Mum tries to enrol her five-year-old in school, is asked what 'type of birth' she had.

A Connecticut mother was busily enrolling her five-year-old in a local elementary when one question stopped her in her tracks:

“Type of birth: Vaginal__ Cesarean__.”

Cara Paiuk said her husband had been filling out a stack of forms for Aiken Elementary School, when she happened to glance over and saw the “absurdly inappropriate” question.

Furious — and confused — but mostly furious, she tore the paper from his hands, and decided to investigate.

She was so peeved about the whole thing she also chronicled it for the New York Times:

“Why was he answering this question?” she wrote. “Come to think of it, why was anyone answering it?

“It reminded me of some awful blind date asking if the carpet matched the drapes,” she said.

“My vagina was not up for discussion by a stranger then, and it’s certainly not up for public examination now.”

Her first move was to  contact the head nurse from the school who told her the question was on the form because it had, er, always been on the form. Um…

The nurse also explained that the form would be stored in the school nurses file, so that it could be consulted if Paiuk’s child displayed any learning difficulties.

“I asked how birthing methods would be relevant, and she responded that a cord wrapped around the neck depriving a child of oxygen or foetal distress could lead to developmental problems,” she said.

“That seemed both far-fetched and inadequate to me. If adverse birth events are the underlying concern, why not ask about them? Birth trauma can occur regardless of delivery type.”

Still not satisfied she took her concerns further up the chain, to the medical adviser of the district.

He informed her she was the first person to ever bring it up and he had completed the same questionnaire when enrolling his own child TWENTY YEARS previously.

“Such parental nostalgia might support a remake of “Gilligan’s Island,” but scarcely provides support for an intrusive question on an exhaustive questionnaire that is used only in rare circumstances,” she wrote.

The school has now said it will review the form to make it more “more meaningful and efficient”

It’s about time, really.

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