Is it unreasonable to ask playgroup to manage this?

[Hana89]

Hi,
I'm just looking for a bit of advice: I'm a first time mum and I'm not sure of the etiquette surrounding playgroups and how they are managed.
Basically, I take my 10 month old to a great soft play session run by our local SureStart centre and the team who run it are so lovely, but lately there have been quite a few toddlers coming with obviously bad colds/chest infections. Think: properly snotty noses, hacking coughs etc.

The organisers have commented in a hinting way to the parents like "Oh dear! Is X a bit unwell to play today?" but they don't actually stop them joining the session.

Would it be unreasonable or unfair of me to write to them and ask them to manage this a bit better? It's a free weekly session and it is great fun so I absolutely understand parents not wanting their little ones to miss out, but equally I don't think it is fair to the children who are not ill and because they're all so young there is no hand-over-mouth or sensibly wiping noses, it is just a free for all. Personally I just wouldn't take my daughter if she was so obviously poorly, but I sort of feel like the parents who don't seem to think about it should be gently asked to take their children home and join in next week.

If it's just me and I'm being a bit overprotective then fair enough, like I say, I don't have much experience of these groups. It has just been a bit of a shock!

We’re another set that wouldn’t leave the house between October and March if we stayed home for a cold.
I keep them home if they’ve got a temperature but otherwise if it’s just a cold and they’re fine in themselves we go about our normal lives.

When my PFB got her first cold at 9 months from a baby group I felt much the same as you OP but now I have 2 toddlers I’ve realised it’s just impossible to avoid.

It's better that they catch something now while you're not working rather than when they are at nursery and you are working.

Yeah afraid this is normal. Your kid is going to spend the next few years catching thousands of bugs, that’s how they build their immune system.
You should start taking vitamin C or you’re going to catch them all too!

I see this at Tumble Tots. With both the children and at least one volunteer coughing and hacking into a sleeve or hankie but not even sterilising her hands after and then touching the children. I really think the managers need to come down harder on them. I know they might not be contagious but also, it's not great!

Bonkers to even consider it. I’ve got health anxiety and an 3 year old and I take her to lots of playgroups. They are all filled with snotty nosed toddlers. It’s absolutely normal in this age group

Nursery is going to be difficult for you OP.

How will your child build up any
Immunity?

School/nursery tend to exclude for fever, vomiting and diarrhoea.

I personally would keep my child home if they had a bad cold/were unwell, but then I've been fortunate not to have one of those kids who runs a cold from October to March. So I wouldn't blame the parents for bringing them.

I do wish parents would be hotter on the nose wiping though - it's so gross to see kids running around with very obviously snotty noses... I'd quite like to wipe them myself but obviously that would be hugely overstepping!

My toddler goes to an outdoor / forest school nursery and has still had a cold since the first week in September with no sign of letting up. I used to worry, but as soon as she started at one I had to stop worrying because I realised it was unavoidable. I still leave the house because otherwise, one of us would go insane 😂

Thanks all (except the couple of snarky posters - they can piss off!)
Not a unanimous verdict, but majority rules! I'll just grimace and accept the snot! It is such a great group but the age range is 0-4 and when my 10month old looks so small compared to some of the other kids, it can all just be a bit daunting really.

And I do think a free, one-hour a week playgroup is very different to a nursery placement. Nursery costs a fortune and (for the most part) people need to send their children so that they can go to work to earn a living so I get why people have to make the best of it at nursery and very soon we'll be in the same boat! But skipping a playgroup for a week or two if your kid has a wretched cough and bubbling nose doesn't seem too much of an outrageous ask!! Still, we'll see how annoyed by it I am in another year or two when I'm probably just giving DD's nose a quick wipe and hoping for the best! Haha!

I came on to say this..
A mother who had a baby the same age as mine (my 3rd DC) kept her child away from any groups etc because of the risk..
My child got everything going and had an almost permanent snotty nose..but when he started school he had almost 100% attendance..but her child then started to get all the viruses they weren't exposed to as a baby/toddler...
It's a fact of life that they'll be exposed to germs and viruses unless you never mix with anyone..ever..
I know it's hard OP and you want to protect your baby but it's really important for their immune system to be exposed to germs and viruses unless they have a medical reason to be protected...

Low level snot that might want wiping once or twice whilst we are there I go but might keep her away from the mats where the baby toys are. I keep an eye on wiping the snot.
If I would be there continuously wiping her nose I stay at home. The same as I would do for myself.
Coughs we go as long as she isn't overly ill. She has a cough all year around due to reflux irritating the back of her throat

My daughter is now 3 and I think I was most concerned about bugs at the same age as yours. For us my daughter was either ill or ok. She was summer born and as she approached her first winter around 14 months we started with the mildly symptomatic phases of viral illnesses and that's when I start to relax a bit more. She didn't get as ill and she felt more robust compared to just a few months earlier.
Maybe work on what you can control and if you are there with a lot of snotty find a safe space you can enjoy and wash yours and baby's hands afterwards and any toys that might have been touched.

As a parent of an asthmatic with a nasal drip I'd be there with a coughing child with a runny nose unless they are actively ill. Cold dry air, cold damp air, hot humid air all trigger the coughing so we'd be home 9 months a year if I kept them in the house for a cough

I have a 3yo and she doesn’t have a permanent cold. I’m not particularly precious about her not catching anything either (except when SIL was going to bring her DD over just before Christmas having just endlessly thrown up!) so I think her immunity is pretty good.

I am also very hot on wiping her nose. I can’t stand seeing children running around with snot streaming down their faces and their parents doing nothing. This is DD2 so not my PFB either.

My eldest had overlarge adenoids and was perpetually snotty. As in her nose ran for 18 months until she had surgery. She wasn't ill.

One of my boys is asthmatic. The children's centre is warm and as he comes in from the cold air outside he always coughs for a while.

Even if they were a bit under the weather, how do you think children build up immunity? If you think your child is too young /delicate tocome into contact with cold viruses and similar than a children's centre probably isnt the best place for you!

Yabu kids are snotty with coughs all winter catching something new every month. It’s good for their immune systems.

I took mine out of nursery, it was UNREAL the level of illness.

I actually developed health anxiety over it, which sounds dramatic but sadly true.
My tiny poorly DS, plus me and DH suffered so much.

Hard no for fever or D&V. Colds etc. as long as he’s ok in himself then you just have to kind of get on with it as they can be very drawn out I find, like PP say! You’d be forever cooped up otherwise.

The thing that genuinely shocked me most about motherhood is the sheer level of DO NOT GIVE A FUCK that other parents have regarding taking their sick kids to public places or sending them into nursery. Sadly you will learn this yourself and also realise that nobody will police this.

Anyone trying to defend that their kids just have a snotty nose and a cough but are "not contagious" are basically on the same intelligence level as covid deniers. If there's one thing everyone learned from the pandemic is that if you have symptoms, you need to stay home. Understandably, esp with several kids, you won't be able to do anything if you stayed home all the time with sick kids. However there is definitely discretion involved in taking your child on unavoidable errands or allowing them to cough over all the other children in a soft play.

Nursery illness is unavoidable, and you will have to grin and bear it until your child builds up immunity. In public places you can use your own judgement and leave if another child looks and sounds extremely unwell.

This is technically bollocks - there’s no reason to have lots of infections - they don’t “build the immune system”.
All kids get colds starting school and most viral infections like colds and norovirus don’t actually give very long immunity at all. (Chickenpox is obs different).

I agree with you, op - it has been so annoying when the kids were young that others would come over or attend groups when quite obviously unwell. It has been proven that getting lots of infections does not "build up the immunity" as the protection from common colds is relatively short lived and cold viruses mutate rapidly. One of the benefits of lockdown and increased hygine measures was that my youngest avoided getting ill for two years and honestly it had no effect on number of viruses cought later on (if anything he got fewer after, as his immune system had time to mature and recover from colds he was getting before). Not a popular opinion here, but I think we should care a bit more about others and avoid spreading illness. (my kids did attend nursery and I am aware it can be difficult at times).

Everyone I know complains about the year their child gets everything going, I choose to expose dd to other kids and have that year before she starts school. Hopefully she'll build up enough immunity to not need time off of school.

Thank you for your comment. That does make me feel better because so many people here have reacted as if I'm being neurotic. I am staggered by the lack of consideration or care shown to other families. Immunocompromised children must have to be cooped up all the time because parents of children with colds and viruses insist on going to indoor play sessions anyway. It's so selfish.
And not that Mumsnet is the place for nuances really, but I'm not talking about kids with an asthmatic cough, or a nasal drip as some aggrieved posters have shot off about, but children who are visibly unwell with horrendous mucus and coughs that are definitely contagious and would probably benefit from resting up for a few days. All the winter viruses are miserable for children and can be dangerous for babies. I would have expected some more solidarity from other mums tbh.

It’s a free session, they can’t really set rules. Don’t go if you don’t like it.

If it is full of toddlers and not very tiny babies I will take my one year old if he has a cold. Obviously if it is very green and there is a temperature we would give it a miss but not if just a little bit of a runny nose otherwise he would never go anywhere.

You are being unreasonable here a bit.