Originally Posted by Leigh:
When I was 12, I was babysitting until as late as 3am for families, and I was changing diapers of boys and girls. Girls have the same teenage hormones, and I wonder if you would worry about a girl changing a son's diaper.
I'm not dismissing your worry, but I feel it is perfectly normal for a 12 year old who is working at Mom's daycare to help out with diaper changes, just as it would be if he were babysitting away from the home.
I have hired a daycare provider's teenage son to babysit my own kids, and have been very impressed with his maturity and skills with kids. He's by far the best sitter we've had, male or female.
I hope this puts your mind at ease a little.
I feel that if we hired a preteen to babysit, I would have less of a problem because I would have met the person, probably an interview of some sort to gage the level of responsibility of the person and put my mind to rest. In this case I have never met the son and I am paying the mother to look after my daughter.