OP - what is your backup plan if Dubai airspace shuts down the week you are flying? |
Of course they do. One call to social services is all it takes. Did you know in some jurisdictions you can’t leave a 12 year-old child alone? And, yes, that is care by the nuclear family. |
| Give us an update, when you get back! |
| This is not something to figure out when you're travelling "soon"; you figure it out before you even book your plane tickets. I would not ask my 19-year-old to do this, and if I couldn't make arrangements for the kids, I would not take the trip. |
| Ask your 19yo if she’s got a friend who’d be interested in helping out. Otherwise this seems like a huge lift, since the two youngest kids will need a ton of attention and the other teens won’t listen to the 19yo unless they have a close, cooperative relationship. |
A kid who is home alone is not being cared for by their nuclear family. Their nuclear family members are not there. In home daycare, it's illegal to have a child under 6 weeks. Does that mean that we can call CPS because a mother is home with her own 3 week old? Obviously not, because the law distinguishes between parents and daycare providers. In home daycare in Maryland, you are limited to 2 children under 2 for a single provider. But if a family has triplets, mom or dad or an older sibling or grandma can watch those triplets. Because home daycare laws don't apply to famlies. Laws about when a child can be left alone by their family, or in the care of other children, do apply within nuclear families, but there are no states where the minimum age to watch your own siblings is over 18. |
| No, thi si snot a normal request. It's too many kids and too long a time period. |
| You have too many kids for a single nanny to handle let alone to leave with your daughter for that long. You will need to hire sitters so that the kids can do things and go places, right? Are you on public transit? |
| When your 19yo graduates and goes no contact, think back on this. |
| I am 40 and I would not want to care for 6 children by myself for a week. |
| Watch 6 kids!! No way!!!! |
| I have a family member who ended up caring for a large number of younger siblings a lot. They chose to never marry and never have kids. |
+1. My husband just left me with two (well-behaved) teens and a dog for the week while he was away on a work trip. I couldn’t wait for him to get home! |
| I wonder if OP has every parented 6 kids for a week without assistance from spouse, nanny, grandparent, or school. |
|
My mom is the oldest of 7. When we see large families and I comment on how the parents can possibly take care of so many kids, she says dryly, "They don't."
OP, I am 42 years old and I would say "no way" to such a request even if it came from family. There is a reason I chose to only have one kid. Your daughter has not chosen to have any kids yet. One week by herself with all of them is just...no |