Originally Posted by C'est la vie.:
I think you might not realize that the perspective of daycare providers comes from one that often sees excessive avoidance of parenting responsibilites. Most parents don't want to take their kids to do shopping. I don't. What I see is CONSTANT avoidance of parenting, for long hours on many days off. Parents that want to see their children for MAYBE two hours in the evening then put them to bed. "Good lord, don't let Johnny nap today or he'll be up till 9 and I'll actually have to parent for a few hours. Just let him stay awake all day and be cranky because I want to put him in bed at 7 without a backwards glance." The same parents are desperate to drop their kids off first thing every morning and leave them in daycare for as long as they can muster. Parenting is hard when you forget how to do it, and don't learn appropriate guidance techniques.
I work outside the home... in daycare. My kids go to daycare with me, come home with me. We have a long day. I agree with the ridiculousness of parents needing "time away".
For example... on Friday one DCP came in at 10 with her son who'd been coughing and feeling sick all week. She said "I'm only so late because I was going to keep him home to rest since I have the day off, but he kept asking to come to daycare." So she let her 3 year old decided that he wanted to be at daycare... thats 1. Here's 2. After pointing out that he hadn't been feeling well all week she left him there until 5:45. 15 minutes before all the staff goes home, he was one of the last 5 children there.. not feeling well, on a friday. WTF.
Several of our parents work a 7 on 7 off schedule and their kids don't miss a day. EVER. All the parents take their days off because they "need a break" but they don't realize that daycare is hard work for young kids. It's their job and it's NOT a desk job staring at excel sheets. It's fun but EXHAUSTING for children.
Here's how I feel. My children are CHILDREN and daycare is their employment. They will never have to work harder or longer hours than I do. I'm the adult. My job is to suck it up and make their lives easy, not have someone else make my life easy for me.
There's one infant dad at our centre who last week complained that we don't offer dinner in our group child care facility because his child is hungry at 5. Mom gets off work at 4. Dad is on disability right now. WTF is wrong with parents that they can't cope with raising their children?
DAYCARE IS HARD WORK for young children. Why don't many parents realize that?
hey where is my like button!!
great post!!
and to the unregistered, I wish every parent is like you... I would die for more great parents that sound like you... these days, it seems they are scarce..