To be purposefully late?

[Crunchycadbury]

I work weekend evenings and by the time I travel home, shower, eat and go to bed it's gone past midnight. I also have bouts of insomnia where I'm unable to sleep until gone 2-3am meaning sometimes I only have 5 or less hours sleep.

My child is in nursery two days per week, Monday and Tuesday. He starts at 9 and finishes at 4.30. In order to get him there on time I have to get up at 7am to get myself and the two kids ready. Breakfast. 30 minute walk both ways.

Given that nursery isn't compulsory I'm starting to resent the rushing and lack of sleep which is causing me to feel burnt out.

It doesn't help that they are 'fussy' and don't like lateness as they want the children to participate in circle time.

AIBU to put my foot down and say he's starting later and that's that?

I take mine when it suits me and our nursery are fine with that. Sometimes one child might need a bit more sleep or I want to spend a bit of time with them before work. We pay for 8-6 but attend 9-5.30 sometimes even don’t go until 10. If it were a school nursery I completely understand the specified hours (which is why I chose a private nursery) x

Hi op, I worked shifts for years and late shifts finished at 12. I totally feel your pain about not being able to get to sleep. For me I’d be going at 100 miles an hours and the. Need to stop and go to sleep! The pressure of having to get up in the morning made it worse so I absolutely feel your pain! Sadly my oldest was at school then so we didn’t have any flexibility and I had to get the baby up too. Try to rest whenever you can. Definitely tell nursery what you want them to do. I’m sure they will agree. What about one of those bike trailers that you can fit 2 children in? Always some on Facebook market place. That might make a big difference to you. Pop the baby in a onesie, toddler eat breakfast on the way. Up dressed out. Get back, try to rest. Also remember this time is short. Things will get better. Good luck

YABU I work in a school with an attached nursery and it’s incredibly disruptive when children arrive late. It can also be quite stressful to the child as everyone looks around, not to mention the office staff who have to take time out to deal with a late arrival etc. I think the suggestion of changing your day or session to a later session would be more reasonable. If your place is funded then even more so as your funding is for a full session.

I do sympathise with your plight, but I know at our nursery it wouldn’t be accepted.

Tell them you need to bring him later. I think any one that's reasonable would compromise when you are going through a tough time.

YANBU, bit will the clocks changing mean your little ones get up an hour earlier and might make it easier to get there on tome?

Since furlough and now being made redundant I drop my 3 year old at nursery around 9.30-9.45 rather than the 7.50. They say not a thing! I pay for it so up to me when I drop as long as it’s within hours.

Babies that sleep until 8:30 !!!! Absolutely criminal to wake them. End of.

I'd take him in when suits you. You're paying for the day but it's up to you how much of that time he actually attends. My son goes in from 7am some days and 8am others but if we're running late he'll sometimes be there closer to 8am on a 7am day. Nursery have never chased us and I wouldn't expect them to. They're getting paid regardless so I don't see the issue. Only thing I would do is let them know if he's likely to miss a full day or any hot meals so they don't prepare food unnecessarily.

Yeah good luck with that. If they offered fixed hours like you’ve described you signed up to those hours. They can tell you to jog on. Many free nursery provisions have fixed sessions.

They’re not unreasonable to ring either if you’re late. He’s due at nursery. If he doesn’t turn up by a fixed time of course they’re going to ring. You’re going to be in for a nightmare when he starts school 😂

@FutureMama94 report to who? And please provide a link to back it up because we all know that’s nonsense. Ofsted absolutely do not require daily reports of child absence / lateness and the local authority only care if child is CSA and has missed 10 sessions in a school year.

Why do you send your child to nursery at 2 if its not to enable you to work?
You will have agreed the hours prior to your little ones start, so effectively the hours form a part of your contract with them. But what I'm finding really confusing is that you only work at the weekend, and your child attends nursery during the week, without wishing to sound harsh, I know Mums who would consider 5 - 6hrs sleep as heaven, they consider 4 - 5 hrs heaven, and then have to work full time.

Perhaps you could look at other ways to increase your rest hours and perhaps get home a little quicker at the weekend.

Hi OP, I have read your posts but only skimmed responses so not sure if it’s already been mentioned- but it could be worth looking into a childminder who has funded places for your 2yr old- this is what I did when I was doing home Ed with my 2 & 3.5yr old, as I really needed some time just to myself, and even though the local nursery/school had places available I wanted the flexibility of childminder hours. If she lived nearer she would have done pick up and drop off too, so if you find a good childminder nearby they may be willing to do that too, which is amazing when you have another child to drag around! I suffer from insomnia and am really Not a morning person, so I found the early school runs really difficult to manage too, hope you get it sorted soon

YABU
Because the OP is claiming government funding which is only paid for the hours the child is actually in attendance rather than for which they are scheduled (as it isn't fair to expect taxpayers to fund a service for an individual who doesn't even bother to use it) the nursery is financially impacted every time the OP is late in dropping her child off. What the OP is doing is essentially no different to arriving at the hairdressers and informing them that you now only require a dry cut when you are booked in for a full colour treatment or informing your cleaner on arrival that they will only be doing and paid for 1 hour when you have booked them for 2.

In your shoes I would be late on some days too!
Would they be open to him coming in at an agreed time every day, later than the normal start time but at a point that wouldn't be disruptive, with the understanding you pay for the whole session.
He is only 2 and you are a paying customer.
I am surprised nurseries phone if your child is late, my dc are older but this was never a thing 8-10 years ago, my dcs pre school didn't mind you running late in he morning but, understandably, were strict about pick up time

YABU as it's really disruptive if kids turn up at different times. There's also loads of covid related difficulties with timings.

Why don't you go for 4 x afternoon sessions? Alternatively use a childminder. They would likely be happy to have a child arrive after school drop off. I used my funded hours with a childminder. They tend to be much more flexible.

First I want to say that I am sending you so much understanding and wish I could give you more. Lack of sleep is horrendous and so difficult to keep going.
It does sound like a nursery with a lot of structure. Perhaps finding a different nursery closer to home. Personally, I put my dad in at 2 and regretted it. It was too much and doesn't teach anyone anything but how to be stressed. If you find it is easier to stay at home and go to the park on your own schedule, do that.
It also sounds like really looking at how you can give some care to yourself and give yourself a break. I hope this works out for you.

I pay for my child to attend 8-6 and dont drop him til 9 as see no reason to rush around when i dont have to be at work at that time! They were totally fine with it. That said, the first set thing they do is 9am circle time, so they may have had an issue, if i had wanted to drop him later.
Have you tried asking if you can drop him at a set later time?

You need sleep! If they are sleeping in - you stay in bed!

@lilstarr99

YABU I work in a school with an attached nursery and it’s incredibly disruptive when children arrive late. It can also be quite stressful to the child as everyone looks around, not to mention the office staff who have to take time out to deal with a late arrival etc. I think the suggestion of changing your day or session to a later session would be more reasonable. If your place is funded then even more so as your funding is for a full session.

I do sympathise with your plight, but I know at our nursery it wouldn’t be accepted.

Your nursery isn't very child centred in that case, if it's been set up so that children who are late are made to feel stressed. Why do this? You don't need to.

Many nurseries manage to have flexible mornings with no stress to children.

Your nursery's inflexibility is the issue, not the latecomers.

lilstarr does your nursery take children as young as 2? Do families pay?

Just curious because when my toddler was in nursery we dropped off and picked up when we wanted and we paid.

But I do know schools use the word nursery for what I would call more of a pre school, which seems quite different.

I’m surprised at some of these responses he is two my son attends a private nursery, we do not drop him off at the same time everyday. We pay from 7-5:30 and drop him off anywhere between 9:30 and 10:00. It does not really matter as long as your paying for that time only time I could think it matter is if it was half days due to staffing but if you pay for full day then I really don’t see the issue

@Ellie4747

I’m surprised at some of these responses he is two my son attends a private nursery, we do not drop him off at the same time everyday. We pay from 7-5:30 and drop him off anywhere between 9:30 and 10:00. It does not really matter as long as your paying for that time only time I could think it matter is if it was half days due to staffing but if you pay for full day then I really don’t see the issue

I came in here to say pretty much the same thing. When my kids were in nursery, I paid full-time hours and dropped them off and picked them up at different times each day, depending on my commitments. Between my kids we used 5 different nurseries and not once did anyone ever raise an issue about it.

Have you tried melatonin or phenergan for your insomnia? Melatonin gets you off to sleep & phenergan is an antihistamine that will help you stay asleep. Both can be bought online, Phenergan costs me £12 for 56, lasts me 2 months.

We pay from 7-5:30 and drop him off anywhere between 9:30 and 10:00. It does not really matter as long as your paying for that time only time I could think it matter is if it was half days due to staffing but if you pay for full day then I really don’t see the issue

The OP doesnt pay though, her son only goes for his free 15 funded hours so she isnt actually paying for the time and in fact the nursery may be paying to have her son there if he misses time.

Nurseries get audited on their funding hours and if they are found to be regularly claiming for hours that a child is not in their care then they can get into trouble and even have to pay back the funding money. Because the OP doesn't use any extra hours the nursery cant be flexible with arrival times as it may mean they are unable to claim the hours funding.

In your case, your child attends 7-5.30 which is 10.5 hours. If your child attends for 2 days a week that's 21 hrs. If you were claiming 15 funded hours then the nursery would be able to average those hours over the 2 days so each day 7hrs are funded and the other 3.5hrs are paid for. If you drop your child off at 9.30am some days then it will not affect the funding because they can say that 7-10.30 were your "paid hours" and 10.30-5.30 were the funded hours. If, however, your DC attends 2 days a week 10.30-5.30 then that is just the 15 funded hours. If you then start dropping your DC off at 11am then that's 2.5hrs a week of funding the nursery cant claim for ... but if they dont know when you will turn up late then they dont know when they can claim the full funding and when they can't.