The holidays can be a very hard time for those in the childcare business. It seems like the last few weeks leading up to Christmas become more and more stressful. It also feels like this is the time of year when our clients forget that we are just like they are.
Take for example getting paid. Budgets are tight during the holidays, and sometimes parents delay paying their childcare bill in order to buy presents that are on sale, or pay bills that they consider more important than their childcare. For providers, having to ask for our pay is a year-round issue. But during the holiday season, when we are buying gifts for our own children and food for Christmas dinner, we feel disregarded and unloved when we have to go begging to be paid.
Photo Credit: danaberlith via Flickr.
It is even more offensive when a parent comes through the door bragging about an expensive item they just bought and in the very next sentence telling us they forgot the checkbook at home. Funny how they never forget to bring us the kids. Just once I would love to see a parent remember the checkbook and forget the baby bag or the breast milk. The truth is, they consider these items crucial, but our paycheck is simply an afterthought.
In addition to worrying about getting paid, providers also get to worry about getting off of work on time. Mom or Dad don’t think about their provider having plans when they "pop into the mall" to pick up a gift they ordered. They have little concern for the childcare provider’s evening when they stop for groceries for their visiting family arriving. They just assume she has other kids so she won’t mind.
The provider on the other end of this thoughtless behavior has everyone else out the door and would love to go get her groceries and clean for her mom and dad’s arrival. So she starts her cleaning still watching the one child left and sends her husband or teenager to the store. In the meantime she fumes about the parent who couldn’t even be bothered to ask her if she was okay with working overtime for them. She is also worried that her family will arrive and she will still be watching this child, which will make it hard to relax and visit with her loved ones. Since she scheduled for them to arrive after everyone was scheduled to pick up, she should be laying out the snacks and finishing putting the last touches on her house.
What does the parent have to say upon arrival? Here are some of the many excuses that are invalid, inconsiderate and downright rude:
- I would have come here first, but it was on my way and I thought it would only take me a few minutes.
- I had to stop at the store on my way here because he is impossible to shop with.
- I needed to stop at their store before coming here, because they close at five and I won’t have time tomorrow.
- I don’t like taking him in and out of the car
- If I take him to the mall with me he always throws a fit to buy things
- I didn’t realize what time it was getting to be. I got off early and lost track of time shopping
- I took the day off today to get my house clean for the in-laws, and it took me longer than I thought, but I can’t clean and watch him.
- I know he loves to play so I thought I would go there first and let him have fun
- I know he is going to miss his friends over the next couple of days so I wanted to give him time to tell them goodbye
In case any parent reading this is wondering, not one of these makes what you are doing okay.
You are also not the first parent or even the 20th to try these lines on us. We hear them from parent after parent, and after a while we feel like the traffic cop listening for the 100th time to the speeder who claims their speedometer is off. In other words, we don’t give two hoots why you cared so little about our time that you showed up late. This behavior sends a very clear message to us about where we rank in your esteem.
The next clear message to a provider that they are simply the hired lackey: the tokens of appreciation exchanged during the holiday season. There are those parents who remember to deliver a gift card and a note letting the provider know how important they are. There are others who drop off a check with a little extra in it for the holidays. Unfortunately there are also those who can’t even be bothered to buy the same cheap secret Santa gift they got their co-worker for their provider.
Meanwhile the provider bakes trays of cookies, puts thought into a small gift for each child and in some cases one for the family as well. After sending everything home and realizing that even a holiday card with, “Thank-you for all you do for us” isn’t coming, the urge to go back to corporate America -- where at least a secret Santa mug awaits -- is overwhelming. Providers aren’t looking for a big wad of cash or a diamond. They want a tin of hot chocolate with a few sentences telling them what they do is important. When it doesn’t come, the message that they are of no importance might as well be lit up in Christmas lights on the front lawn.
Another huge faux-pas parents pull over the holidays revolves around time off. When a provider asks for time off well in advance, she makes plans. It never fails that at least one parent will forget her closure date and show up. Then there are others who will ask her to cancel because they "haven’t found anyone," when in reality they have had a month or more and waited until the last minute.
There are even those who make nasty passive aggressive remarks about how, "they wished they could have the week of Christmas off." So the provider either gives up her time off without a fight because she doesn’t want conflict over the holidays or sticks to her guns and receives emails and text messages bullying and berating her for wanting time off.
Either way, the vacation she has been so excited about becomes a time of resentment, depression and fighting with her children, who have planned on having her all to themselves and are now bitterly disappointed. She ends up unable to attend the holiday concert and parties during the school day that all the other mommies are going to. She cancels lunch with the other provider friends she never gets to see. She reschedules her nail and hair appointment and resigns herself to the sad fact that she will never get to do what her clients do: turn in a request and enjoy their time off.
You would think that these behaviors would be limited to a very small number of jerks.
The truth is that almost every single parent, even the best of them, has done one or more of these things to their provider. They don’t do it out of evil or malice. They do it out of selfishness and thoughtlessness. They do it because they are so concerned with their own daily needs and wants that the nice lady who is always available and always agreeable just gets taken for granted. They don’t seem to realize that same sweet lady looking sad and dejected as they deliver their excuses and platitudes. And that’s the final icing on the "You Don’t Matter" cupcake.
Theresa J Mulhern
"Your childcare provider is, next to your spouse, the most important relationship you will ever have with another human being"
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