AIBU - 2 year old suddenly crying at nursery with male staff member

[Francine84]

I might be being completely unreasonable here but I can’t get it out of my head. My 2 year old started nursery around 9 months ago and has always been very happy there. Always happy to go in and they told us that she’s happy all day, hardly ever cries.

In the last week she has become very clingy, waking up crying from naps and during the night calling for me. Really out of character for her but I put it down to separation anxiety.

She goes to nursery Wed-Fri and yesterday when I dropped her off the only male member of the nursery staff answered the door and my daughter burst into tears and was clinging to me. It was heartbreaking, I had to hand her over and she was hysterical. When I picked her up in the afternoon her key worker (female) said she was emotional all day, which again is so unlike her. She hasn’t cried at nursery drop off since she first started earlier this year. And even then once she had settled in she was happy all day.

This morning the same man answered the door again and the same thing happened - hysterical crying and holding on to me.

Given the recent news about a male nursery worker abusing the children in his care I can’t shake the thought that something is wrong. Why is my daughter suddenly so clingy and unhappy? I know that men work in nurseries but it seems like it’s only this particular member of staff that she has that reaction with.

AIBU to say something to nursery? What would I even say?

Or am I overreacting and this is normal for 2 year olds to have very clingy phases? I just want to protect her and it makes me feel so sad to think she’s not happy at nursery.

Advice would be much appreciated!

15% is shockingly high. It must be even higher because of those who won't admit it. What I want to know now is what % of the 15% think they would act on their feelings and how many of the 15% do act on their feelings. It would be lazy to say that 15% of men are paedophiles. Some of the 15% must be ashamed of what they feel.

Just because your child can tell you doesn't mean they will. They are usually too scared to confide in their parents. I don't think children being able to talk makes it much safer really.
Personally I'm not against male nursery staff, having worked with some but if you are worried about male staff members don't kid yourself it's so much safer when your child can talk.

Who on here has said that it’s definitely nothing? I don't think anybody has said that there's no possibility whatsoever that he (or indeed any of his male or female colleagues) could be an abuser, have they?

Why stop there? Surely if you want to reduce the risk as much as humanly possible, you would, as the child's mother, look after the child yourself, rather than ever considering running the risk of trusting a female stranger?

Maybe all of those feminists who fought long and hard for the rights of women to be able to work outside the home had it all wrong all along, eh? Best to leave the jobs outside the home for the men, to keep them well away from children and make everybody safer?

The same is true of women - we don't know how many women nursery workers are abusing children and not getting caught.

Look, I'm just saying that if you're going to use statistics to make a risk assessment about how likely your child is to be abused by a male nursery worker, use more relevant statistics. Because, well, probablility and maths and stuff.

Because I'm a data geek I did the maths as best as I could.

TLDR: Using the most doom-laden scenario planning I could, the chances that any given adult male in the UK is a child sex abuser is in the region of 0.02%. Meaning that there is a 99.08% chance that he is not.

The overwhelming majority of those incidents will happen where a man is least likely to be caught: at home. Then factor in all the additional safeguarding precautions that nurseries take with all their employees. Then add in all the extra attention to safeguarding that the horrific case in the news recently will have brought to every nursery in the country.

Now you may still think that this is an unacceptable risk to take, but I think it is a more useful statistic to bear in mind and elicits a more proportionate response than thinking solely about the figure 98% of all sex abuse being committed by men. There are 23 million men in England, and thank fuck that the overwhelming majority of them are not child sex abusers. Are not any type of abuser, in fact.

The long version with the maths for those who want to read it:

ONS figure for Total number of crimes flagged as child sexual abuse and/or relating to indecent images of children April 2024 to March 2025 (England): 122,938 (Fucking hell, I have no words).

Yes, we know there are crimes that don't go reported. We don't know how many, but Criminal Injuries Helpline whoever they are suggest about 72% of adults who 72% of adults who experienced sexual abuse as a child do not tell anyone at the time of the abuse, so I'll call it three quarters don't get reported and quadruple that first figure: 4 x 112,938 = 451,752.

98% of sexual crimes are by men, so 98% of that is: 442,717
(leaving 9.035 of sexual crimes against children committed by women)

Population over 18 in the UK in mid 2025: 46,437,085
49.25% are men (call it 50%) - 23,218,543

Assuming the most dangerous case scenario, that each CSA crime was committed by a different man (whereas in reality each guilty man will be responsible for multiple).

442,717 crimes divided by 23 million men: 0.019.

For each individual man in the UK, there is a 0.02% chance that he is a child sex abuser.

There is a 99.08% chance that he is not.

Feminists fought for choice. Childcare requires sacrifice and that too is a choice.

Not a chance in hell. A man in a nursery is major safe guarding fail. A nice face and a quiet demeanor is nothing. Trust your gut and pull your child out now. Why is this even a debate?

On VERY RARE occasions children are harmed by adults who work in a nursery setting, period.

Keep it proportionate. The overwhelming number of nursery staff, male and female, are SAFE.

When people go to this length to disprove an alarming statistic concerning CSA one does begin to think about their agenda? If 98 percent of convictions for CSA are held by men what do you think will happen when there is an increase in male recruitment? Do you think there will be no rise in cases of CSA?

If you’re such a geek then you should know what a trajectory is? Or is it that yes there is a probability of there being an increase but for the sake of hurting the male population’s feelings we should just let potential CSA happen?

We know that women as a demographic, across the board, commit only 2% of sexual offences. We know that men as a demographic commit 98%. While the overall risk may remain low, it is magnitudes higher with a man, than with a woman.

We also know that paedophiles deliberately infiltrate nurseries and day cares, because it gives them easy access to victims, so the percentage of paedophiles will be skewed far, far higher in nurseries than across the general population.

Given these things, the sensible choice is to make sure your child is cared for by a woman.

Also, multiple studies have shown that men will self admit to rape and sexual assault at rates of between 7% and 39%, depending on the study. So I'm afraid you can probably throw your estimated numbers out. They're just not relevant.

Just to add to this because none of us have a crystal ball however Australia has had male nursery workers longer than we have had here.

The article below illustrates the outcome of hiring male workers in larger numbers.

www.abc.net.au/news/2025-10-27/childcare-centres-paedophiles-abuse-four-corners/105926324

This is a debate because it is looking at the facts. You are not debating. You are sticking by an opinion that doesn't stand up to reason. That's bigotry.

Trust your gut and change to a nursery that doesn’t employ men. I’d not let a strange man look after my children. Does he change nappies and accompany them to the toilet? Madness.

I feel quite strongly that we have to keep the recent news in proportion and not make regressive steps in society. Men are absolutely capable of having the nurturing instinct (that I personally as a woman lack!) and being good at childcare without nefarious intentions, and it would be horribly regressive for women if we allowed any societal backslide into mens jobs and womens jobs

Couldn't agree more.

Except statistically speaking, women are as good as men - or even better than men - at most jobs that were once male-dominated (for example, female surgeons have a better survival rate), so there's no reason to bar them from those jobs.

But statistically speaking, men are more likely to sexually abuse children, and sexually abusive men use nurseries as hunting grounds with captive victims - a good reason to bar them from those jobs.

I think its best to talk to the head teacher, and get to the bottom of the matter. Something is definately off.

Obviously, you're being very unreasonable to hand a terrified screaming tiny child over to a man you don't know. Stop doing that.

There have been two stories in the past month in the news about male nursery staff turning out to have abused the children.

Hell will freeze over before I put my child in a nursery that has male staff. I’d remove her.

I’m not sure about the strong ‘I wouldn’t leave my child with a male’ however, your gut instinct should never be ignored.

It’s pretty staggering to read that women would put the safety of tiny voiceless babies and toddlers firmly BEHIND women’s rights and equality? And call it ‘regressive’ to consider ways to protect the most vulnerable in our society?

It beggars belief actually.
It is deeply shocking.

No, actually our rights do not come before the safety of babies. Our rights should never be weaponised against us by predators and peadophiles looking to abuse our own children?! We are literally paying for our children to be abused in these places. What the actual hell.

It is just like the trans movement part two. Bloody wake up! Some of these men are openly RAPING our babies of course we need to consider whether it is even safe for them to be there at all. Why wouldn’t we as a society decide that the risk is too great. We have all female teams working in the breast clinics and doing smear tests etc.

I have to hope that these posts are from males on this thread with dubious motives, and hope to dear God they are not the ‘cool’ mothers with real children. How sickening to suggest women’s rights come before all else. No, they really, really don’t - but good try.

Dont you think there needs to be something in here adjusting for the fact that the creeps might seek out work that puts them in contact with children? Purely from what i see in the press etc there seems to be 2 types - got caught grooming a 13yo decoy promising them mcdonalds at leeds train station and scout leaders, teachers etc.

Dont forget the ex head teacher of the year put away for raping and killing the baby boy he was in the process of adopting. Wish i was making that up.

I think there should be more male staff in early years. But obviously safeguarding measures need to be adhered to

What ‘safe guards’ do you suggest that will keep babies safe from male sex offenders with full access in a nursery setting?

I think there should be more male staff in early years.

Why? Genuinely, why?

What benefit do babies and toddlers get from being cared for by males at a point in their lives in which, in primitive tribal situations and throughout our history as a species, females have been the primary carers?

From the research I've seen, the primary 'benefits' seem to be that that men usually 'more often' engage in rough and tumble play, and that babies and toddlers see men in caring roles (the benefit of which is touted broadly, and yet I have found no studies actually demonstrating it has a positive, lasting effect on children.)

Those vague and minor possible benefits don't seem worth the massively increased risk of child rape and sexual abuse...but maybe that's just me being hysterical and bigoted towards the poor men.