Nannyshare or nanny with own child?

Maria, I think I can help you , I have messaged you on the other thread that you have. Please contact me on [email protected] and we can have a chat.

You may run into problems with OFSTED with that arrangement, and also any insurers, because the nanny would technically be caring for children from 3 families, albeit one of her own, which OFSTED see as childminding even though it isn't in her home IYSWIM.

Hi,

A few months ago we took on a nanny with her own baby and, unfortunately, it didn't work out. Although we employed her for a few months, eventually her child (who was 1 when she left) proved too much with my 2 (DS1 DD2.5). The main issues of contention were illness (if mine were ill, she didn't want to come in, and if her's was ill, she wouldn't leave him with anyone else). Also it proved very hard to look after my 2 as her little one was starting to walk and crawl which took up alot of her time and attention. Having said all that, the nanny was brilliant and we mutually agreed that the situation wasn't going to improve...

For the foreseeable future, I won't employ a nanny with her own child.

HTH and good luck!

Maria - I don't think the same problems would arise if nanny didn't have her own child as the mixture of the job with looking after her own child was the main thing which instigated the problems ie. she wouldn't have to drive home to pick up her own child or have any excuse for her boyfriend to come to our house if she hadn't had a child to begin with.
But she was a problematic nanny in many other ways as well.
I think that a very clear discussion of expectations before she started working for us would've helped but I had no idea that she would find it reasonable to behave the way that she did (she was qualified with 10 years childcare experience).

I take my Ds, 18mths, to work. Originally I did 4 short days but have now changed to 3 long days ( 8-6 ) as my boss wanted to spend more time at home with her Dc. I actually prefer the 3 long days as we can get more done instead of rushing back for 3pm for Mum boss to be home. My Ds fits in with whatever suits the family and he's pretty laid back with it. Occassionally my mum boss is late but she's a GP so emergancies come up. It doesn't worry me in the slightest as I find give and take is essential in any nanny job. She's always so desparately apologetic but it really doesn't bother me. If she's major late then I just bath my Ds with her Dc and he's all ready for bed when we go home. I have had employers who have gone to the Mall at 2pm and spent the afternoon shopping and rung up at 5 to 7 to say they are stuck in traffic. That used to irritate me especialy as they were sahm's and could have gone earlier!

I think it is important that you and any nanny have the same views on routine, discipline and feeding etc whether they have a child or not.

With regards to illness etc, I look after their Dc when they're ill and I bring my Ds to work if he's poorly as long as he's not contagious. I'm talking coughs and colds rather than D&V! I figure that if the children are in close contact that they will get things together anyway. If my Ds was ill, my DP would take time off as he can work from home.

It takes a couple of weeks to settle into a routine that works for both nanny and charges and nannies child. They all have to adapt but an experienced nanny would deal with it professionally. Most nannies I know tend to put their own childrens needs second. I did to start but my boss was very insistant that I treated them both equally. My Ds adores their Dc and her name is normally the first thing he says when I get him up in the mornings. The job is ending soon but they live close enough that we will meet up weekly to keep the childrens friendship going.

Good luck with your nanny search.

hi maria

i think a nanny with own child is easier than a nannyshare but if you do go down this route then find a family thats near by and if that family did stop/not want the share anymore then you will have to find another family to help with costs

anyone (female-sorry nick) under 45/50 could have a baby that you employ - worry about it when it happens and yes if has a baby then hopefully the nanny wont think about no 2 for a few years, and if she did get pregant then you dont have to offer job back with nanny coming back with 2

Maria - I think it's likely that 4 short days would appeal as one of the issues with our ex-nanny with child was that she wanted to leave early constantly (ie. before the end of her contracted hours - I am not the type to ask for overtime).
Other issues were that she didn't like to wake baby in the morning to bring him to work so she would leave him at home with her partner, come to work, take ds to school then drive dd the 30 mins back to her house to pick up her baby then drive dd back to our house so our dd spent 1 hour in the car unecessarily. Also we had reports that her partner was coming into our house during her working hours (ds mentioned that he was coming in and sleeping on the sofa!) which was to do with picking up the baby to take him places - it turned out that her partner had a criminal record so was definitely not the kind of person I wanted hanging round my house or children!
Also nanny's idea of what she wanted to feed her ds didn't match our ideas of healthy eating so our children were exposed(well, fed) to foods which we didn't want available (e.g. daily sweets, sausage rolls, chicken satay - our children are Vegetarian!).
Nanny took 2 seperate days off 'sick' because she had been up in the night with the baby and so she was 'tired'.
Nanny's baby once he was a toddler broke quite a lot of our things which nanny gave him to play with e.g. cordless phones, remote controls) which we then had to replace (this is in a baby-proof house with a playroom full of toys for all ages, no need to give him the phone to play with!).
As the employment went on it became more and more that looking after our children was something she did around her child's 'needs' i.e. during school holidays she would take them off to her house and meet up with her friends who wanted to see her baby and my children were left watching cartoons in her mum's house.
To me, one of the benefits of having a nanny rather than any other form of childcare is that you get more input into what the children do (play in their own home/local area), eat (vegetarian food) and are exposed to...this was not the case with this particular nanny.

As for nanny-sharing - biggest issues we had were to do with booking holiday so that both families and nanny knew who was on holiday when! This gets more complicated if both families don't need nanny for 5 days i.e. if one uses Mon-Thur and the other Tue-Fri and nanny likes to take Fridays off then one family is bearing the brunt of nanny's holiday. Otherwise as long as issues like discipline, food, attitudes towards breakages in each others homes, and sick children are sorted out before-hand then it can work really well.

When I was last looking, I had DS1 5 and DS2 3. I was quite happy with a younger child. DS1 loves babies and I thought it would do DS2 good to learn that smaller people sometimes has to come first - he has a very happy spot as the baby of our household. And as others have said, if it's similar to the usual sibling gaps of 2 - 3 years there's no reason why it shouldn't work with the ups and downs and compromises of any sibling relationship.

But then some older children may enjoy having a baby around - and nanny gets one on one time with the baby while the children are at school. School holidays and activities become a little more difficult though.

I think same age or a gap of less than 3 years is very workable - a 5 year old and a small baby will tie down the older one.

As to how the nanny treats each child - when you have your own child at work with you, you are very careful not to favour one over the other. To some extent your own childs needs come 2nd as you are at work and being paid to look after the other child. If you get a nanny with experience she is more likely to know how to handle this well.

I think the age gap you describe sounds very workable. The activities eg:playgroups etc are likely to be similar. The 7 month will soon be mobile. Both children will sleep in the day giving each child some one on one time. When I went back to work Ds was about 10 months, his CM had a baby of 14 months, it worked brilliantly. I think a big deciding factor was the element of DS having a little freind, as he had one on one with me on the other days. Good luck. I you like the candidate you can always have a trial period, if it do'esnt work I think that will become apparent quite quickly.

In terms of treating their own child differently, that of course depends on the nanny. I know friends of mine who bring their own child to work have been so keen to absolutely not favour their own child that actually it tips the other way and their charge's needs are always put first!

As for age differences, I guess their are pros and cons for all kinds of combinations. I have one friend whose own child and charge were exactly the same age, which worked well as they were at the same stage with food, baby-proofing the house, doing the same activities - but they did need double the amount of equipment. Another friend had a baby a couple of years younger than her youngest charge, so it was more like just having a younger sibling who slotted into the older children's routines.

I think nanny shares do tend to be limited in time - people have more children, or move (especially in London). But if you've never had a nanny before, and you're not used to being an employer, it's great to have someone to compare notes with and agonise over!

As others have said, children who share a nanny do form incredibly close bonds which last for years. There's a lot to be gained for the children. DS1 shared a nanny for a year when I first went back to work and 6 years later he and his little pal are still like best friends, even though they only see each other once or twice a year.

One of the reasons I have a nanny is to get babysitting when DH and I are both working late, which for us is about once a week. More organised couples get one night babysitting in their nanny contract so they can go out together (even if it's just once a month!) but we cannot get ourselves together for this . If that's important you would need to discuss it at interview with the nanny and see what her approach is. I have a colleague whose nanny brings her child who has no issue with babysitting; when I last looked for a nanny some candidates weren't happy with babysitting once a week. That was candidates with and without a child.

I've had 2 nannies go on maternity leave now and TBH I think it's a great way to part company with a nanny. You get plenty of notice, the DCs can get used to it and obviously it's a very happy time for her and (vicariously) for her employing family. You need to cover her antenatal appointments, and if nanny has a difficult pregnancy that is a real pest unless you have good support networks. If your nanny is PG, you need to keep some of your holiday in reserve. And in terms of coming back afterwards, I think all the economic power is with the employer. On nanny pay, you cannot afford childcare sufficient to allow you do to a nanny job, so if the employer is not prepared to allow nanny back with a child or another child, you can be pretty sure she will not come back. I didn't want one nanny back with her DC, for a range of reasons. I would have been delighted to have the other nanny back with her DC but she chose to move 250 miles back home to be near her family. In that case I would have offered a temp role to the maternity cover.

Also, if you have a nanny who then goes on to have her own child (rather than one who already has one) you have to deal with maternity leave - she could take up to a year off - and employing a temp to cover her whilst she is off.

I started my job with one dd already, so the job didn't really change like it would if you hired a nanny who subsequently had a child, I should imagine that although you may love and trust your nanny and want to have her back it would mean having to adjust to the changes of having an extra little one around. Working as a nanny with 2 children of your own would present more problems and I don't know any nannies that do/have done.

My boss took a career break after having her 2nd child and I became a childminder. I did this until my youngest was 14 and old enough to get himself home from school and not need me around for a couple of hours. I've been nannying again for a couple of years and just work a 3 day week. I love it

Sorry Maria, don't quite understand your question???

Just to tell you my story;

A lot of employers on her don't like the concept of a nanny with their own child - and I do understand the potential complications it can bring. However, for me and my employer it worked really well. My dd was 2 and my employers dd was 7 months old at the start of the job. They got on really well and were like sisters - they are still in contact now and they are 19 and 21 years old! My daughter was very healthy and I never needed to take time off because she was ill (though hubby would sometimes have been able to have her so that I could have worked). I was happy to go to work if my charge was ill as I figured the girls had probably passed any germs between themselves already. I didn't need things like double buggies and extra high chairs as my dd was old enough not to need them. At 2 she rarely slept during the day, but if she did I was happy to pop her on the sofa - so no need for a travel cot. I cost my boss about 25% less than the going rate for nannies in the area. She had someone who was committed to their job as I wanted continuity for my own dd - like she did hers.

Possible difficulties were; not being able to go swimming with 2 small ones. Working late would have been difficult (though my bosses were in jobs where it was never needed) as it would have been past my dd's bedtime.

Happy to answer any question you have

Maria79 - start a new message thread (click here and then put in a descriptive message title) it is more likely to get responses. If you can include your location as wages do vary around the country... London (inside M25) for example is often a lot higher than outside of the M25. There has been chat on here in the past about nannies with their own child taking a pay cut of 20% maybe more... but also many comments from nannies in particular saying that they didn't take a pay cut to get work.