To get into a fight with my best friend over my au pair?

[fijennin]

I've had the said au pair for a long time, and she really is like a part of the family. I am a single parent and have one DD and she is 3,5. The AP is absolutely brilliant and fantastic, and I wouldn't doubt her judgement for a second.

DD is off nursery for the week and AP has had her for full days (all paid for extra).
Au pair was sick on Wednesday night, poor thing was throwing up and was just really unwell. My best friend, who is also DD's god mother, offered to take DD out for the next day (Thursday) as she had time off work and wanted to see her. She has her own keys to our house. She also has two older kids who are staying at grandparents for the week.

Now, the situation as told by my BF - She walked into the house only to find the AP asleep in her bedroom, with DD in the living room on her own eating fruit and watching telly. She said she was horrified, and couldn't believe how irresponsible my au pair is, to leave a toddler watching tv on her own. She said she walked into the APs room to confront her and all AP did was keep her mouth shut and then my BF took my DD and left.

NOW THE AP SIDE - DD woke up 7 am (I'm out of the house by 6.30), she got up, gave her breakfast, gave her a shower, washed and dried her hair, got her dressed, and by the time all that was done it was already 9. She cut up an apple, a banana, watermelon and left some raisins on the coffee table along with DD's water bottle and put on a cartoon and went to lie back down as she was still feeling really ill. at about 9.30 my BF walked in and shouted at her - calling her a disgrace and a bad au pair, an irresponsible brat and lazy teenager, saying she'll never ever let her babysit her DC again (ap babysits for extra cash) and that she'll make sure to tell me and everyone else what happened so they would never leave her children alone with someone who thinks it's okay to sleep during their working hours leaving a three year old unattended. AP said she was in shock and couldn't believe she was being such a bitch to her. as soon as they left AP called me to say what has happened and cried on the phone.

Few facts - 1.AP's bedroom door lead straight into the living room. her bed is positioned so that if her door is open she can see the sofa in the living room. Her doors were open.

1. DD is a really calm child, and rarely gets tv time. so when she does get to watch tv, she will sit quietly and watch.
2. AP is the type of person that jumps out of her bed in the middle of the night straight away if she hears DD crying. I don't doubt for a second that even the slightest whine from DD would have her sprinting to the living room to check on her.

When I called my BF to ask if what AP said was true her response was - ''WELL OF COURSE IT IS!!! How can you leave your child with someone stupid enough to think it's okay to leave a toddler alone while she sleeps! the lazy cow (and a lot of other things and name calling)!'' to which I completely lost it and told her to fuck off. I would've done the same thing if it was me in the position, and if DD was sorted out completely why wouldn't she lie down. anyways we got into a very heated argument and said a lot of things, and I think she was completely out of line and told her not to talk to me if she's gonna go batshit crazy over something that doesn't concern her. some other mutual friends of ours said that BF was right, and AP shouldn't have done that and that I shouldn't have picked the AP's side in this. I'm still sticking to believing that my BF is wrong in this scenario and didn't have to right to insult and make my au pair feel bad over something that I support.

Opinions now, am I really being unreasonable with this? Should I have taken my best friend's side and had a chat with ap about responsibility (like several people have told me I should've). Or am I right to stick by my au pair in this?

The ap really is amazing. I even asked her if she wanted the day off if she was sick and she turned it down, saying she can manage for a few hours until the BF arrives. sorry for the long post!

Don't be dramatic Rosie.
Most of those hypothetical situations aren't even similar to the issue here.

Yanbu op

Um, has no-one read the OP? The OP clearly states that the aupair was asleep when the friend came in. So asleep that she wasn't aware that a person had entered the house, so she wasn't caring for the child of 3.5 in any way at all. The best friend was wrong to go off at the aupair but she wasn't wrong in her concerns. The 3.5 year old was to all intents and purposes uncared for. That's really, really not ok.

SpringerS have you read the update?

few things - the ap wasn't actually asleep, even(former) bf admitted she saw her eyes open when she walked into her room.

YANBU Op! c

I used to work as a Nanny and I personally wouldn't have left the room, especially if DC was eating, but that's just personal preference, not to say that your au pair was wrong. If you are comfortable and trust her, that's all that matters. In my experience au pairs/nannies often don't stick around for very long if they aren't trusted by the parents. BF is entitled to an opinion, but there was no need for her to share it, especially not in the way that she did. She's caused a lot of upset for no reason. She should have approached you non-judgementally, mentioned what she saw and allowed you to come to your own verdict, and approach your au-pair in your own time if you felt it was necessary. Taking the situation into her own hands was totally uncalled for and disrespectful. What I actually think is the most out-of-order thing in this situation is that your BF totally flipped out presumably in front of your DC?! That's actually the most concerning behaviour right there!

...I mean leaving the room for prolonged period of time btw

SpringerS, you haven't read the OP properly. The statement that the au pair was asleep was the friend's version, OP doesn't believe that to be correct.

You trust the girl who looks after your...
Some precious fanny/ fuckwit took upon herself to abuse someone you trust your child with.

Where would you have been if you were feeling Ill?

So called fiend is ...

My friend lost a young relative who died from choking. It wasn't on food, but I did a first aid course and was told you don't hear someone truly choking to death because they can't draw breath. You'd have to see them choking. So although I do leave my kids to it at times I don't leave them eating. They are not sensible enough to sit nicely eating. So personally I don't let them eat alone but you have to judge your children accordingly. Personally though it's when it goes quiet I go looking what's up. They always go quiet when about to do mischief.

Can I ask at what age you do leave your children alone to eat? Not being funny - I am genuinely interested. DD1 is almost 5 and is in reception. DD2 is 1. Sometimes I will leave DD1 eating a snack while I do jobs or see to DD2. Never anything like grapes or malteasers but I realise she could choke on anything not just the things I class as risky. So at what age do you leave them alone?

Your BF sounds an absolute charmer!

I think the worries over choking are just more 'available', obviously if it's your child /someone you know, understandably you will place more importance and worry about potential causes....

I've never known personally a child/family where someone died by choking. I know it happens but is very, very rare..

The figures:

Around 180 people (both adults and kids) die from choking annually. This is out of the 500 000 people who die annually... It is a tiny, tiny percentage (approx 0.04%).... The chances of this happening are miniscule!

www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2011/jan/14/mortality-statistics-causes-death-england-wales-2009

YANBU.

I think quite a few parents these days have the tendency to be sanctimonious (and passive aggressive) helicopter parents.

When I was 3 years old, I played on my own A LOT. Like with no adults in the room. That is despite the household I grew up in having three housekeepers / nannies around... PLUS my mom was a SAHM. To this day I love dogs because I remember our dog at the time having been my best babysitter. When the dog passed, I named a stuff toy after her that became my favourite and accompanied me all the way to uni. This still made me a fully-functioning adult!!!

At the age of 3, my brother would watch TV on his own on weekends, and sometimes, he'd eat a cookie or so. I remember ther were Sunday Morning TV shows created exactly for this purpose!

Personally, I think this seemingly new method of parenting, likely created by scaremongering in the media, produces kids that are too dependent on their parents, often removing instincts that would be there if you're allowed to go out on your own, i.e. most of life's lessons are learned from the mistakes we make. There are more and more 3-year-olds out there that have the behaviour of 1-year-olds thirty years ago and constantly look at 'mummy' for help...

OP, I think your post of 04-Jun-16 16:07:16 is pretty relevant to this whole fiasco. Your friend employed your au pair to babysit until midnight, didn't get back until 7am "and they tried to only pay her for 4 hours instead on the 11 that she did". I'm assuming that the attempt to underpay her was unsuccessful? And boy has that rankled your (extremely unreasonable) friend! I'd guess that your friend has resented your au pair ever since (and you too if you insisted she pay what she owed), and leapt at the chance to have a go at her. It's telling that part of her rant to au pair included "saying she'll never ever let her babysit her DC again".

You posted that "some other mutual friends of ours said that BF was right, and AP shouldn't have done that and that I shouldn't have picked the AP's side in this." What they think about it is less relevant here than the number of mutual friends she has spread her lies this to. IMO your friend is being rather spiteful here - she's trying to get your mutual friends to not employ your au pair to babysit for them. She's trying to punish your au pair for not meekly accepting your friend's absolutely shitty behaviour towards her.

So - do these mutual friends know about your friend's previous behaviour towards your au pair?

I believe your AP, not your BF.

However, in this situation I would not want to fall out with my BF, so I would phone her and try to build bridges - even if that involved apologising.

I think WhereYouLeftIt has hit the nail on the head.

And thanks IamtheDevilsAvocado for the statistics, because I am also genuinely interested in this, as I have a small child living with me.

OP, I think your post of 04-Jun-16 16:07:16 is pretty relevant to this whole fiasco. Your friend employed your au pair to babysit until midnight, didn't get back until 7am "and they tried to only pay her for 4 hours instead on the 11 that she did

Your friend is a cheeky cow

I think I too would be concerned about leaving a small child with cut up apple etc. That's not to say I don't busy about while my children eat snacks, but I wouldn't deliberately give them fruit and then remove myself from the room until further notice.

I'd have been totally ok with this if AP had perhaps laid down in the living room with your DD. When I'm ill a nap on the sofa while the toddler watches Cbeebies cuddled up next to me is a lifesaver... I wouldn't sleep somewhere else.

The mutual friends will of course support best friend, because she's telling them the au pair was fast asleep. I wonder if they change their tune on hearing the other side of the story?

you haven't read the OP properly. The statement that the au pair was asleep was the friend's version, OP doesn't believe that to be correct.
Nobody will never know which is correct.
Normally I'd believe the friend because people who fall asleep don't notice it. Considering how OTT and confrontational she was, I'd give the AP the benefit of the doubt.

Also: some people don't know what helicopter parents are, clearly.

But OP knows the friend and the au pair, so she's in the best position to judge.

Rosie posts are spot on!

And of those 180 people who die of choking annually I imagine the vast majority will be elderly

It's just something we can imagine. See the earlier poster who won't let her children eat alone because a family member choked to death - even though they choked to death on a nonfood item. It's something we can picture.

If the au pair drives the child anywhere or walks with her alongside busy roads on a path, that's almost certainly a higher risk.