Call me crazy. Call me judgmental. I honestly don’t care because I will never put my child in daycare. It’s not so much that I feel like I am a bad parent because I can’t watch my child. I support and respect all parents that work and are able to do daycare.
I have an issue when I see time and time again, the kids beating up on each other and nothing being done about it. I hate seeing kids picking on others that aren’t there because they want to be, they are there so that their parents can provide for them. But quite often there is never enough help to be able to watch all of the kids and that is when trouble starts.
Then, being the germaphobe and thinking the worst thing that could happen, I worry that what if I take my child there and he puts a lego in his mouth and tries to swallow it? Who is going to help him? Are the workers CPR certified? What about those snotty nosed kids who drink their buggers? Are they sick? Contagious? Maybe they’re just teething. Who is going to keep my child away from that snot faced germ carrier? I guess these are things that I can look into if I ever had to use daycare, but shouldn’t this just be a standard protocol?
The gym I go to has childcare and it freaks me out if I were to leave my child there. They have cameras that I can watch him the whole time I work out- seriously that is the only way I would leave him there. When I was little, my parents always took me to the gym with them and I would play with all the kids. Looking back, I have no idea how often they cleaned the place, if they ever sanitized the toys and play equipment. I wasn’t a sick kid and didn’t really have any problems then, but when I think about it I think, “What did they do when a kid puked?” Gives me the willies just thinking about it.
I know that I am just being crazy and thinking outloud and there a lot of great daycares out there. I just have a problem when kids are taken to a place to be watched over and they are just being injured, put in situations out of their control, or not being cared for properly. We’ve all seen the videos of the kid who kicks down another and no one does anything to reprimand or comfort either child. The news is full of creepers who take advantage of children by trusting caretakers. How can we get this fixed? How can we get these people that are hurting these kids not only fired, or let go, but take some kind of legal action?
I have never been one to stand up for kids really because they usually annoy me. One time we were at a pizza place and we took my little nephew with us. There was a play area and some kids were in there with him. Don’t get me wrong, he can be pretty annoying himself, but he just wanted to go in there and play with the LEGOS. All of the sudden the older kids started throwing legos inside the play area and my nephew was stuck inside crying as these kids kept picking on him. They were old enough to know better and their parents were just binging away on the pizza buffet.
I couldn’t take it anymore, because the older kids parents weren’t doing anything to stop it either and there were other kids they were hurting too. So I went back there, and in my protective uncle voice, yelled at the kids. This nephew has quite the reputation to annoy most anyone and so for me to get all papa bear was a big deal. I just don’t appreciate it when people are picking on someone littler than them. Fortunately when the mom came back I didn’t go off on her too because I would have and it would have gotten nasty.
I think my hold up with daycare is the fact that I can’t be there to protect my child. I know that with my wife or grandmas or even close friends that he will be treated according to my standards and that they have his best interest in mind. If I were to let go of that control and something were to happen to him, I would only blame myself. I know many of you are thinking… good luck with school, camp, classes, etc. I guess I am a control freak and want to know for sure that my son is being taken care of the way I would want him to be. I’ve come a long way though from his infancy. I wouldn’t let my wife leave the house for the first two months he was born. I freaked out when anyone touched him and I never let him out of my sight. You think I’m kidding, I would bring him, sleeping, into the kitchen while we ate dinner just in case he stopped breathing or coughed or said dad for the first time. So maybe by the time he gets to Kindergarten, I’ll be able to let him go, if, my wife volunteers everyday:)
