Crying over children’s behaviour at work

[Themanuscript]

I’ll preface this by saying there are some wonderful parents out there who parent beautifully with and without limited means and raise lovely, well mannered children and I’ve encountered many over my 13 years experience of nurseries/nannying and schools.

But after the past 5 years, I think I’m finally going to walk away from the childcare industry. I’ve just walked in to the house after being tearful the whole way home and broke down after another day of sheer abuse from the children I nanny. No matter how well I teach and model behaviour, parents are not backing it up. Modern work/life balance is so bad that parents are giving into their children out of guilt and creating children that are unpleasant to be around. There should be no such thing as an unpleasant child! I should not be being hit for not giving them more sweets after they’ve had treats all night because they’ve screamed at me for not originally giving in and their parents have come out of the home office and given in to keep them quiet, undermining me in the process. I should not be having water thrown at me for telling them not to hit eachother in the bath. I should not be looked in the eye while telling a child an instruction or not to hurt another child for them to smirk and not listen and just walk away. These are primary aged children and I’m being shouted at constantly because they aren’t being taught ‘no’ at all.

I’ve worked with disadvantaged children who have come from foster care, poverty and abusive households and none of those children ever treated me as bad as the middle class KS1/2 children in beautiful homes who never go without.

Today an 8 year old child was asked what they wanted for dinner, I made said dinner which they decided they didn’t want and because I would not make an entirely different meal they threw it on the floor and later jumped on me full body weight while we’re sat on the couch. Meanwhile I’ve come home to an empty fridge and bank account and they have no idea how fortunate they are.

this isn’t an isolated thing. Like I said previously, this is 80% of the children in past 5 years. I spend all week trying To instil good behaviour, they don’t see me for 2 days over the weekend and it’s back on to square one on Monday

AIBU to walk away from working with children at all? I expect age appropriate challenging behaviour but I am sick of being abused all evening long every single day.

I think it’s much harder for nannies with parents working from home. We employ a nanny and try to both work out the home as much as possible to stay out the way of the nanny doing their job. Who wants their boss hanging around. Not sure what the solution is but I would try and get the children out the house if parents working from home. Pack a picnic dinner and have it in the park now the evenings lighter and nicer perhaps.

posters complaining it’s a middle class problems doesn’t help as only the middle class plus royals etc employ nannies! Childcare work as a nanny must be better than nursery work. Perhaps you could work in a school instead of in a home.

We had a nanny when our DC were preschool. We sat down before she started and discussed our approach to discipline and our expectations re manners etc. I would bring it up at interview stage, there are plenty of parents with rules and expectations re discipline as well, it’s a shame that hasn’t been your experience.

Unlike others, my experience wasn’t of them being that awful at home. If anything they loved their nanny they would be great for her and maybe worse for us as parents, where they typically test boundaries.

I left a school job for the same reason. Kids are wild, I was kicked bitten punched verbally abused / you name it - kids horrible to each other, no manners, rude, entitled and it’s was getting worse

I now have an office job, and the pay is better can go on breaks - holiday when I want -

Please leave for your own sanity!!

These children sound like entitled monsters.
Children NEED boundaries, and to be told ''NO''.

One of the nicest children a friend taught {he is a music teacher} was a child who had to work for anything they wanted- like Paper rounds- and at 15, after Easter and Whitsun they turned up with a very nice Electric Guitar that the lad had worked at a fair for- he had a job cleaning fairground rides - including cleaning vomit out of rides - but he was able to buy his Fender guitar, coupled with his paper round money.
He had manners, pride, self worth - The kids who were bought everything are much brattier.

To come home day after day frustrated and depleted, I’d be like you and dreading the next day and repeat of the same. How utterly demoralizing. So many children nowadays, for the sake of parental convenience, are in charge of things at home, unbelievable as they have not the maturity nor life skills to be in this position. No wonder so many in the teaching profession are walking away, confronted daily by these opinionated, entitled, largely impolite youngsters.

By NO means are all children displaying these behaviours, but unless nurtured by the adults around them, and I mean influenced, encouraged, corrected and shown consequences for undesirable behaviour the result is sadly inevitable. Too many rewards or treats do not help.

They sound terrible. If one of mine was chucking food on the floor like a toddler at the grand old age of 8 I’d die of embarrassment.

I know a couple of childminders who are packing it in, one after 25 years because she’s sick of kids these days. She said last 5 years or so behaviour has got worse (swearing, rude, destroying stuff for the sake of it) and she’s telling parents who just don’t care. Lots of them behave badly too- rude, paying late etc.

I also see the parents of today sometimes not prepared to deal with an incident quickly enough.
They, due to their busy lives, are scrolling and not totally noticing their child about to misbehave. They sometimes miss the chance to intervene early and promptly before something esculates. Once alerted to their kid's unruly behaviour, I see some parents of today behaving over politely and almost embarrassed to seem angry/stern in public.

A raised assertive voice was always acceptable towards a child back in the 1970s and 2000s. Kids's stopped in their tracks because they knew their parent would react like their stern voice told them. Back into the car, toys taken immediately away, no icecream after dinner, their gameboy on top of the fridge for a week. Consequences happened. Parents had little time for gentle reasoning with their child who was rude or hit other kids etc. Parents removed themselves and went home more often with naughty children too.

I don't really know why parents sometimes seem less reactive and attentive these days. Perhaps they are so very exhausted and over worked. Work follows them around on their personal devices every where they go.

My neighbour had a lovely childminder who left because the child, then seven, was appalling. I minded that child myself on occasion. She bit me when I wouldn't let her empty the freezer. She shat herself on purpose when I had a cup of tea with her mother and she wasn't the sole focus. I don't think she was ever, ever told no. All she had to do if she wanted something was scream louder or get violent. Unsurprisingly, she is now a nasty little thug at fifteen. Naice middle class home too.
I think this has been mentioned but night-nursing for tiny babies might be an option, however ultimately I would retrain.

People making a career out of cooking for their families were often on valium and they did so because they had no means of living independently, having had kids, having given up their careers. It is impossible to work a 10-2pm job and live independently and provide for yourself and your children. Most women wouldn't have been able paying for childcare by themselves.

And why do you want for women to be limited to basic jobs? Even animals have childcare and child rearing is shared.

The proportion of women working in early 2000s compared to now isn't very different.

There are countries and populations where stay at home mums do not exist due to excellent childcare options and women treated as nicely as men.

By their nature, people choosing to employ nannies for their school aged kids will be quite different from other people. Not only indulging but also likely naive, gullible and unquestioning too which will translate into their following all the parenting fads including not believing in discipline and consequences.

This OP blames the working parents while she has probably never been employed by non-working parents so doesn't have any comparison, however anecdotal. The worst behaved children I came across through work or personal experience had an indulgent upbringing with stay at home mothers. If they gave up their career/job to look after the kid, they ensured every whimp.was catered for.
The OP wouldn't want to be around such kids.

My goodness...the thought of cheeking a teacher, much less having a tantrum because of a lovely poster is absurdly entitled.

I remember the lovely posters some teachers had, some were so interesting,

One, for Cheddar Caves {Geography} made me feel really hungry as it showed delicious crumbly cheeses at the bottom of the poster. 🧀

YANBU. I was reading a thread on here the other day from a trainee teacher in despair of the behaviour in her class, in an area she described as 'leafy and middle class'. Just today i saw a news item stating 82% of head teachers have been verbally and/or physically abused by parents. As a society we're getting more demanding, less patient, more aggressive. Children mirror what they see, and if parents are also disinclined to say 'no' for fear of being unpopular no wonder kids run riot.

If we don't get a grip there'll be fewer and fewer teachers, nursery workers, paramedics, nurses etc because no one goes to work to be abused but all to often people who work in those fields are. So people will leave these professions, or not train in the first place. I grew up 70s/80s, it was rare to hear of teachers or nursery staff being attacked by either kids or parents. Now it's common place. And yes i know, Covid etc (i had 3 in primary/early secondary at the time) but we've had previous generations live through actual wars and the children and their parents then managed not to assault their teachers, hospital staff or shop workers in ridiculous numbers.

So frankly i don't blame you for wanting to quit OP, esp as you're still young enough to retrain and enjoy a good career elsewhere. Life's too short for being bodyslammed by anyone.

@Themanuscript I was in a park the other day {Will try to change details in case the mother is on here!}
She had a child of around 3 who was fit enough to run away - the mother was not physically able to catch the child- instead the mother tried bribery, but the child just giggles in a really irritating way- the sort of ''giggle'' that would set your teeth on edge.

The child KNEW the mother wasn't physically fit enough to catch them, and the mum sounded near to tears, as the child ran and did the irritating giggling.

The mother changed tack- that of abandoning,

''Mummy will leave you here , with DOGS.
Mummy won't be able to protect you, Byebye'' and the mother wandered off to the park Gate.

It seems to be a lot of parents have lost control.

Parents beaten up by their own nine year olds - it's deeply shocking.

Spoiling might work in the very short term, but then what?

Is part of the problem that the w are WFH so the children perhaps feel that if they play up enough, the parents will come out and take over?

You sound very experienced and knowledgeable OP , your skills are very transferable

https://prisonandprobationjobs.gov.uk/roles-at-hmpps/overview-of-the-probation-officer-role/probation-officer-training-pqip/

At least with adults if they body slam you, you can usually recall them to prison.

If you still want to work with young people look at youth offending roles or 16+ or leaving and after care social care teams. You don't need the social worker qualification for lots of those roles

This a million times.

It's not the children's fault. They are too young to appreciated their good fortune.

Blame the parents.

That's quite shocking of the parents. We weren't like that!! When our kids tried to arbitrage between us and the nanny we just said nanny knows best and you do what nanny says when we're not here. She was wonderful and I miss her every day. A better mother than I can ever be. 😍

Just like horses and dogs.

A very good {in my opinion} horseman says ''Discipline'' is a dirty word these days- Everyone wants to be their child''s/horses/dog's best friend.

{Discipline isn't hitting} It's boundaries and being expected to behave and to do as asked to keep people {and horses/dogs} safe.

I'm not sure why you've included neurodivergent in your list. Being ND is one of the best things about many young people I know. ND people are unique, interesting and genuine so please remove being ND from your 'list' of what children shouldn't be please.

Hexabonsareneverround, I never hope for women to have limited basic jobs. I never used the word women, nor limited, nor basic. Valium was about but I never saw it, never used it and my own experience was that of parents who were very fulfilled, both engaged in very important and enjoyable work.
My own shearer father always maintained that my mother's work was much more important than his own. My own mother delighted in her parenting and homemaking. Many people, even today, place great value on those who work caring for children. It has never been a basic or limiting task.
Some people, male and female choose it as their life's work.

crying?
thats extreme?

You do realise this is as offensive as saying ‘only low income’ children behave badly? Or only certain ethnicities?

There are huge variations within all economic brackets and within working parents. The generalisations you are making are huge and downright offensive.

Working parents is not a reason for badly behaved children. I am PROUD to be showing my daughter she can work hard, be top of her profession, earn money to support her wider family AND be a good person.

And yes we have a nanny. Who wouldn’t dream of making such awful generalisations about our family…

@Themanuscript oh and I’m also very confused about the notion you’re so badly paid.

Qualified nannies are gold dust and so hard to find. We pay in excess of £25 an hour plus holidays etc. 3 full days a week = £30k.

I can’t imagine that income is so awful compared to similar qualification-level jobs?

The generalisations you are making are huge and downright offensive

Happens towards social housing tenants on here all the time
Now SOME will know how it fucking feels!!!

And that is equally wrong…

two wrongs don’t make a right? Or is that a ‘bad parenting’ quote from someone in a big house?

Yeah, fuck that. I don't know what the answer is but there is no way I'd be going back to that job.