AIBU to ask who looks after the vomiting child?

[Cuppaand2biscuits]

Child 1 has vomited at school this afternoon and been sent home. My day off today so no problem.
I've rang work to tell them I won't be in Thursday or Friday because of 48 hour clear of sickness rule. DP is working away and can not return and I can't ask anyone else and risk them catching it.
Work was unimpressed and suggested I ask a friend whose children have already had the bug!
Who looks after your children? Would you ever call on grandparents?

No willing family here so I used to do the 'sick days'

One reason I was a SAHM for so long

We’re not allowed to work from home if we’re caring for a poorly child - quite rightly. You can’t work, and be cuddling/clearing up/reading to a sick child, and do a day’s work at the same time.
We can take annual leave, but after 3 days, it’s usually unpaid.

In a previous life, my partner was a teacher. He couldn’t leave a class of 30 kids very easily, and I’m in a role where one of 3 of us has to be onsite. I wouldn’t have lasted in this role (a colleague hasn’t), if I constantly needed time off for a sick child.

I guess you make a decision that one of you works in a role where you can take time off for these things, or cultivate friends/grandparents/nannies to cover. None of us would be impressed if a long-awaited surgery was cancelled, for example, if a surgeon’s child had D&V....

Single mum so I have no choice but to look after them if they are ill, my work is understanding as long as I try and find cover for my shifts (which I usually manage), can’t help it if kids are ill, no way would I dump them on a friend when they have a vomiting bug.

I wouldn’t ask grandparents while they were actually sick but I see no problem with them looking after the kids when it’s just the 48hr rule.
If they were sick this morning but not all night and seemed ok in the morning I’d send them to grandparents and go to work

Seriously what a ridiculous suggestion from your work. I would politely propose bringing your vomiting child in with you “he/she won’t make much noise just the occasional chugging sound of their guts coming up”

Do you have grandparents you can call on? If your DC is well in himself/not vomitting tomorrow morning, then I'd be tempted to ask grandparents to have DC Friday if possible.

We tend to both work from home and tag team around dialling in for meetings. E.g. I'll start at 5am and work til lunch, and DH will work from lunch into the evening, with a few swoop overs through the day. It doesn't work very well if either of us are particularly busy, but better than nothing!

We alternate sick days with DC but obviously if one of us were away then we couldn't. My mum might look after DC for a day but she has to travel quite far to get to us so certainly wouldn't be the plan regularly. Work just has to suck it up I'm afraid. They shouldn't be making you feel guilty - the 48 hour rule is rigorously enforced ime.

Dh and I used to juggle it, depending on who’s diary was worst, and often changing halfway through the day - both doing one long half day on the office and both doing some later at night at home once dd was in bed. With the odd day of annual leave (usually me) to cover if really necessary.

No one else available to assist us. But bosses generally understood, and as we usually worked hard to visibly keep work and urgent stuff covered, often used to do extra when we could otherwise, and also the visibility of both juggling and both appearing in the office some portion of the day all went a long way towards bosses understanding.

But no, if DC was sick and DH was away (and yes, that happened more than one), it was down to me.

We tend to take it in turns, depends what’s happening with work.

I wouldn’t expect grandparents to look after a vomiting child but I might ask if they could if they were well again but still in the 48 hour rule.

It's a difficult situation, but children come before work in my world. I would definitely take tomorrow off work and if the vomiting stops during tomorrow, I might consider asking a grandparent to look after the child the following day. To be honest though, I would probably stay at home and work can lump it

We have to take a day of holiday to look after a sick child (in france). I don’t know what would happen if you didn’t have holidays. Unpaid leave, I suppose m

Teaching was never ideal for missing a day although 5 periods is worse than if it's a day where you have more PPA. DH would work from home where possible and would prioritise that, but if he's out of the country, on site or in a meeting requiring more complex arrangements with multiple people then I had to take the hit.

Family and friends were not an option. They either work full time or are elderly and live at an unviable distance.

Working parents often don't have convenient local friends for childcare because they are too busy working to meet and make any.

Me usually. Work is very understanding, I just take it as last minute annual leave.

In our house it would be my DH. But certainly no nursery would ever take a vomiting child and I can't think another parent would either!!

DH and I take it in turns. We use annual leave usually if it's the little one (such as at the moment - has scarlet fever). If it's the 9yr old then we take it in turns to work from home as she is pretty self sufficient and likes to hole up in her bedroom when ill.

I've had this situation today! Both DC were due to be with grandparents anyway- I kept the puker and stayed home with him. It's hard enough for them looking after both of them without adding vomit to the mix, and he just wanted me. Now he's stopped grandparents will have him in the 48hour period while he can't go to nursery. Felt guilty about work, but had plenty of flexi leave to take. DH is a teacher so doesn't have an annual leave allowance- I always store a week of my leave ready for illness emergencies!

DH would work from home if he had no meetings - his company is more flexible than mine. If DH couldn’t do it I might take annual leave or I might ask my DPs. I don’t feel bad about the risk of them catching it - I’ve never caught a sickness bug that DS has had - just need to be vigilant about hand washing.

Luckily, DS has only ever had 2 sickness bugs in the two years he’s been at nursery! The first, he was sick multiple times on a Friday night but then recovered quickly and the 48 hours had passed before Monday. The second, I took one day off and DPs had him one day to cover the 48 hours.