October 28, 2005
Finding Temporary Help
Q: I am 29 weeks pregnant with my second child, and my husband's job requires him to go on frequent out-of-state business trips. If I were to go into pre-term labor during one of his business trips, could I hire and get to know a nanny who would accompany my child and me to the hospital and care for her there while I was in labor? I will be an inpatient @ the hospital for around 2 days; during that time if she'd bring my daughter to see me after caring for her all night it would be greatly appreciated. I'd be willing to pay almost anything for this service.
This answer comes from FindHomeHelp.com, a safety-oriented database for temporary in-home child care.
A: Routine temporary nanny care is easy enough to find, whether in home, in hotel or on the road. But finding someone near you is an issue: conventional nanny placement agencies concentrate in urban ares where the demand is greatest. That's why we have launched FindHomeHelp.com, a national roster for temporary child care providers.
Much temp care is live-out, provided by "come-and-go" nannies, some available for short hauls including overnight, or for driving a child to school or to the hospital to visit her mom. The minimum stay is 4 hours.
There are also temporary live-in nannies who will be in your home on a 24-hour basis, although as in any job, you must limit the actual work day to allow for her rest, too.
However, unless you know the dates in advance, finding someone available for the days you want may be tough. Most nanny temps depend on maintaining a regular income and thus cannot work purely on call. For instance, if the birth in question were as a C-section (i.e., scheduled in advance) this mom could schedule her child care and include time to get to know her caregiver as well. Until a date is set, though, it's hard to know who will be available, and thus unlikely to get to know her first.
As for cost, temps are usually paid an hourly or daily rate closely related to the going rate for full time in your area; in St. Louis, where we are based, it starts at $10/hour and increases with the number of children in care.
Besides regular temp nannies, there are also baby nurses, who specialize in newborn care. Although the baby nurse's focus is Mom and newborn -- changing diapers, teaching breastfeeding, covering Mom's naps as she heals, providing overnight care -- she will often help with older children. She typically works for a few days or weeks and up to six weeks, when the newborn is sleeping overnight and Mom is back in shape.
Because she charges more, a baby nurse's schedule may be more flexible. Make no mistake: the genuine baby nurse is a specialist. As such, her normal rate starts around $150-200 a day, and in bigger cities can be considerably higher. If scheduled for 24-hour care, she will work while her employer naps and sleep while her employer works. She's often an essentially retired person and can thus adapt -- at least somewhat -- to the vagaries of baby arrival times.
Whenever you hire temporary child care, remember that even your standard temp nanny is a specialist: make the most of the forms we provide at FHH, which are there to help bring you up to speed. We have worked with hundreds of successful nannies, temporary and permanent, many of who we have placed again and again with continuing success. But before we referred them at all, we interviewed each one individually and checked (and now maintain) all references and criminal and driving records. These tools are the essential basis of a thorough screening for candidates local to you.
In fact, temps require the same processing as full time nannies. We not only offer guidelines and resources for conducting a reliable background check of any nanny temp. Uniquely we also require registrants to adhere to our full disclosure policy, adding one more level of security to our process.
When you need a temporary nanny, visit us first to see if we have candidates in your area; if not, feel free to use the screening helps that we provide. During our startup your registration and referral, as well as all forms and advice, are free of charge.
Note that, while general employment temporary agencies may offer to place their people for child care, this is specialized work for which a well-screened office temp is not necessarily qualified. Even if your candidate comes through a friend or an established nanny agency, you should screen her thoroughly. Speak directly to at least three references, and check criminal and driving records.
Posted by at 11:31 AM | Comments (0)
October 21, 2005
Unacceptable Behavior
I recently visited friends whose 5 year old daughter, Abby, has tantrums. Abby misbehaves -- teases her brother, plays with her food, refuses to eat carrots, creates a commotion when Daddy's making a phone call, -- pick one. When scolded she tucks her chin on her chest, frowns deeply, looks ready to cry, and pouts, asserting, "I feel sad." If adults don't capitulate, she cries, screams, stamps out of the room or runs to the arms of someone potentially sympathetic. Parents feel guilty, strangers are embarrassed, and all are at a loss for what to do.
This is a routine that neither side seems able to break. When both parents are present, Mom prefers to cede authority to Dad, who raises his voice, becomes stern, and announces an ultimatum. Abby's done this before, he knows that and he knows how he feels about it. "Eventually," his response to her suggests, "I will break you of this habit."
Her behavior frustrates her parents, but their behavior frustrates her, too. Abby is playing a game guaranteed to offend her loving (but imperfect) parents. She knows all the buttons and their power to provoke. Can she still count on this one to work? She'll find out: our children learn their strategies from us, either copying our ways or by trial and error developing their own ways to stymie us when they themselves feel stymied.
What should Mom and Dad do?
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Help us find an answer. Choose one and be sure to add your comments.
a) Ignore Abby's pouts and her tantrums as well. It won't hurt her to cry it out in her room, and she'll probably go there without being sent.
b) Listen to the vibes, i.e., figure out what provokes her to misbehave in the first place -- everyone's ignoring her? she's bored? -- and redirect before she does.
c) Ditto, except re-structure the situation by talking out the alternatives ahead of time. For instance, before sitting down to eat, whisper in her ear, "We're going to have carrots. You know Mom only wants you to eat 2 bites -- are you ready?" Or, "One way to keep dinner from being boring is for each of us to bring something to tell the others about. Do you have something ready? I do."
d) Mom and Dad need to work together on this. Looks like Abby feels she needs to take responsibility for keeping things interesting, 'cause Mom and Dad aren't. Try reading the newspaper aloud (and let everyone talk about it) if you can't think of anything else to do.
e) None of the above (alternate suggestion).
Your thoughts:______________________
Posted by at 12:01 PM | Comments (24)