Day #4: Be Smart about Daycare
April 8, 2011 by DrReynolds
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A Nanny?
Our second son is still at home with mommy but will also start 1-2 days a week in daycare around 18-24 months. We just had our third son and have decided that we need some help around the house. Three kids under three can be fairly challenging for one person. So we have hired a Nanny to come 3 mornings a week and she will come 5 mornings a week in the summer when our oldest son is on a break from daycare.
We obviously trust our Nanny and think she is great with our kids. Otherwise, we would not have hired her in the first place. (And, I should mention that we searched for many months to find the person that was a right fit for our family.) However, we expect her to help out only with our 13-month old and almost 3-year old. The newborn is not her responsibility. For the most part, the newborn will always be with my wife until he hits the 6 month mark. It is not that we do not trust out Nanny, it is just that expecting someone who is not the parent to care for a newborn and two other children is inappropriate in our opinion. This would place undue stress on her and it is this stress that leads to problems.
So this is the recipe for our family based on the things that I mentioned above. It may not be for you as your situation (and bias) may be different from my own. However, while I do concede there are some benefits to a daycare environment for children, I feel strongly that children do best when they are predominantly in the care of one or both parents. That is just my opinion though. For you and your family… You Decide.
I like this guy's blog in general. I've been hearing a lot about the nanny debate, is it okay to hire a nanny for various reasons and under various circumstances (or at all) (I say, it's your money, spend it how you will), and he makes some really good points here. (The rest of the article is also excellent, as are many others I've found here. I always appreciate a doctor who presents the facts as s/he sees them and asks me to decide, but is willing to present his or her opinion, clearly delineated as such. Medical science has merit and value, but when it's a corporate venture operating in a capitalist system it's doomed to become corrupt and an active part of any social machinery consuming the consumers in the name of the gluttony of the greedy by inciting the wrath of the envious, pride leading to lechery in the form of desiring to use to what- or whomever one lays one's eyes on, be it (or they) person, place, thing, or idea, with no thought to potential consequences, leading to the indolent attitude of one who believes themselves to be entitled (to anything not earned).
While I'm on the subject, or close to it, Obamacare is *not* a good example of socialized healthcare from anything I'm hearing. It's pretty much another form of extortion and coercion about to be perpetrated by the US government (I could literally go to a prison in a non-Geneva-convention country for saying that, come to think of it, under current law but come on, it's true, and one that, again, from what I'm seeing which may not be the whole picture, creates another criminal element (not having insurance would be a crime, if I'm not mistaken?), another however many bodies that can be warehoused and given jobs no one else will do for far less than they require to live and pay the many costs often associated with their time, legally and illegally, while making the ranks of the unemployed seem smaller by removing all those new 'criminals' from the pool of eligible workers, making the percentage of 'unemployed' (as opposed to 'unemployable'; people in prison are not counted, nor the disabled - making adding new disabilities to an already overstuffed list another way of manipulating the appearance of the economy - shifting retirement ages, there are many ways in the current system to route funds to and away from various sectors and to control how much and which parts of the population are given a voice or effective presence as is deemed appropriate by the powers-that-be, whomever they may be at any given time) seem to shrink and giving the illusion of economic improvement. Or perhaps it'll be the kind of crime that they fine you for and then force you to buy what you have to buy, like carseats, whether you can afford it or not and then slap you with more fines if you don't, and eventually call you into contempt and throw ya in prison anyway. :D (I shouldn't laugh, that's how I feel about the law these days and it's really no laughing matter; laws are made these days to apply to everyone on the basis of the experiences of individual people, they're made at will with little or no rational basis as a clear manipulation of the populace by creating emotional frenzies around conflicting issues and getting people to agree to things that, however seemingly small or no matter how little they affect any given individual on a daily basis in real life, open the door to having much more overt shackles put on our choices, especially as, as we become more and more emotional and more and more unstable in our approaches, we begin to act and react through fear, greed, lust, and anger rather than through rational but caring thoughtfulness. Then there's evermore excuse for the government to choose to step in and tell us what to do, and then to tell us what to do, OR ELSE, and then to tell us what to do and shoot us when we refuse. And many agree, we need protecting, we need discipline, we are incapable, as autonomous adults, of making appropriate and productive choices, or we are so ignorant that we'll choose to refuse to do so if the choice is given. Many do under the current structure. For some it makes sense, they really have no hope, either because they're very unlucky, opportunity avoids them, or they choose to act in ways that repel it, for some it's just pure laziness, for some there is legitimate need. They shouldn't need to get 'welfare', it should be assumed that they will have what they need in a society as capable as ours, and they should get it. That would most likely be the case, most people would love to be supportive of the people they love and the people amongst whom they live, help them achieve their goals, and those who wouldn't generally haven't seen what happens when a group of people begins to achieve success, where it can take them, or don't understand the need for a strong, interdependent network, or whatever. Those things can be learned, and really, there are those who will always be most productive alone, but even they tend to have a few essential people around them.) Also, my understanding is that a lot of prescriptions that were previously covered no longer will be, or will become much more expensive. Many people on social security programs are on fixed and/or low incomes. How is this helping the people it was supposedly supposed to service, the already underserviced? Tell ya the truth, I still like Obama, and I like Michelle, and frankly it all kinda feels like a huge 'in-your-face'! And a pretty amusing one, really. I mean, I think people believed in them because they really believe what they believe, their hearts are in the right place, but they have little or no tact. They just, do what they're gonna do, and if you don't like it they're gonna ignore ya. That's a good trait in a lot of areas, but not in public service, and he is the highest-ranking public official in America, and some would argue the world. But ya know, in some arenas (like fashion) tact is overrated. Politics is not one of them. If the people can't generally agree in a calm and reasonable but caring manner on a solution that's on the table, it's time to find another solution, and another and another until there's one that works well enough to be effective but not unreasonably restrictive (which many would say would mean, 'not restrictive at all', but boundaries are indeed necessary, and where there are boundaries there must be enforcement, but those boundaries need to be limited to acts that result in a weaker social structure, removing from the population those who cannot live in it without tearing at it's fabric, which really wouldn't be very many if we decided to treat one another with a fair amount of respect and assume that the next guy or gal is trying as hard as we are and that we're all in this together, and act as though others are assuming that about us. It doesn't mean that there won't be those who take advantage of that assumption or who outright belie it, but if it weren't for the feeling many have (at least in some parts of the world) that everyone's tryin' to get theirs, we might as well be out for our own, too, the need to be on guard and to get the jump on the other guy (or gal), we'd be more likely to act as most of us would like to claim (and I believe would like to do, and often do do), in our own best interests *and the best interests of those around us* (and, where there's any interest left, in the best possible interests as we see them of the rest of the world; that'd be something any individual would have to choose for themselves, how much and to whom or what, as we ought to be able to do with our taxes, have the government allocate the appropriate percentage of income to any governmental department, post all projects up for funding on any given part of the budget in the appropriate area on a central website to which every citizen (within whatever guides a government chooses to set, and I might say, none, if a person is able and willing to work, and they have an income, reasonable percentages of their income goes to all the various departments and that way everyone contributing to the tax pool, automatically allocated as funds are allotted, in real time, to the project to which the taxpayer decides is best, either in his or her own opinion or those of people they personally considered qualified to help them make a given choice, whether that be some kind of certified expert, a pastor or other leadership figure, their god, gods, or God, friends, family, whomever, as long as they cast the vote meaning even if they choose to just vote as they're told they get to make the choice they're most comfortable with) is ensured access (not in theory, but in practice; it would happen because otherwise people wouldn't be able to allocate their taxes, and every day the site is down is a day that money is sitting in the taxpayer's account accumulating interest. There could be no penalty to the taxpayer for inability to access the site, and the only penalty to the government if it didn't set up appropriate and easily navigable systems would be the loss of interest for the time that money sits in the taxpayers' account. Failure to make the choice would penalize the taxpayer by potentially delaying projects he or she want to see finished, but attaching a financial penalty 'failure to pay' is a practice of questionable value or reason, and it would seem appropriate to allow a taxpayer to allow funds allocated to a given governmental department hold those funds (not spend them; they could be in the account but unavailable for anything other than electronic transfer to the appropriate department) when none of the projects on the table are the right choice for them, up to say a year, or some months or whatever, however long seems reasonable to expect someone to have come across or proposed an initiative they wanted to get behind. In the case of grocery money and medical care, a taxpayer could choose to support individuals (family, loved ones, secret charity cases, their enemies, whatever they wanted to do) or organizations, or both, and the money would be immediately available to the recipient upon allocation, meaning the potential for a steady stream of income depending upon the size and scope of, and support for the endeavor (which may depend upon it's reputation and/or it's marketing campaign, not everyone is going to put quality over flash, but more and more people will as they have more of a direct impact upon how their money is being spent).
Anyway, I like this guy's blog. I'm not fond of Obamacare, and become less so the more I hear about it. (I'd say learn, but I'm only repeating what I've been told, in many cases from sources I consider to be reliable with a bit of leeway; in order to really learn what it's about I'll have to take a closer look at it for myself, and I may not grasp it all anyway (but you might, so I'm always happy to hear what you think :D ).
Been away a while, had some stuff to say. :D
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