Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To wish people who send their kids to daycare would be more considerate?

176 replies

cinnamongirl1976 · 15/01/2015 10:16

Overheard the other day: "He was sick in the night, but I sent him to nursery because he was okay this morning and I have a really important meeting today".

I hate, hate, HATE it when people do this! The 48-hour rule is there for a reason. Why are some people so inconsiderate when it comes to this? Do they not think of the other children at the nursery/childminder, their families etc? By sending your sick kid in, you could be ruining someone else's weekend. You don't know if they have people in their family with compromised immune systems.

Colds are fine of course and our childminder is fine with that. If we had to exclude for colds I would have been sacked long ago and our childminder would be out of business.

But for anything else - especially D&V - I always follow the illness and exclusion rules our childminder has 100% - work has to take a back seat and it is simply not fair on the other children, your own child, or the childminder/nursery, to do anything else. I have also kept DD off when she's not been contagious (eg ear infection) but would be happier at home. Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who actually abides by these rules - do you?

OP posts:
GahBuggerit · 15/01/2015 17:13

GahBuggerit - whatever you read from my posts wasn't intentional, you are right, so apologies to anyone else if it came across in the wrong way. I will bite back if people are rude to me, though (grocklebox).

No probs, Im a bit raw about this as DS2 was really poorly recently and I couldnt ring in work, my mum looked after him, and I stupidly did feel that I somehow didnt love him because I couldnt afford to take the time off, so to kind of see that implied (not intentionally I now know) was a bit cruddy.

Slowcommotion · 15/01/2015 17:15

Agree parents should use their judgement. And of course there is a balance (as with everything) and a sensible course of action. We're talking about when some parents make the wrong judgement and send a contagious, miserable, sick child in to nursery or school when they should be kept at home. In that particular instance, it's not fair on the child, or their class-mates, whether it's highly inconvenient for the parent or not and whether they are perceived on here as "lucky" or not.

Ruralretreating · 15/01/2015 17:19

I'm with you OP. The rules are set out by Public Health England (and I believe there is an equivalent for Scotland) and set out exclusion periods for various infectious diseases. The list of diseases does not include "the sniffles" which is why childminders and nurseries are able to accept children with mild colds. It is a pain when you are the parent who has to take a day or two off but the rules are there for a reason. For those saying one vomit is not a bug, it may not be but unless there's a clearly non-contagious cause then be cautious and follow the 48 hour rule. My DS had a bug recently that was vomit once, then vomit again a day and a half later. Other children had exactly the same pattern. That was a horrible week juggling work and poorly child.

naty1 · 15/01/2015 17:21

I think it is irresponsible
Kids with diabetes
Leukemia
Adults with the above or just immunosuppressed
It means other adults kids and eventually your own kids have to have more time off

Though i cant agree about the colds. Even though dsis and i had asthma ourselves. You pick them up just out and about. There is the flu jab. They are so common most people get at least a couple a year. Whereas kids do seem to catch and spread d&v.

Slapped cheek (and cp) cause problems if youre pregnant. But i guess most adults must be immune to cp luckily.

Classes of 30 must spread things easily.

I am a bit surprised at the people whoose kids/themselves are getting sick from pigging out. (Ive only had that once xmas eve after about 2 selection boxes)

Surely as the french quote genuine d&v would have a temp?

Dd had reflux/allergies spat up at nursery and playgroups but was clearly not ill, especially compared to her exorcist vomitting caught from nursery.

Slowcommotion · 15/01/2015 17:25

Our school policy is that a cold is fine but a fever isn't; which seems fairly sound to me.

Good point about it being counter-productive to send in dc when they are ill. The bug just circulates around the school for longer and causes more parents to have to take more days off.

insancerre · 15/01/2015 17:43

As a nursery manager I follow the company policy on exclusion which is taken from the health protection agency guidelines
But, as manager, I have absolute discretion as to whether I accept children or not.
If I think they are too poorly to attend then I don't have to let them in
Children do sometimes just vomit once with a tummy bug and can pass it on ton other children
Some children do vomit for other reasons and we don't exclude if we know about the condition
But , I'm not medically trained, so I will always verge on the side if caution to protect the health of all the children the staff

GahBuggerit · 15/01/2015 18:12

i cant see any info in the public health documentation about colds/coughs, it just says to practise good hygiene. i was a bit worried i was a rule breaker but it appears not

notauniquename · 15/01/2015 19:14

were you off work for 3 weeks when you caught that cold?
it happened to fall when I was on annual leave.
I called work and worked from home after my annual leave (yes I'm lucky that I got a job where I could do that, -and a part of my reason for taking such a job was the ability to look after child without missing lots of works)
then it was Christmas.

so long story short yes. I managed to stay at home and not go spreading germs around.

hanban89 · 15/01/2015 20:29

I'm with you on this one. It makes me very angry when parents send them in with horrible bugs. Minor things are fine but I agree that it's the responsibility of a parent to care for a sick child, and not nurseries etc. it just creates a few days of utter misery for someone else. I do understand the dilemma with work, we all have to make that decision, but kids when they are poorly come first.

redspottydress · 15/01/2015 20:34

Some people are faced with dilemma of sending sick children into childcare or dace disciplinary procedures.

redspottydress · 15/01/2015 20:34

Face

sanfairyanne · 15/01/2015 21:46

ds2 still has random puking incidents. noone else in the family has ever caught it. its just some weird pukey thing he does - overexcited, overtired, eaten too much etc
the 48hr thing is to stop viruses spreading.

PiperIsTerrysChoclateOrange · 15/01/2015 22:02

It's a difficult choice to make.

I get sick pay, but if DC are ill then it's unpaid leave. Thankfully my department is always short staffed so my boss will swap my days but when that happens then I take unpaid leave and work an extra day the following week to cover the short fall.

However it still classed as sick and I have a poor record due to a recent long term sick

thewavesofthesea · 15/01/2015 22:05

GP here. If you tried to ask me for a note to say every time a child was sick once to 'prove' it was not contagious I would refuse. Or I would charge you for it. I couldn't prove it either way, and common sense says that children vomit for reasons other than infection.

One vomit with no other symptoms is not an infection. It is too much to eat, it is reflux, it is anxiety, it is coughing lots, it can be a urine infection, an ear infection, a cold.......and then sometimes it is a tummy bug.

jellybeans · 15/01/2015 22:36

Yanbu it bugs me too. But you only have to read some of the threads about people getting in trouble at work for daring to take a few days off a year with an ill child! People should be able to put their children needs before work.

Human lives not robots!

fromparistoberlin73 · 15/01/2015 22:40

These bugs are going to spread anyway OP unfortunately

I so tend to follow the rules . But these contagious bugs will spread regardless as people are often contagious before they are sick

Just being In my office and travelling on the tube spreads it . Imagine a school or nursery with them liking everything (boak)

So to some extend a this ranting is waste o time

cerealqueen · 15/01/2015 23:13

There will always be selfish people who put themselves first but maybe they should read Mistlewoeandwhine post at 10.33, as to the repercussions of that kind of behaviour for proper D&V bugs.

One off vomit caused by too much ice cream or a hacking cough - I use my judgement.

Often though, a child needs to be at home with a parent, even if its not contagious as a childminder can't look after a sick child when they have other to care for too.

TheNewStatesman · 16/01/2015 02:12

I was lucky enough to have family support available to take care of my daughter when she was sicknot everyone does, sadly. If other parents sometimes took a chance and sent their child in at times, meaning that my child got sick a little more often than she would have done you know, I can't get too upset about it.

Coyoacan · 16/01/2015 04:34

is that clearly we are not geared up to support working parents in this country, on the whole

I agree with this and think this is the best thing you said, actually. I'm afraid an awful lot of your posts read like Marie Antoinette, get a nanny or an au pair??

I was a single mother without family support and I remember having to leave my sick seven-year-old at home alone to go to work because otherwise we would not have eaten the following week.

VeloWoman · 16/01/2015 06:15

I agree with you OP, and I wonder what some of the 'I cant take time of work' brigade would do if the they had a child like my DS1. He has a number of medical conditions and a weak immune system, I tried to go back to work when he was three, he caught so many bugs from the other kids at nursery that I ended up only being able to go into work two days out of five on average. The director of his nursery said that parents would often ignore the 48 hr rule or even give their children calpol so they could go into work until it wore off and they were called in to pick up their feverish child. She said she had even known parents to refuse to answer their phones so that they couldn't be asked to come back and collect their child although I found that last one hard to believe.

I ended up having to resign from my job.

Kittymum03 · 16/01/2015 06:29

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

FitzgeraldProtagonist · 16/01/2015 06:46

We make provision for sick children (nanny with nursing experience). Doesn't stop bitchy comments about my going to work when a child is poorly. Despite them being at home and well looked after. Am horrible me-leaving the poor bairns so I can feed and keep a roof over their head because I don't get tax credits or regular CM go off a frolic round the office. Hmm damned if you do, damned if you don't.

redspottydress · 16/01/2015 06:47

Working 2 days a week and being able to take leave is not comparable with a full time worker unable to take leave.

Kittymum03 · 16/01/2015 07:00

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

WilburIsSomePig · 16/01/2015 07:05

Well it pisses me off when people knowingly send their infectious kids to.school. I have to work and have no support either. Oh and as my daughter has an autoimmune condition, she undoubtedly ends up being admitted to hospital if she had a sickness bug but did that bother the mum who sent her kid in last week after spending the previous day throwing up? No, because she didn't have anyone to watch him while she went to pilates. Still we had cracking three days at the local hospital a few days later.