to dread that 7.30am call from our childcarer

[agnesf]

Just that really. You know that if whoever is looking after your kids today when you're meant to be at work is not going to call you at 7.30am just to check if they like sausage and mash for tea. Its going to be bad news and its going to end up in you spending the next few hours ringing round everyone you know who can be paid/ bribed or called in for a favour to look after the DCs.

It happened to me today ..............

As a soon to be ex-childminder, I must say that it is a VERY big decision to call parents to cancel the day! One day I had D&V to the point of not knowing which way to go when I reached the bathroom (Sorry if TMI) yet one of my mums gave me an earful for not having back up plans!

Besides, I lose money if I cancel. But, yes, the shoe will soon be on the other foot with me being at the mercy of my childminder

OP, YANBU but your childcare provider is only human (unless it happens regularly then they are merely human taking the piss!)

Yup - alliwantisaroom you are totally right and we are really fortunate to have a regular childminder who is just like you. Its even worse when she has on the very rare occasion rung me at 7.30am - I know she must be really ill.

I hope you enjoy your retirement from childminding - its a job that I could never do (too much of a control freak/ too grumpy) - you have my enourmous admiration.

Oh dear, I really feel for you. If it's any consolation, as a Childminder, I have had to do the 7.30am call (only once in 18 months of childminding thankfully) and it was awful. I had horrendous d&v. The minute I started throwing up in the middle of the night my first thought was 'fuck, I'm going to have to let everyone down'. One parent was great, one was decidedly frosty. In fairness, I think he was also just thinking 'oh fuck'.

It isn't easy this working parent lark...

Thanks, OP.

Yes, Lingdilong, I have also done the massive BOAK thing, while thinking "oh gawd!! i have to let everyone down!!"

I know that most of my parents had the "Oh FUCK!" thought when I told them I was chucking it all in.

I found the problem with nursery was the kids were more likely to be ill than the childminder was, especially with 3, so my odds were better if I had childcare at home.

My worst time was my very first nanny who was doing it as her very first job after qualifying. I discovered she was taking all three of mine on the bus for an hour every day to meet her badly behaved little sister out of school, because her very domineering mother had told her to. I told her to stop doing that. She rang me on that Sunday to resign, immediately, no notice, not coming in on Monday.....

Yep as a cm I dread making that 7.30 phone call after being up all night with a child puking. Knowing I'm going to be cursed as soon as the phone goes down, losing a days pay. I always give my parents the option of another cm as emergency back up when we do contracts and they never want to take it up. Do my best to stay healthy but can't stop kids getting bugs at school.

Yes Lydia, calculating how much money the tummy bug was going to cost me didn't really help with the vomiting either...

I got into work one morning when my husband phoned to say that he had the D&V bug. He had phone my parents who had it too! That was the day I had to go home again. I thought I had backup but that went down too.

And then I caught it too...