Nanny vs Daycare- the Negatives of Each
By Amy | Leave A Comment
By Amy | Leave A Comment
Last month, I shared with you my views on the positives of Nannies and Daycares. I neglected to add one other option: having a family member care for your children while you are at work. This is my first choice. I have no negatives to share only that I wish it were an option for me.
This month, I want to share what I see as the negatives. I would love to hear your thoughts as well.
Nanny Negatives:
- You are trusting your child to one person instead of a team of people. If something is going on with your child, you have two witnesses and one of them is the child.
- Unexplained wear on your house and furniture. We had one nanny (only employed for a short time) who let the girls write on the walls in ink and on our couches. She never told us they did it and honestly, I don’t know that she watched them closely enough to know that they had done anything wrong.
- Your child will learn to eat the way your nanny does. That may sound silly, but if your nanny likes to bake or likes treats, she will likely make treats for your child. Or if she likes Happy Meals, and you have never given them to your child, you can plan on him asking for one after getting one with her.
- You might miss mornings with your little one if you have to leave before he wakes up.
- A nanny can be very expensive and you are responsible for a lot of the tax “stuff”. If you have one child, a nanny is not the most cost effective method, but if you have multiple children at home, a nanny might make better sense.
Daycare Downers:
- Mornings are hectic because you have to get you and the kids ready to walk out the door – ON TIME.
- There is not a lot of one on one time.
- You will need to take time out of your work day to go and visit daycares while kids are there, to really get an understanding of how the school works. A daycare administrator can paint a pretty perfect picture when no kids and teachers are there to show otherwise.
- You are stuck with their teaching and discipline methods. It isn’t up to the parent to dictate the methods used.
So, those are my cons. As I said in the last post, the first choice of child care is likely the mom or dad, with my second choice being other family members.
What cons do you see with each?
ABOUT Amy
Amy enjoys trying to achieve the perfect balance of family, faith and life- that for her includes a{read more}
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I’m posting as a mom whose oldest son attended a daycare center that we LOVED for 3 years before I became a SAHM when my second child was born.
The first con on your nanny list was the reason we chose daycare over a nanny. I just couldn’t get past that issue, despite knowing that the vast, vast majority of families have great relationships with their nannies.
Another con on the nanny list- if she’s sick, you’re stuck. You either need to have backup care lined up, or be prepared to stay home if she can’t care for the kids due to illness or quits suddenly (which just happened to a friend of mine).
I have two additional cons for the daycare list too-
High staff turnover. Daycare is a low-paying job and it’s hard to retain staff. Ideally you want your child to develop a loving, trusting relationship with their caregiver, and that can be hard to do in centers where staff turnover is high.
Food. Many daycares provide meals and snacks, and the quality of these varies tremendously. Mine included breakfast and snacks in the cost of care, and offered lunch for an additional fee, so you could buy lunch or send in your own. I wasn’t thrilled with the food offerings and was able to send in meals from home. Some centers don’t allow outside food or can’t easily accommodate food allergies.
Oh my goodness. I totally forgot the negative of when a nanny gets sick. And it is one of my frustrations. Luckily I have 3 different women who are available as a back up, but there have been many days when I have had to call in late or end up working from home when it wasn’t scheduled.
Your two points about the daycare are great. Turnover is very hard for a child to deal with, especially once they have built a relationship.
Thank you so much for adding these 3 very valid negatives.
Wow stephanie – great points. I can’t believe I neglected posting about the negative of nanny getting sick. That has been a big issue for us. There have been several days that I’ve ended up missing work at the last minute.
Both points for the daycare are great too. Thank you so much for sharing.
I think you’ve forgotten one option — home daycares. That’s what I used for both my kids. They are very different from “institutional” daycares, so the pros/cons are much different. I think you get some of the advantages of nannies with a home daycare (you can give more instructions about how your kid should be cared for, they are in a home environment), and some of the advantages of a daycare (meals are usually planned, you can observe the daycare anytime, your home doesn’t get messy).
There are some cons I found… you are usually dealing with basically a “home business, ” often another mom whose business sense may not be as good as her daycare skills. Also, it is a small playgroup — some of the other kids may not be great kids for yours to be interacting with daily.
Kristen-
Those are fantastic points. I haven’t ever looked into an in-home daycare simply because I haven’t known of any in my area. I did have a friend, years ago that ran one and I loved what she did with the kids. Those two negatives don’t seem too bad – although the 2nd one would be much more frustrating.
Thank you so much for adding to this post.