Sickness at nursery

[Leggs11xo]

How often are kids sick at nursery. I am due to go back to work full time and I don't have any family or friends who can care for my DD. Just wondering what other people's experience of how much time their baby has off when they first start I know all baby's are obviously different.

I didn't manage to work a full week at work for a month

We have been lucky, my DD has been at nursery for 9 months now (3 days per week) and only missed one day so far for conjunctivitis. It may not be as bad as you think!

Quite a lot of sickness periods for the first 9 months to be honest. Every few weeks (and the type she had to have time off nursery). After that she want poorly often at all so had obviously built up a resistance after those first 9 months!

First 6 to 9 months can be bad tbh

Thanks guys - me and my partner are both starting news jobs and I'm nervous that we are both going to have to take alot of time off for sicknes and I don't have anyone who can help out . Guess I'll just have to deal with it as it comes

My two have been in for a month and during the settling in period, my 3 year old caught a sickness bug (4 days before I was due to start my new job) but luckily no one else caught it.

Nothing else yet 🤞 but it's early days 😬

The first few months were awful I'm afraid to say. If I wasn't off work looking after poorly DS, I was off work ill with whatever DS had had,

It did get better though, although DS then seemed to develop a habit of carrying germs, so he was fine, but DH and I ended up ill!

It must have built up his immune system though as he only had about 2 days off over his time at Primary School.

Unfortunately DS has had everything going, colds, flu, Chicken Pox, various other unspecified viruses... in the first 6 months. He got it then I did. Occasionally DH also.

There’s s big ethos of “send them in ill” around here which just compounds the matter

I know some nursery have a will give capol and weight for fever to reduce policy. I'm finding this whole childcare stressful!

Late to the post but my 18 month old started at 9 months and I've been off with her around 5 times.
I also am a nursery practitioner in her setting and have worked in the baby unit for around 20 years.
In my experience some children pick up everything and others barely pick up anything.
There were 8 children who started at the same as DD and there's only 1 child who picks up everything, the poor thing is barely there and when he is he has antibiotics or calpol or eyedrops or something.

My DD went one-half day per week& always caught something;diarrhoea, conjunctivitis, vomiting bugs & colds. It felt endless

Rarely gets unwell now (aged 13)

I think a childminder is better than a nursery if you are hoping to avoid constant illness. Also, a good childminder is generally just better than a nursery setting for under 3 year olds.

I would love to find a really good child minder but I find the idea of handing my child to just one person alone too difficult atleast with nursery it's well regulated lots of people. I know it sounds horribly untrusting as I'm sure my worries are complelty unfounded. Fingers crossed my little one won't be that poor kid that picks up all the bugs! If she is maybe I could then explore the childminder option. I wouldn't even know where to begin with looking for a childminder ?

My DS went to nursery at a year and didn’t have more than 2 days sick in the two years he was there so don’t panic just yet. You don’t know how it will go.

See if you can find a childminder that will do emergencies. That’s what we did. I had her round while I was at the house to get to know her, and for DS and her to get to know each other, then she was basically on call if I ever needed her.

I was lucky, she did school runs for the most part so was quite happy to have occasional other work.

Summer is better than winter. We've rarely had to take full days off, altho we have left work more often - maybe 20 times across 2dc and 4 years of nursery.

It depends how your child gets ill. My two rarely get temperatures so as a result, rarely get sent home. A child that spikes a temperature at the merest sniffle is going to cause you more problems.

My daughter was constantly full of cold for a couple of months, but it was winter so the worst time. I had a couple of doctors appointments and one day off, but generally they are not bugs which require you to keep them off. I allow my nursery to give calpol if she has a temperature but I don't think they've had to. It's more a case of sleepless nights and going to work very tired!

My daughter has been at nursery for 13 months. She has been off a total of maybe 6 days. And half this was due to discovering she can get travel sick - getting rid of her morning bottle of milk solved that. She has had a few minor colds but not needed time off for those. No tummy bugs. Her nursery has a lot of outdoors time so I think that helps.

It all depends on the child and the nursery. We’ve been quite lucky. Both in full time. DS 2 x sickness bugs, 2 x high temps 1 x chicken pox (from 9mo to 4.5). DD 1 x sickness bug (from 5mo to 3). Plus a couple of colds for both thT nursery would have taken them for but I kept them off anyway.

Chap I work with’s DD is off probably at least a month with something.