The fundamental problem with daycare is that it's a seller's market. This means there are more parents who want a slot for their kids than there are slots available.
What does this mean for you as a parent?
It means that you have little to no say in how they treat you or your child.
I have come to believe over the past 9 months that daycare is sub-optimal for most children under the age of 2. Unless your child can sleep if there's a bomb going off underneath them, and cries LOUDLY reliably when they need to eat, they simply aren't going to get the soothing they need to sleep during the day, and they may not get fed enough, unless you are really on top of the teachers (Which they really appreciate, let me tell you. NOT!).
There are babies like this, apparently. I thought I had an easy baby until I met them, and then holy shit. When people looked at me incredulously when I said infancy was really difficult for us, I now understood why: they had fantastically easy babies who actually slept when put down!
Dylan is not like that.
Scratch that. Dylan is AMAZING. She is perfect. She is wonderful. She is (now) a great sleeper! But! She is also a light sleeper (easily fixed by putting her to sleep in a dark room with a noise machine). And she is not a complainer. She is very good natured, so if you feed her only when she cries, she basically will eat 70% of what she really needs.
If you stay home with her, she is easy-peasy. However, neither of these needs get reliably met in a daycare setting. Well, I take that back. In the infant room, where they can accommodate a morning nap and an afternoon nap, now that she no longer requires any soothing at nap time, she will reliably take two perfect (albeit shorter than at home) naps. One at 9:30, and one at 2. You could practically set a clock by her schedule. And I solved the eating problem by bringing in 4 perfect bottles a day and having a shit fit (no, really) whenever they didn't attempt the 4th bottle, which happened more or less any time a teacher who wasn't familiar with her took care of her.
Unfortunately, now that she is being "promoted" to young toddler they are no longer able to let her take two naps a day. A 2 nap schedule just doesn't go along with the schedule (not to mention chaos) they keep in that room. And while on one hand, I can't wait to be rid of the attitude in the infant room, this means she needs to conform to the schedule of a typical 18-24 month old child. I.e. 1 nap per day.
I was assured that they would let her sleep if she was tired. This is a lie. This week she has reportedly been struggling to stay awake over lunch, and (I hear) nodding off at the table. Why? Because she is taken to the young toddler room for transition at 10, right when she should be taking a morning nap, and then forced to stay awake for another 2-3 hours.
I am told that when she returns to the infant room after lunch at 12:30 that she conks out like a stone.
No shit.
The infant room has graciously (*snort*) been trying to put her down for a second nap later in the afternoon. They have had varying degrees of success with this. If she sleeps from 12:30-1:30, they can often get her to go down again at 4:30. However by the end of the week she is so tired that she sleeps from 12:30-2:30. Then if they try to get her to go down at 4:30, she won't go to sleep. She cries and cries and cries. They say to me that she must not be tired. The reality is she's so freaking exhausted that she can't self soothe, and also that 2 hours is too short a window for her to take a second nap most days.
This causes her to be really fussy -- like so fussy I can't put her down at all -- when I bring her home. She routinely crashes within 30 seconds of being put in her carseat in the evening (it's worse at the end of the week), last night she fell asleep while Luca was putting her bib on for dinner, and she screams and cries and won't eat dinner.
Of course daycare doesn't see this, so they've adopted the, "You're just a crazy mommy who doesn't want her baby to grow up," attitude with me. I'm sure you can imagine how well that has gone over.
I've talked to the young toddler teachers, and they have repeatedly assured me that they will have a cot for Dylan to crash on if she needs to in the room.
This is a lie. Two days ago I saw another child in the room having a colossal meltdown at 5. This same child I've repeatedly heard the teachers say, "I'm so sorry sweetie, I know it's a long day," to in the past. Was there a cot for her to lie down on?
Ha. Ha. Ha.
Look, I get it. Daycare can't accommodate children this age who don't already have the sleeping habits of a 2 year old, and parents are expected to live with it. And I appreciate that the infant room is trying to help Dylan get her rest -- they really are trying, and they can't change center policy. But keeping Dylan awake for 6 hours in the morning before nap #1 is messing up the rest of the day in a major way.
It's all very upsetting because if you adhere to a morning / afternoon nap schedule, she is the easiest -- happiest -- child in the world. She will even put herself to bed for naps! No soothing required. You say, "Dyls! Want to go take a nap?" when it is time, and she will toddle herself over to her cot and lie down with her lovey.
But because two naps are inconvenient for daycares to accommodate in the room for young toddlers, they simply force the children who aren't ready for one nap yet to do it anyway whether they're ready to or not. And then they put up with screaming crying fussy overtired children. Goodness knows if they develop an active dislike / resentment for these children too, but it honestly wouldn't surprise me given what most people are like. It's pretty horrible. I think most parents are too afraid to complain (since it is so hard to get into a daycare at all), and / or are generally too conflict avoidant to say anything (we're talking about guilt ridden working moms here).
It does make me wonder if the ADHD/childhood obesity epidemics are in part due to daycare though, and their inability to accommodate all but the easiest and most low maintenance children. Too bad it hasn't been studied long term yet.
That does suck, specifically for D and for society/young children in general. I am glad you have the 3d/wk option. I agree with you on the likelihood that sleep dep probably causes long term problems for children but I don't think that day care has a monopoly on it.
ReplyDeleteOh I am sure daycare doesn't have the monopoly on systematically sleep depriving babies. When Dylan was in the colic phase, Luca and I would take her for long walks in the stroller to soothe her at like 7PM (bedtime for most 0-2 year olds). We often saw throngs of people in the park -- mostly parents with young kids / babies. And no, these weren't parents with colicky babies like us.
DeleteI hope it gets easier when she is on a regular schedule again. It does sound difficult for her with them trying to get her some time in the new room, right when she is suppose to be sleeping. (That sounds like the stupidest idea someone came up with) Hopefully she wont be stuck doing that much longer. They created the upset and cranky kid and should try and remedy that. I'm glad you keep speaking up for yourself and your child. My old roommate worked at a daycare for several years and the only stories she had to tell me were of the "bad spoiled children" who never listened when they did things like hit and throw things and the coworkers who were intolerable to be around. Never anything about the parents.
ReplyDeleteIt's not going to get better when she officially transitions because playtime is at 10, and naptime is at 12. If anything it will be worse because she will *never* be able to take a second catch-up nap at 4:30.
DeleteHow old were the children your roommate was taking care of? 1-2 year olds who hit are completely normal, i.e. it is not a sign of being spoiled. It's not that you shouldn't tell them not to hit, it's just that you really can't be mad at them for doing it, because that's just what kids that age do. It's a developmental phase. Kind of like you can't expect an 18 month old to share.
Of course, that doesn't stop teachers (and other parents) from having unrealistic expectations for behavior. Kind of like they have unrealistic expectations for napping.
I think she was in a larger room with older kids around 4-5 years old. The "spoiled brats part" comes from the rules at her particular daycare, and her having a hard day. I think the hardest part she told me was they were not allowed to say the word "no" to the kids or utilize something like time out. They were suppose to talk it out about why it is wrong etc at each incident. While not interrupting them playing or taking away any of their toys. She felt it was ineffective (I think she had a hard day with a "repeated offender" kid on the day she discussed this with me is all) which I am sure is normal in a group of small kids, some will get it, some wont and a few enjoy getting all the blocks from the other kids too much. I just wanted to say she never commented in those few years that any parents discussing their kids with her or other staff bothered them enough that she brought it to my attention. I am rooting for you to keep telling them what is on your mind. I completely agree other parents are probably somewhat fearful to say anything.
DeleteMy mentor is working on a longitudinal study of children providers and their views on nutrition/physical activity/etc in relationship to the childhood obesity epidemic, particularly their education when it comes to that kind of stuff. Interesting stuff.
ReplyDeleteI hope she's using something less subjective than measuring opinions in addition, otherwise she's going to have the same problems with unmeasured confounding as so many studies before her's have had. Wrist actigraphy for the infants, for instance.
DeleteActually, a study that looked at concordance of viewpoint and actigraphy with 5 year follow-up with blinded behavioral questionnaires and physical measurements would be really neat.
When we were looking at daycares there was one (near you) that had kids in the "baby room" until 2. I initially thought that was ridiculous---how is a 21 month old like a 4 month old---and how can they play together? But I get it now that it was for the cribs & ability to nap on demand. That daycare was inconvenient to us for many reasons (only opened at 8am being the biggest one), but I think about it sometimes. L likes his morning nap on the weekends, but he wouldn't take a reliable one even in the infant room (he would fall asleep for 15-20 minutes on the way in, and ruin any chance for a real nap).
ReplyDeleteWe got into that daycare with a Jan spot, and you're making me wish we'd taken it. It's a tradeoff though. They expect the babies to nap right in the middle of the room regardless of whatever else is going on in there. At the time we saw it, Dyls was 5 or 6 months and barely slept at all even with a separate sleeping area, which is the main reason we opted not to sign up. Other cons -- you have to bring their food, and there was mandatory volunteering.
DeleteParking was also a problem. The start time was a problem. We didn't know we'd be hiring an au pair at the time. Sigh. We also didn't like the vibe.
I am so sick of the BS where we currently are though!
YES! I forgot about the volunteering BS. That was another strike for that one. We got into that one and the one that you (I think) use a week after we started B at our current daycare.
Delete1. if i come up to PHL you, me and ana are having coffee together.
ReplyDelete2. i'm totally scared about the transition now, argh
3. a has been in a horrible pattern of not sleeping at ALL in daycare (fine, 1 30 minute nap but i barely count that) and it SUCKS. she is a mess when she gets home. she falls asleep on 5 minute car rides. and i feel kind of powerless to fix it (they try to put her down - hourly sometimes - but she is just too distracted. she naps FINE at home.)
1. I'm down
Delete2. What they told me was that many babies who sleep poorly in the infant room (too much stimulation, everyone naps at different times) sleep great when they move to young toddler (everyone naps at the same time, ergo it's boring to be awake). I am thinking -- holding out hope anyway -- that this is what is going to happen with Annabel.
3. Isn't it horrible when they don't sleep? It's horrible for them, and it's horrible for us.
I heard one mom tell the daycare specific times to put her baby in the crib down to nap, and to leave her there "complaining" for up to 30 minutes if necessary, before deciding she's just not tired enough for a nap. (So yeah, it sounded a bit like CIO.... which I was never comfortable with someone other than me doing.) That's what worked for her child. I think she's a great mom, so I totally respect this approach.
When Dylan finally developed a solid napping routine at home, I went into daycare and told them that they needed to put her down at 10 and at 2 whether she seemed tired or not. Dylan is like a clock at home, and I was pretty sure it would work if they were consistent. And it did some of the time! Unfortunately, a lot of the time they'd insist she wasn't tired and wouldn't even try to put her down (this is why we had a big confrontation about 6 weeks ago).
Anyway, maybe I shouldn't have made a big stink about it, but it really seems to make a difference for her. I am not known for being conflict avoidant. :-P
I say this all with the caveat that the napping area is separate from the play area at Dyls' center. I don't know how well either my method, or the other mom's method, would work if the babies slept in the same place that other children were playing.
1. I'm game. Are you planning a trip?
Delete2. This was true for mine. When EVERYONE is sleeping and the lights are dimmed and the put soothing music on...
3. Again, transition to everyone sleeping together may help. At ours, B had trouble falling asleep and the teacher would rub his back, etc.. until he did. Something WE didn't even do at home. Thus he slept better for naps (still does!) at school.
Yes, hoping transition will help! They do try to let her CIO although they have a random 15 min limit. Apparently most of the time she doesn't even cry, she plays.
DeleteAna I am from phl (havertown) and my parents live there so it's only a matter of time :)
(at least, they say they try. i'm not there so i don't know how hard!)
ReplyDelete