No family support nearby

[Danini]

Who do you rely on for help with childcare if you have no family nearby and both parents are sick, or one parent is travelling and the other one gets sick? Or if the whole family is sick? I got unwell a few months ago when my husband was abroad for MIL’s heart bypass, and it was touch and go that I could take care of our child - I wasn’t able to take her to nursery, was so dizzy I was worried I’d pass out getting her food. She watched TV all day long for a week. My initial thoughts are that a nanny would be the only option for help, but this is not regular help needed, more ad hoc. A babysitter would do evenings and weekends but not daytime? A childminder would help if the child itself is not sick? Struggling to find the right fit, any advice appreciated.

You can hire babysitters to do day times too. Try the Bubble app.

I didn't have any sort of plan for that. Are you likely to get sick again?

There's nothing wrong with child watching TV all week since your sick.

Honestly, you muddle through. I lived 5000 miles from family and exh regularly traveled for business, I was literally on my own. I laid on the sofa and fed dc junk on more than one occasion until they could fend for themselves. It's really only 3 years or so where they can't do anything

You just got on with it really. Tv, snacks etc. Babysitters are great but would you want someone in your home if you're that ill, I wouldn't.

This. We had DS in a different country to all family, and then moved away from all friends when he was a small baby. We used a childminder once I returned to work, but if I was sick and DH away, we just muddled though. DS definitely had to live on toast and fruit and watch a lot of TV a few times in the pre-school years when I couldn’t lift my head

You just need to muddle through. We had this and if the kids eat chips, biscuits, lollies for a few days and sit glued to a tv, it is what it is. Essentially, it’s rare ‘emergency’ situations where you just need to do what you can to get by. Yes, it’s shit when you can’t get them to daycare/school when that young if you are truly too sick to take them or organise it, but it is what it is and they won’t die or blow up. Any babysitter would be mad to agree to come to a house where a parent is ill, and risk taking it home themselves, unless it’s something like post-op related so not infectious.