going to do about dd's attendance' over and over. I said i could do nothing if she was ill, what did he want me to do. I said he KNEW i was pro active, conscientious. I cried alot and tbh wish i hadn't but there we go. I said i would continue to do my utmost. At the end of the meeting he started mumbling 'ah yes there WERE alot of kids off during the start of term weren't there' as if 'oh yes i remember now it was not just pirate's dd' . I was like 'oh my god you can't even remember 6 weeks or so back.'
I know i am going on here but i need to vent and share. As i left the meeting he took me to one side and caringly said 'if you ever need to talk, please come and see me' NOT ON YOUR LIFE HT.
During that meeting he suggested the school social person get in touch with me, i think this person is some sort of liason/counsellor. I said 'ok' if it meant help or a way to do things properly with keeping a good relationship with the school system.
Did i ever hear anything-no.
So, back to now. dd had a good term, didn't get ill.
This term, we have both got swine flu.
Dd has been in for 2 days out of the last 11. I have let school know. Rung time and time with updates. I even got my friend to call, who waslooking after me the first two days, to ask them for school work.
Noone has got back to us. So i have sat here ill, with dd ill, very stressed in how this will affect her attendance. I have sent her in on the two days because i feel pressured in my head, because i know they can suddenly come down on you. Like they have no 'procedure'. It's been miserable and lonely.
I feel that even though we are very ill ( tho getting thru it now)all i have been worried about is school.
I have realised that every time dd is ill, now or in the future it will just look 'bad' on their records. It won't help dd's education either, i KNOW she is missing out. Yet this feeling that dd being at school is just about 'records' won't go away. I feel the school cannot cope with it's 'family' caring ethos. I hear all the time that it's understaffed. Things don't get put in letters to us. I have heard the head regrets taking the school on, and wishes he had stayed at one of the smaller local ones.
My head is spinning. I know i am all over the place with my feelings abotu how i was treated, with regards to the meeting and anyone informing me or something wrong. If dd had never been ill so many times then i guess i'd just be takingher to school and not known about the 'system'. It's the thought they can't provide her with work at home even tho they moan she is falling behind. I put this down to no communication between them. I wonder if she would do better in a smaller school. Whereby, info does get thru, both ways. I sometimes wonder if she would be better off being HE?
I know this is a not a very well worded post. but i am all over the place. I feel so guilty we have had swine flu, guilyy she is off. All i want is a quiet life, she goes to school end of. But we always seem to be in the focus becuase of her rubbish immune system.