To have a nanny who smokes?

[crispysausagerolls]

Please for the love of god if I am being unreasonable asking this, don’t yell at me via the medium of typing 😂🙈

I am looking for a nanny who will have DS for one afternoon a week and I think I have someone great but I just realised she smokes as she smells of it and I am not sure if it’s ok - mostly because I’ve seen so many posts on here of the smoke sticking to the clothes and then DS passively smoking through that even if she is not smoking around him? Is that really a thing? Quite hard to find someone for this length of time so unsure if I’m being ridiculous discounting her for a seemingly small reason.

No yelling 😬

More than half the nanny's that my siblings and I had growing up smoked heavily and they looked after us from 12 hours a day, five days a week for our whole childhood. (1980's-90's) They never every smoked in front of us.
It didn't influence us to smoke. My brother took up smoking when working as a chef in Paris but every other chef smoked there. None of the rest of us smoke.

Dragosnextwife. This lady will be childminding for 4 hrs a week. That's it!

I work with smokers who go in excess of 4 hrs between breaks every day.

This has all been blown so out of proportion it's absolutely ridiculous.

As long as she didn't smoke when looking after the child, then i would hire her, maybe just point out you can smell it and hopefully she will freshen up before coming over.

Would be a no from me. Doesn't matter if you smoke away from children, it gets into your clothes, hair and breath.

No, asking medical staff if they smoke before treating your child is not ‘a good point’. It’s ridiculous. It’s an emergency, one off, not a regular planned thing.

Talk to her. It’s only as awkward as you allow it to be ‘Kate*, I noticed on your last couple of visits the smell of smoke. I haven’t noticed it before, have you just started smoking? (see what she says) if she’s smoking and not about to give up just ask her to change her top when she comes to do the housekeeper bits, but find alternative care for DS. I wouldn’t have her holding him for any length of time.

It’s got jack shit to do with influencing and everything to do with the dangers of second hand smoke.

I don’t care if some people think it’s msking a big deal out of nothing. They can do as they please with their poor children and the rest of us who do care will make different choices.

Temper temper

We had a nanny for our two DCs. She was a smoker but didn’t smoke in front of the children, ever. I don’t think the children even know she is a smoker and my eldest is now 10.

She was fantastic and the kids adored her. She worked for us 6 years, never a day off sick. We still keep in touch, she’s even come to visit us (we now live abroad). The kids speak to her regularly on FaceTime.

She’s now been working for another family, been with them 4 years so obviously they must like her.

So on the basis of our experience alone, you’d have to be daft to dismiss someone who you know and trust, simply because they have an occasional cigarette on their own private time.

Lots of doctors smoke, would you not go to your GP for fear that your DC might be exposed to third hand smoke?

Lwmommy

Apologies, I didn't see that she would only be around the child for 4 hours a week. Then no I wouldn't see it as a problem. I thought we were talking about full time care.

Do you live in a stately home?!!

Absolutely not but we have a spaniel and lots of mess, ironing etc and DS is insanely clingy I can’t put him down to do anything 🤷🏻‍♀️ And I’m lazy and why not 😬

Hospital staff are not the soul carer of the child during the day and they do not need to smoke around the child or leave them alone to go and smoke, they have breaks (not enough but that's when they smoke).

Neither would this woman.

They can do as they please with their poor children and the rest of us who do care will make different choices.

That might be peak mumsnet.

My poor children who I do care about might one day be exposed to a smoker! How ever will they survive.

Burnt toast is a cancer risk.

I love my kids so much that I only hire gluten intolerant nannies.

Tell her to look up iqos.co.uk & get a free trial, it's heated tobacco so no smoke & no smell. I wouldn't have a smoker but an iqos user would be fine with me.

No .i would not hire her

It sounds like for 4 hours a week it’s probably fine?

When my mother was dying, we had to ask for several hospital staff members to be replaced because they were smokers. She needed to be lifted regularly which meant very close contact. When a smoker leaned in to pick her up, change a dressing, give her meds, etc it would trigger an asthma attack. I finally came to believe that smokers should simply not be allowed to have certain jobs, particularly ones where they need to have close contact with vulnerable people.

Just give her the rules as you would anyone - she’s not to smoke during her work. I don’t really get why this is such a big deal. You’ve found the perfect candidate and you’re worried because she might smoke?

OP, you're not going to get a consensus here. You have to make your own decision.

What risk do you honestly, in your own mind, think your child is at from four hours a week with someone who might only occasionally smoke and never around your child? Do a brief risk assessment of the very limited third-hand smoke exposure vs the positives and make a decision.

When mine were little I worked as a childminder-and I smoke. I told the parents at interview that I don't smoke in my home nor out and about with the little ones.

When the little ones had a nap , I would carry the baby monitor into the garden and have a cig with a coffee once a day if I was able. This was followed by washing hands, brushing teeth and freshening up etc.

I was a very successful childminder for a few years before mine got older and I went out of the house to work. That said, I was transparent from the get go with the parents, and left the choice with them.

I'll change my response because it's revealed she's now an established part of your child's life, not a new hire as was presumed.

I think you would have got a different response, crispysausageroll if you'd said that at the outset.

New hire? No, don't hire a smoker.
Somebody your son knows and loves? Well you didn't notice it before so have a conversation with her about it

There are so many defensive posters around this subject. Nobody's opinion really matters here, except yours.

Of course it's fine!

4 hours a week!

Much, much better a smoker who knows and loves your child than a stranger.

Smokers dont have two heads and the risk from other things that injure health is so so much higher than 4 hours of 3rd hand passive smoke. Car travel, nanoparticles from pollution, & regular consumption of cured pork products, to name a few.