Who’s Watching Your Kids?
Inevitably, when I’m in a situation involving a briefcase and someone finds out I have children, the next question I am asked is “Who’s watching your kids?” I wish I could say I’m always kind and gentle, but sometimes I respond with a sarcastic, “I just set food and water out, and the biggest one knows 911.” In reality, this is one of the most common questions working mothers get. It’s one of the things most of us fear when we first see those two pink lines and start pondering our entire future. And it’s one of the big decisions we have to make early on because finding good childcare can be time consuming, and there’s always that one daycare that requires you to get on the waiting list five years before you get pregnant.
For those of us who need childcare after baby comes, and don’t have the option of a close friend or family member watching baby, the decisions can be overwhelming. Hopefully, I can help break down some of my thought process into bite-sized chunks to help you evaluate this decision. Often, this research is done in your first trimester (see wait list conundrum above). If you’re not telling people that you’re expecting, you can do most of this anonymously online or through phone calls. I highly recommend talking to others and getting actual recommendations, though. Internet reviews are never as good or reliable as talking to people you know and trust.
1. Budget
The first consideration for finding good childcare is most likely going to be budget. We’d all like to believe that the first consideration would be anything other than money. The reality is that finances will drive a considerable portion of this decision. How much you can afford to spend affects what kind of childcare you can use—daycare, nanny, or in-home care.
Figure out what daycare realistically costs
It may be awkward, but price daycares in your city.
- Call and ask what they charge for your work hours. I’ve never been in a city with an online resource comparing daycares, but Google may find a result for your city–always worth checking!
- Ask if they are closed on school district holidays or other national holidays.
- Find out if they have early drop-off or late pick-up if you work hours other than regular business hours.
- Ask what they charge in penalties if you do not pick up your child at the appointed time (the ones in my city charge by the minute!).
- Learn what their child to adult ratio is, and compare it to others in your city.
- Do they provide formula? Baby food and snacks for toddlers? Figure out which daycare has the best bang for your buck.
Figure out what a nanny costs for comparison
Then check Care.com’s cost estimator for a nanny in your area. You may be surprised at how affordable a nanny is in your area compared to daycare. Keep in mind, though, that if you employ a nanny, they will be considered your “Household employee” under the IRS regulations. You will owe employer taxes as well as be responsible for the employer’s portion of FICA (an extra 7.65%). You can read the IRS’s publication about being a household employer here. Care.com also offers a calculator to help with planning for taxes. I would recommend speaking with your tax professional to verify Care.com’s calculations and other tax considerations.
In my experience, childcare deductions have helped balance out much of our employer taxes over the additional FICA responsibility. The “Household Employee” designation also creates requirements for wages—including overtime pay. This can be negotiated into the salary if you need the nanny to consistently work 45 or 50 hours per week (since they don’t get to take off an hour for lunch), but it bears consideration when determining what you can afford.
Check into reputable, recommended in-home childcare providers
Finally, check with friends or online for in-home childcare providers. These are people who care for children in their own homes. In my state, these providers should have childcare licenses and are supposed to meet minimum standards like adult to child ratios, inspections, and CPR certifications. This certification requirement does not, of course, guarantee hygienic conditions or appropriate child-to-adult ratios. However, many of these in-home providers are sweet people who run upstanding business that are worth considering for your new baby.
Try to tour one of these places around lunchtime. See it at its hardest, worst times. If they won’t let you come during that time, take that as a warning signal. If you’re not allowed to come the same day you call, ask why. Ask what happens if the care provider is sick one day, or what happens if a child gets sick while in care. Determine if they have any children who will be in the house around the childcare children. What happens if the care provider’s child is sick?
Decide what your budget can best afford
Once you have all the price information, look at how much you earn. (If you live in a dual-income household, every little bit helps!). Look at how much you can squeeze out of your budget for childcare. Meet with your HR department or whoever helps you with benefits and figure out if your job provides any childcare credits or benefits. Check into whether you qualify for state assistance—some states provide more than others at different thresholds, and as stated above, every little bit helps! Googling “[state] childcare assistance” should bring up your state’s government entity which handles childcare subsidies or other assistance. In Texas, it’s done through the Texas Workforce Commission.
Once you have a number in mind for affordability, you should be able to figure out what kinds of care you can afford. It’s okay if you can’t afford a French au pair who once cared for royalty. Lots of fantastic kids come from daycares or even creative childcare solutions, and they are children to fantastic mothers who are doing their best to provide safe care for their babies while continuing to work. Finding good childcare is really about getting your child the best situation for him or her to be safe and loved.
2. Hours and a Realistic View of Transportation Issues
The next big consideration is what are your work hours and transportation times like? Do you frequently have to go in to work early or stay late? Are your hours consistent, regular hours, or do you work rotating shifts? Do you work nights? All of these considerations can play into what kind of childcare will be right for your family.
In addition to your hours, evaluate the travel time involved in dropping off and picking up at childcare. Do you work in a large city with a long commute from home to work? Do you live in the country and occasionally have to wait for herds of cattle to clear off the roads? Honestly assess how long it would regularly take you to get from home to childcare, and then from childcare to your work. Evaluate how traffic is between your work and childcare at the end of the day. Is there any road construction likely on that route? Or school zones? Can you realistically drop your child off and pick them up within the childcare’s hours of business?
If you’re considering a nanny, all of these questions apply, but the other way around. The nanny needs to be there at least 10-15 minutes before you leave in the morning to hear a report of any updates or new information about baby from overnight. Plan for the same 10-15 minutes after you get home to hear from the nanny and get any updates about diapers or snacks or how the day went. This can add an additional half hour to the nanny’s wages, in addition to your drive time to and from work.
3. Work Accommodations
Many jobs have benefits or accommodations allowed for working parents. Check to see if you have childcare allowances or benefits from your HR department. Maybe you have a flex spending account that allows for childcare costs. Would they allow you to work from home or work remotely one day a week or more to allow for lower childcare costs (keep in mind that working from home still means you are working—you won’t be free to keep baby from shoving that fork into the socket, but you can pay less for a mother’s helper during that time or work during naptimes and after bedtime). Is there a daycare in or near your workplace that your child can attend? Can you and your employer find a way to accommodate each other and your child to benefit everyone involved?
4. Your Comfort Level
Often I find it best to keep my heart and emotions out of decisions about my children until after all the facts are in place to allow me to make not just the best-feeling decision, but the most logical one. After the ugly technicalities of feasibility are worked out, then your mother’s heart can play a role. Once you know what you can afford, what childcare options can and will work with your hours, and what work accommodations you might have to help, you can decide what your heart feels best about.
Especially for your first child, you may not feel 100% comfortable or happy with leaving your child behind when you return to work. Listen to your mother’s intuition, and listen to your husband or other people who love you and your child. Find a childcare source that makes you feel confident that your child will be safe, healthy, and cared for, and which will work for your family.
It is tremendously difficult to sort out one stranger from another to decide who would care for and love your child as well as if you were doing it yourself. Here’s the thing: nobody can or will replace you as Mommy. You’re not trying to find a duplicate mother for your children. You are trying to find another person (or people) who will pour love into your children while keeping them safe and healthy and helping to teach them the ideals and skills you need them to know as they grow. Your children will still value their time with you. You will always be Mommy. They will just widen the circle of people who love them.
How it worked for us
When we were finding childcare for our first child, we toured several daycares and got on waiting lists for the two daycares we felt most okay with. Surprisingly, it was my husband who was least comfortable with most of the daycares that we toured. We waited for three months without hearing from either daycare about an opening. Then we put an ad on Care.com for what we could afford to care for our child.
We were able to find a nanny who provided amazing care for our child and stayed with our family for five years and three more children! Yes, sometimes it was hard to see a child fall and run to the nanny instead of me. But then I remembered that we had hired her to love our kids. If our kids felt safe with her, then I’d done my job. We always saw our nanny as a third member of our parenting team–another adult to teach and love our children. I don’t believe children can be over-loved, so any time an adult joined our family to love and care for our kids, we saw it as expanding our family and our children’s sources of love, rather than taking any of our roles.
My hope for you is that you can find good childcare that is affordable, works well with your work hours, and makes you confident that when you return to work, your baby will be safe and loved in a bigger circle than you can provide by yourself.
What other suggestions or questions do you have about finding good childcare? Please comment below!
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