I gave up interacting positively with health visitors when an early one of mine recited a leaflet I'd seen on the internet after I said I'd looked on the internet already and I was asking for her personal opinion. They seem not to be allowed to have personal opinions (I suspect if they deviate from the approved list of Things To Say it makes them liable for anything that subsequently goes wrong). I think they're there mostly to spot obviously abused or neglected kids and obvious medical problems, and for everyone else they just have to look as if they're being useful.

The questionnaires are infuriating, but they're also national standard. (Actually, I think international standard.) There's something just like the post-natal depression one (are you more depressed than before? no? you're obviously fine then) in the research interviews I'm doing, and we're not allowed to change the questions because it buggers up the analysis.