Nursery: send or not send

[ThatsBullshirt]

DS1 is due to start nursery next month (Scotland) but I'm in two minds whether or not to send him with everything going on with Covid 19.

Our main reason for sending him to nursery was to help with social skills (they aren't bad but it would definitely help his confidence) and separation anxiety so that school doesn't seem like such a shock when he has to go full time. Obviously I know that there are other benefits to nursery but this was the main one for us.

As I am a SAHM and will be home with his little brother, I don't know whether now (August) is a good time to send him or if I should hold off a bit. We don't need to send him to nursery for the childcare while I work so I'm trying to weigh up the risks with this bloody virus. We have several family members in the vulnerable category that we've only just started seeing again and I would be worried that we could potentially spread the virus to them and others without knowing if DS is coming into contact with a lot more people.

Aibu to want to wait it out a few more months/however long it takes? What are you doing in terms of your children and the new school year? Particularly nursery that isn't compulsory.

Mines gone back, he practically bolted from the car door. The nursery has small bubble groups of children that don't social distance with one another. All toys are wipe clean so no soft toys ext. they close early every day to deep clean. The staff don't wear Ppe but they have the visor masks knocking around which the children play with. So if anyone shows symptoms and they all don Ppe the children won't be scared. Definitely the right decision for us, I noticed his behaviour wasn't the best during lock down and it's really improved since. What's right for my family though might be very different from yours. Have you spoken to nursery about your concerns?

It’s completely your call but I personally would send your child

Mine are back. Loving it. Like previous poster they ran for the door, nursery worker tried to encourage them to "say bye to mum" but there was no chance of that 😂😂. Different situation though as they have been before and loved it, really missed it during lockdown. Loads of safety measures in place. I feel like they're safer there than in Tesco at the moment.

We haven't spoken to the nursery about concerns as we were told in our last letter that we would get further details about the situation closer to the time. I do know that they plan to stagger start and home time but that's about all I know. I know that they'll be taking far more precautions than they would have pre-covid but little kids are such germ factories that I feel that perhaps he would be better staying home as he doesn't strictly need to go. I can imagine it being much safer than a trip to a supermarket but neither myself or my kids have been inside a shop since early march either! DH does it. It's so hard as we had hoped to do a few settling in days and also get him staying with family a lot more this year (specifically without me) to help his separation anxiety but we haven't been able to do that. I feel like I'm throwing him in at the deep end when he doesn't have to go.