to expect child minder not to slam door in dp face? Please help

[lilymolly]

ok here goes

Usually pay cm on friday morn, but dd was excluded cos of conjuncitivitis.
CM rang on friday to ask after dd and I told her I would drop cash off over the weekend, instead of cheque cos obv could not be checked into the bank.

CM under a lot of personal pressure due to family illness, sons car payments and start of menopause, she had 1 day off last week due to stress, and I was really supportive and me and another mindee bought her some flowers and offered to go for a meal and drink to cheer her up, (this was cancelled by the other mindee and was rearranged for a few weeks time)

Anyway, I totally forgot to send money to her this weeekend, and she sent this text message at 4.30pm

"where is dd childcare fees, i take this as at best as forgetfullness at worst disrespect and insentivitness and i trust that you will not need me to look after dd any more"

I sent dp down with cash for her, he tried to apologise for delay, and told her we had had manic weekend, as dog has just had puppies and was at the vets etc... she told him not to talk about his weekend and that her mil was terminally ill, she had a car to pay for and that she would look for someone elses children to look after as we have no rexpect for her!!!!

I swear down, I have the upmost respect for her and have treated her with so much sensativity, ahe is an excellent cm, and dd is due to go to her care on Tuesday and I dont know what to do.

I have sent a message apologising and asking her to contact me directly but she has ignored me.

I am devastated, I have been in tears all night, I am CONVINCED i have done nothing and this is totally out of the blue, and if she is stressed I am willing to let this go, but need some advice as I don not want to loose her and dont want her treating us like this.

Please Help

Thanks

now you are being totally unreasonable. you are begging her and showing her that no matter how rude and aggresive, you will put up with it. very bad idea.

her financial and emotional well being is not your responsibility and nor is it more important than the safety of your daughter.

i really hope your dh has the sense to refuse to send his dd back to this woman, for your dd'd sake i really do.

i know there are plenty of good childminders out there but your daughter is going to be left alone (meaning without another adult) for hours at a time and you will have no way of knowing what is going on.

Don't do it lilymolly.

You sound like you just want to leave dd with anyone tbh Well, that's the way it's coming across. It seems that she can talk to you whatever the hell way she wants, even tell you that she wants no friendship with you... and you will still leave your dd there.

It's just because you can't be bothered to look for someone else, isn't it?

You are an idiot to think this woman is capable of looking after your dd well in her current state. She may well be under a lot of stress at the moment and you don't want to tip her over the edge. Well I certainly hope that given her current state it's not something your dd does that tips her over the edge.

I'm more annoyed by you than your childminder at the minute.

Well, you've made your choice.

Let's just hope you're not back on here posting how your dd according to your cm 'tipped her over the edge' and cm flipped at her/shook/bashed/screamed at her.

no not that I cant be bothered looking for someone else, just that I know that for the past year she has been wonderful with dd, and I think she is just having a really hard time and unfortunately i broke the camels back.
I dont think I could find anyone as good as her. she has conistantly had good reviews from ofsted, all her other parents think she is wonderful and my friends who know her think she overreacted and whilst think it was uncalled for, needs to be given the benefit of the doubt.

Did she really slam the door in your DP's face or is that an exaggeration? Because you describe her as "ranting" when what she was actually saying was quite reasonable that she wanted to be paid on Fridays. You dismiss that as a rant Lily, which makes it sound like you really haven't taken on board that you did anything wrong. And the way you describe it it sounds like you wanted to brush it aside with a rote apology so you could get to your self-righteous part about how badly she treated your DP. He's a big boy, if he's that bothered can't he talk to her about it himself?

As for the people here saying "OMG the weekend hadn't ended so why does she care she didn't get paid" (as if any of them wouldn't be pissed off if their employer didn't make the effort to pay them at the right time), the point is she was right, you said yourself that you had forgotten, so she wasn't unreasonable in saying that you had in fact forgotten and to be annoyed about it. And TBH it sounds like you don't respect her work the way you were talking about her getting money for nothing on a Friday. A childminder had to pop up and remind you that this lady is keeping this spot open for your DD which most certainly isn't money for nothing.

I do agree with everybody else though that you should find new childcare for your sake, for the sake of the CM and most importantly for your DD. If the trust has gone I don't see how you can continue to ask her to do such a sensitive and important job. It's going to be too stressful for both of you and thus by extension bad for your daughter.

I wouldn't have her look after my dc's. She is unstable, rude, childish and I think it quite spiteful to state that she does not consider you, nor want you as a friend.

Give notice and move your dd..before her next meltdown (or bailiff visit) is whilst she is in her care.

So if it was your friends who had been treated the way this woman treated you, they would give her the benefit of the doubt would they?

If one of my friends didn't pay me money I was owed and needed when I was having huge difficulties that they knew about, then they tried to brush me aside with a story about puppies, I'd probably stop regarding them as a friend too.

yes she slammed the door in dp face. yes she gets paid for having kept a place on a friday for my dd on a friday which I have no problem with at all.

Yes she was reasonable to expect payment on a friday, and her ranting is my description of her talking very loudly in a forceful manner, not shouting and screaming although dp thought she was nuts when he went to the door.

I do respect her work and do not think she is getting money for nothing, I was merely trying to point out that I dont think as clients go I am such a bad one to keep hold of, esp as since somedays I pay cm and have dd at home with me due to the nature of my work, which is surely a goodthing for a cm?

the OP states that she said she would send the money 'over the weekend' and make it cash not a cheque. In my mind Sunday afternoon is still the weekend and getting cash then would be better than a cheque on Friday....

Elizabeth, you are starting to make sense now, thats what I was thinking, Thats why i feel now after hours of deliberation that I am in the wrong and will try to recitify a business relationship

The OP also says that she had completely forgotten about it, which the childminder rightly surmised.

lilymolly

This thread has brought back some very bad memories about how my relationship with my cm ended www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=2300&threadid=393964#8017740- see this thread. I tried very hard to salvage the relationship but it turned out to be impossible.

The problem was that my cm had behaved unreasonably (as has yours not matter irrespective of your minor error on the payment) and what I worked out was that she was finding the stress of 3 young children too much especially when some of the arrangements around their care changed and when on top of that ds had a regression in potty training. I think it all got too much for her and instead of talking to me and giving notice she went off the deep end leaving me with no choice but to make a decision for her.

She never said any of this as that would be admitting she couldn't cope which she was unable to do, I just worked it out really.

It seems to me that your cm probably wants to reduce her stress. One way of doing this is to reduce the number of her mindees. she probably can't bring herself to make the decision but her behaviour will eventually ensure that this is what happens. She is prbably not doing this consciously but it is clear she does not want to have your dd back. she probably realises she went too far but can't bring herself to/or doesn't want to back down.

As a parent you need to make the best decsion for your dd and put aside all your feelings of hurt etc.

To just say children are resilient is true but ignores the fact that the change is very difficult for them (and us). However sometimes change is necessary, however painful it may seem at the time and I honestly don't think you can send your dd back to someone under such stress who can't communicate with you.

I know that the advice to change childcare seems difficult - I found it incredibly stressful and it is easier said than done to find good childcare at short notice. Also I found myself unable to trust another cm as I had belived everything was fine, yet it obviously wasn't.

I too didn't want ds going to a another local cm who might meet up with his old cm at toddler groups/nurseries etc. I couldn't stand to think of them discussing me or the situation with him there. It may not have happened but I couldn't take the chance.

In the end I went with a nursery but the impact to my job in terms of my credibility and reputaion is immense. I had to take masses of time off and in fact am still taking some unpaid leave (1/2 a day a week)as the nursery did not have enough hours available to cover what I needed and I refused to use a nursery that did have the hours but that I liked a lot less.

Also ds has now settled in nursery but it took a good couple of months and he was very unhappy and clingy for quite a while, all of which added to my guilt.

I had all these feelings and thoughts you are having

Was it my fault?
Was I too soft? (I also overpaid her for a lot of her time - I paid 4 days when I only used 3 and paid for more hours than I used t omaintian flexibility)
Why is she rejecting ds? (this was the worst one)

In the end I had to get past this and make the best decision I could for ds and that was to change childcare. The nursery he is at is wonderful and the difference in the way they talk about him and the way the cm did in the last few months is only now beciming all too painfully clear.

I am still pretty angry with my cm about it though.

yes I had forgotten about it, due to the fact that my child was ill, dog was ill at the vets all weekend and that i have 11 puppies to look after! still my problems are signifcant I know, compared to hers, but that does not make me a bad person, which was why I was so upset, but I dont think she meant that i was a bad person simply wanted paying on time.

Lillymolly you are clutching at what Elizabeth is saying because you want to continue to use the CM. She was not your friend, she is not your friend and she should not be your CM. Why on earth should her behaviour be acceptable? At any level in any job and particularly one where children are at the centre of it? In life we are not allowed rant and rave and throw strops in our workplaces, why should she? She is not your friend, she has made this clear, she doesn't deserve a second chance, she wouldn't even if she was clerk in an office, but definitely not if she is looking after your child.

YEs Lilly you forgot, so shoot you. I forgot dd had a birthdya party this weekend because ds was poorly but the mother didn't rant at me or DH or send rude text messages. Yes you frogot but a little bit of common sense should tell you that any rational human being should have given a quick call or text "just in case you forgot dd's fees are still due, any chance you can drop them off?" but she didn't she sent you a text full of attitude which in the first instance got you upset.

The fact that communication has broken down is the biggest concern here, she obviously has serious trouble on some level communicating with you in a sensible manner.

Yes she probably got a bit peed off at your dp's going on about puppies and knowing dp's he might have been a bit waffly and making it sound like a bit of an escuse cause let's face it most aren't the best at dealing with these things but that was absolutely no excuse for her behaviour.

Everyone has problems god I know someone going through WAY more than your cm has told you about but she manages to be a civil human being because that is what people do.

SHe cannot have the best of both worlds she cannot rant and rave in a way a friend might to let off steam then tell you that they are not friends with you. THis is a business relationship to her and I am sorry but the personla care of a childminder is the whole reason for picking one this is not a bak transaction.