Your <6 Month Old Infant in Daycare

[Anonymous]

OP, I know you're stressed about this, and I totally understand why you are. But, completely being honest, I LOVE our daycare. It's an in-home daycare, which I know is different than yours, but we just love it. Our daughter is so happy there, and I often think she's happier there playing with the "big kids" (a few months older than her) than she is with us all day. They know her as well as I do, her likes and dislikes, and they challenger her to try new things more than I would if I were home with her (I'm a FTM and pretty ignorant about a lot of baby stuff, admittedly). I know it might sound like I'm justifying having her in daycare, but I don't think that's the case. Sure, I know she'll miss me as she gets older, but for right now as she's an infant, she doesn't seem to mind. She never cries when I leave, nor does she cry for me while I'm gone. I think the whole arrangement is working quite well, and I'm realizing I stressed out before starting daycare much more than I should have. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
First, my experience was nearly identical to 19:08! (except mine was sick a lot)

11 weeks
April
6-8 babies
Got sick frequently. When he wasn't sick, he had a runny nose.
Yes, he got enough one-on-one time.
It was very difficult the first few weeks, but as time went by, it got easier. There were things I really appreciated about daycare: I learned a LOT from the workers there about general things like various ways to get babies to sleep, first foods, when to use a exersaucer, normal age ranges for milestones...Another pro of a daycare center is accountability. The director of ours was always available in person, email, phone or text. If there was ever an issue, she talked to the workers and had a resolution the next day. This also requires the workers to be honest and upfront with the parents as anything they do or say could possibly be related back to their boss. Our workers were great, and most issues I dealt directly with the workers. You wouldn't have that accountability with grandma or an in-home daycare. Also, I liked that he was getting the socialization. My son did very well there.

But I didn't cope well. Such a painful rude awakening to come home from work at 5:30pm, to spend less than 2 hours with my baby before bedtime. I eventually quit my job to SAH when ds was one.

I don't have bad feelings about daycare at all though.

You don't get the staff turnover at an in home daycare as you get at a daycare center. My friends with kids at centers are always complaining about turnover.

This wasn't my experience during my son's year in daycare. Three workers with the babies, three workers with the next room up. The only turnover they had while I was there was the floaters.