I am fuming with the school

[lougle]

After all our 'attendance issues' and my discussion with the Head Teacher, who told me that DD2 couldn't possibly have had a temperature at school, because they would have sent her home....

This morning DD2 didn't want to go to school - she told me she was poorly.

I told the teacher this morning that DD2 had said this (her temperature was 37.5, so just on the cusp of 'do not send to school', but of course if I don't send to school I have to get a doctor's note now).

DH went to collect DD2 this afternoon and teacher said 'DD2 has a headache and didn't go out to afternoon play.'

It turns out that DD2 told the teacher that she felt poorly before lunch and after lunch and the teacher didn't take action (other than letting her miss break time).

I took her temperature because she looked thoroughly miserable - 38.5 and rising.

Why can't they just do what they're meant to do?

Btw, she says when she swallows, her cheek hurts. I remember that from Mumps, but are there other things that can cause that?

Oh no, I would be fuming.... So much for 'automatically sending her home with a temp.' Well they tripped themselves up there. So rhet wont be able yo use thst old chestnut again, ha! I hope they are sorry (but they probably won't be).

Hope your lovely dd2 bounces back (has she has her MMRs?)

I think that can happen in an ear infection too.

I'd be cross with school too. Lougle I'm so sorry you're going through this. It sounds like every day is a pita with this school.

YOu know to write a note yes?

To use as evidence in the future when you need to prove that you know what you are doing and the school well, just don't!

Oh Lougle they are shit aren't they?
:(

Lougle, sorry if I have missed it somewhere, as I've only read some of your posts recently, but have you considered the possibility of Glandular Fever at all? I know it can drag on for some people and the symptoms can come and go, including the temp being up and down.

There's a bit here about it dragging on and resurfacing in some cases.

As for school. I don't know what it is about some school's/teachers that makes them so adverse to sending sick children home, when the schools are the ones that get all jumpy about children passing bugs around. You can't win, if you send them in you are passing the illness around, if you keep them off they're on your back for poor attendance and if you hedge your bets and send them in, they say they either say they can't be responsible for monitoring individual children or they say they will but then don't bother.

Interesting moosemama, thanks.

An (hopefully carefully worded and factual) email has been sent, with a request that a copy be put in her file, and a comment that I would be putting a copy in my file.

Eldest DD had glandular fever when was 9 and it kept springing up over a 5 year period! trouble is to test for it is difficult as the timing has to be spot on for a blood test to confirm it. x

It is painful though and DDs throat and sides of face used to swell uncomfortably.

Your dds school was totally brainless today grrr

Apparently the actual glandular swelling bit isn't marked in some individuals though coff. Which is how it gets overlooked in some cases.

I wonder if that's what she had the first time? The doctor was surprised to feel that she had so many glands up in her neck.

Yes that is what happened with DD moosemama, because she repetitively had tonsilitis as a child they disregarded it as that even though she had tonsils out you can still catch it apparently. Then they said it was farengitis (sp) so we bought that but 6 months down the line it went up with neck swell and thats when they mentioned glandular fever. Blood test didnt reveal nothing first time round and thats when I got told the blood test is a hard one (or was its was years ago now) as if the timing is out it will read all clear for it.

So your DD could possibly be suffering similar lougle :)

Lougle...I had glandular fever when I was 18.
Most unpleasant.
Are her glands in her armpits and groin up too?
If so it's more than likely glandular fever.

I just don't understand why everyone seems so keen to think she's lying

I was explaining to DD1's carer, how DD2 just seems to 'shut down/mask up' once she's at the classroom. It's not easy to describe, but yesterday she was begging me not to send her to school. She was on the verge of tears as we walked from the car to the school. In fact, she was clinging to my leg as I walked towards the cloakroom door.

But then, the teacher took her hand, made a joke and said 'dd2, you've got to write up your fantastic poem today so Mummy can read it!' -DD2 gave her 'funny'laugh (imagine someone trying to impersonate a duck talking) and went in the classroom.

The carer said 'oh well in that case she's playing you'

I said 'no, she knew she had no choice and the teacher pointed out a nice thing which would happen'.

Why, because she is 5, do people think she is being manipulative instead of accepting that a) she doesn't feel well and b) she doesn't like the thought of school, even if once there it isn't as bad as she thought it would be?

Sounds like me as a child Lougle.
Even now I can't explain it...my utter terror and the isolation I felt when I went through the school doors.
Everything confused me. I didn't understand the rules and some of the kids were horrible.
I was the boy who cried wolf too often and my parents got sick of it and sent me to school no matter what - which if course meant that sometimes I was sent to school when ill.
Then they would get cross because they had to fetch me home.
I did what was expected of me at school...I was the top reader in the school, was in the choir and orchestra.
And I hated every fucking minute if it.
Oddly, until I was 13/14. Then with options at GCSE I got some choice in what I learnt and started to enjoy school..I e en stayed in for a levels! :o
I don't know why your dd doesn't like school but its clear she doesn't.
Sometimes there is no clear answer..it's just a gut feeling which cannot be shaken off or explained, especially when your verbal skills are not very good.

...and I would point out that being scared/stressed can make to feel ill.
I used to suffer from nausea, diahorrea and cramps on Sunday nights.
Every Sunday night :(

I feel your pain lougle ds1 is very anxious and is most comfortable around me, so I also get the he's just 'playing' you, when they can't see what I see.

I agree wholeheartedly.

I said to her carer:

'my bottom line is, she has some genuine illness, evidenced by fever (career says some children can make themselves ill. Well, it's Saturday, no school, she has a temp of 39.2 and is refusing breakfast). She may well have some anxiety that she is expressing in physical symptoms. Either way, just because she can't express herself the way an adult might, that does not make her feelings any less real. Doubting a child and breaking their trust is a terrible thing.'

In fact, I might take her to out of hours today. A waste of nhs resources, perhaps, but I want her genuine symptoms documented, especially as I've written to the head.

I would take her Lougle, as you say, best to get it documented that it's not only on school days and a second opinion from a different doctor might be interesting as well.

Eldest DD as far as school was concerned was "playing it" she ended up with 5 duodenal ulcers due to stress :(

I moaned constantly about my arms hurting, muscles hurting feeling wobbly, couldnt see etc they made me stay and ignored it. Turned out I was having fits after a brain scan.

Anxiety plays a part in illness and stress makes things worse but to me a child tells their mum. Thats it and if the mum takes the child to the school doors its a case of "oh well I got to go in" and a sort of resignation takes over.

I dont believe its to do with the fact that they are fine in school so there is nothing wrong.

I would take her GP Lougle and trust your instincts regardless of other peoples opinions x

I'm another one who was told she was 'playing it' when I was ill in secondary school. I was becoming weaker and weaker, losing weight, looked obviously ill, had intermittent temperatures and a persistent cough. I remember sitting in a French lesson and looking at my teacher and all the other pupils going about their normal days and actually thinking to myself "How can they not know? This is it, I am going to die here and no-one is going to notice or care." I have memory issues, but that one is burned into my memory - I remember to this day how lost and hopeless it felt.

That was in the November after I started Secondary and I had been ill since the previous winter in Primary. Mum had taken me to the GP several times and been told they couldn't find anything so I must be ok.

Two days after that French lesson I collapsed. My step-dad carried me into A&E and they told my Mum to expect the worst, they couldn't find a cause, chest xrays showed nothing, until one particular consultant suddenly thought of taking them from another non-standard angle and discovered both lungs just about full up with pneumonia. He said if they hadn't found it then, they didn't think I would have lasted another 24 hours - yet I'd been at school that day - because I had no choice. I gave up trying to tell them how ill I felt, because I felt no-one was listening and instead just dragged myself to school each day desperately holding myself together, trying not to collapse.

My mum has told me she 'knew' in her heart how ill I was and was terrified I was going to die, but felt powerless to get anyone to listen to her.

As a parent now myself, it has definitely affected how I feel about sending my own dcs to school when they are ill. I will always trust my own 'gut feeling' first and foremost.

Very few people are ready to accept that emotions (such as stress and anxiety, fear) will have some very physical symptoms.
And that sometimes, in children especially, the emotions will 'only' be expressed physically (ie dc1 got headaches and tummy aches for about year due to stress bt never expressed his anxiety in any other ways. Because he bottled it all up and physical symptoms was the only way he could express his emotions).

However, Lougle, there is something else going atm with your dd2. A child doesn't get fever when 'they are playing up' or even when they are stressed or anxious. There is some sort of infection going on, whatever it is. She is obvioulsy fighting something.

Perhaps, you could have a word with her teacher re the fever this weekend and ask them to keep an eye on it. It seems that the teacher is mixing the current problem (Infection) with other issues (The fact dd2 doesn't like school, etc...).
But tbh, this seems to me very similar to what I have seen happening with my dcs, incl very NT ds1. Unless the child is really complaining of something (and can say exactly what it is) or the child is lying on the table not moving, they are very much expected to 'get on with it'.

Schools are useless, a few weeks ago i collected ds1 from school in tears, white as a sheet, he had been feeling ill all day and the begged the teacher to go home and he wasnt allowed i wasnt even called! upon getting home he immediatly lay on the sofa vomiting for the rest of the evening, for a sensory seeker laying still just dosnt happen he was really ill.

This week dh collected ds from school, teary and unable to talk he had lost his voice, again no word from school. On friday dh called to inform them yet again ds would be in that day and was spoken to like dirt school demanded a vaild reason and refused to accept a teacher wouldnt of reported ds being ill at school

USELESS FOOKERS the lot of them.