Posted on 01/05/2007 8:32:57 AM PST by qam1
Here is my nightmare. I moved to Madison without knowing anyone here, so I found a babysitter through the University of Wisconsin graduate program in early education. The woman I found was great, but she said that she was really busy, and could her boyfriend babysit instead.
I squashed all my sexist stereotypes and asked for his qualifications. She said he has a law degree in Puerto Rico, where they are from, but he can't work here because he didn't pass the Wisconsin bar, and he doesn't want to study for it because they'll only be here two years. So he is looking for work. He has five younger siblings and he babysat them.
I said okay. I did the normal routine-- stayed with him and the baby one day. Went out for a little the next. The third day, I told him I'd be at the coffee shop. I told him if he wants to go there, go when the baby is asleep so the baby doesn't see me and start crying for me, so he shows up at the coffee shop at naptime.
I say, "Where's the baby?"
He says, "At home."
"AT HOME?!?!?"
So I sprint eight blocks home, imagining all the most terrible things a mom can imagine. I get home and the baby is asleep, on my bed, ten feet from an open stairway.
The guy says, "I'm sorry."
I say, "You can just go."
He says, "I think it was a language problem. I just misunderstood you. I thought you told me to go to the coffee shop and leave the baby at home."
This could happen to anyone, and it does. My friend paid a chic agency in the New York City area to find her a bonded, background-checked nanny. But she turned out to be anorexic and she fainted behind the wheel. My friend didn't know until the car was wrapped around a pole. (Everyone safe, thank goodness.)
The difficulty of leaving a baby to go to work cannot be understated. And babysitting situations like this make it even more difficult. So we've now gone months with no babysitter, and my husband is about to kill me because he's picking up a lot of the slack.
So here's where the advice comes in: how to find a perfect babysitter, right? Wrong. There are no perfect babysitter situations. It's the nature of motherhood to be unsure of leaving. One thing I can tell you, though, is that I am a part of the opt-out generation: I sprinted up corporate ladders and ran two startups of my own, and I don't want to do that now, when I have young kids.
A press release from Lifetime Television just announced, "Women in generation Y do not want to permanently drop out of the workforce." The assumption here, of course, is that the Generation X women-- me-- who are dropping out of corporate life today are going to abstain from all business for the next twenty years until all their kids are in college.
Newsflash: The current opt-out phenomenon is not permanent. Some moms can do it, some can't, most fall somewhere in between, like me. As the kids get older, the opt-out revolution is about opting out of the absurd and inflexible hours that corporate America is demanding right now. It is not opting out of all work that does not involve kids. In fact, the majority of small businesses are started by women for these very reasons.
So, finally, here's some advice. Babysitter problems are not unique to you. They are part of a massive trend, and one bad babysitter doesn't mean you should give up on corporate life, and the crazy demands of corporate life don't mean that you should give up on work outside the home. We are all trying to find a compromise, and some of us are trying to find a sitter.
Yes, I've heard of this. However, unless the group also brought their babies, it's not the same as the author's situation. She told the babysitter to bring the baby to the coffeeshop (although she didn't tell him very clearly, because I also thought she meant he should leave the sleeping baby at home!).
If she's an employee of the coffee shop, her child should not be there when she's on shift. If she was meeting clients, the child still shouldn't be there, unless the clients expected it, and then what does she need the babysitter for?
carolyn
It's scary, isn't it? I worked with a life-and-health actuary who thought Hillary-care was a good idea!
Terrifying ... you'd think that a person who spent his time calculating health-care costs would understand that the costs aren't going to go away, no matter how the system is arranged.
Yet this woman undoubtedly considers herself smart.
Silly me. In this author's world, all adults have day jobs and parenting is a hobby.
That is the most perspicacious comment I've seen on this thread. (Not that all the others were bad ...) I'm putting it in the mental file to use myself at the first opportunity!
She said she had two successful "startups" so here is a perfect opportunity for her to start up another - Executive babysitting.
I've thought of going into that business myself, when I'm 60 or so :-).
I also liked the story about the German man who was a "relationship terminator"!
Ahhh. Common sense and realizing that life is not "all about ME." What an epiphany! ;-)
That is not what is being alluded to here. This nitwit WORKS at the coffee shop.
No. I've already gotten in trouble once for leaving my six year old at home alone for an hour, while I ran to the store to get her medicine. Never leave the child alone. Webcams don't count.
What bizarre instructions. Seems like the lawyer doofus did what he was told.
More fundamentally, why did this woman have a kid if she didn't want to be around it?
"As the kids get older, the opt-out revolution is about opting out of the absurd and inflexible hours that corporate America is demanding right now.
While, of course, demanding that her husband work more absurd and inflexible hours to "pick up the slack."
That is his responsibility of course. He is the bread winner and she is the MOM.
...and are therefore wrong?
I'm head of a single-income family, so structured in order that we can homeschool our children. Some people deliberately choose this life, even today, and it's not out of ignorance.
Agree in part, although a child should never be left sleeping in a bed, or close to an unguarded stairway.
Beds are dangerous, not only can the children roll off, but the baby can get tangled in the covers and suffocate (happened in a day care center at least once I remember).
We hired baby sitters from time to time, but they were kids we knew from the neighborhood, who had played with our children, or children from our church.
My wife didn't work until the kids were in school. Raising kids is a full-time job, and one of the parents should take that job, not hire it out. My wife beat me to it (she actually had stopped working several years before we had our first kid).
Nonsense. We live in an 'economically vibrant area,' 35 miles from NYC.
I stayed at home and raised all four of our children. Homeschooled the youngest. Never had a single problem with any of my kids getting into drugs, alcohol, tattoos, piercings, or any of the other 'fads' so many of their peers --children of dual-career parents-- fell for.
We did all this on ONE income --my husband's. And he doesn't have a fancy degree.
Don't tell me I'm the exception. Lots of stay-at-home/homeschooling moms live in my area. And they live well, if not opulently.
People who insist that you need two incomes to support a family are either lying or delusional. Too bad for their children.
Our company taps into top-tier stay at home moms regularly for all kinds of consulting work.
This lady's a whack job, but her point is valid. You don't need to go to work to maintain some sort of connection to your career, and you can do it in the context of staying home to raise your kids.
However, don't expect to CLIMB some sort of ladder while you are raising 0 to 5 year olds.
The technology available in the home is MOST DEFINITELY good enough for great talent to contribute in specific ways. We get talent we couldn't even discuss affording at incredible rates simply because we accommodate stay at home moms.
In large organizations, this is a nightmare. Small to medium, this is very workable.
I noticed your use of the PAST tense which means you are affiming my point about experiences from years ago.
We live in a different era today. For most people who want to buy a house today the ASP is staggering. If you want a house in a good area (low crime, decent schools) then it costs you something. If people can afford to have a stay home TODAY then it means one parent makes real money. If you want to make real money then you won't likely do it in a rural area economy unless you own a business. Since $150K a year on one income is hard to come by then it means that two people usually work.
Who said it was?
And this is a good situation for people and companies. What if I don't need 40 hours a week for someone to be a high paid employee but instead I need about 50 hours per month? I can get a talented person for reasonable cost and she gets to earn income and maintain her skills and sanity doing grown up stuff on the side.
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