Anonymous wrote:Could you try to find a nanny with a similarly aged child? Less expensive and likely a bit more of an isolation factor.

This. Not necessarily a similar aged child but any child that she needs to bring to work. This way you are both in a 2-family (yours and nanny’s) closed loop, rather than 3.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Start looking now. You want to make sure you and the other family are a good match and that takes time and lots of questions.

OP here. Sorry, I realized I wasn't clear. We are starting to look now. The question is, when will it be okay to actually start participating in the share, once we find someone.

Childcare is essential, so anytime.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll be the opposition, OP. It’s a truly foolish economy to risk with such a young baby. Just hire the nanny for your child only and cut back in other ways until there is a vaccine or far fewer cases.

OP here. Thank you for speaking up. Unfortunately, a nanny share is already a huge percentage of our budget - we're really scrimping and pinching to make that happen. So, the options are nanny share, or juggling childcare with work. How would you define "far fewer cases"? What are the metrics you'd be looking at?

Cases of new infection down by more than half but most importantly a treatment for this new Kawasaki-like syndrome that is hitting very young children and babies with COVID 19. I would definitely go with a nanny share before daycare.

Could you try to find a nanny with a similarly aged child? Less expensive and likely a bit more of an isolation factor.

Anonymous wrote:I’ll be the opposition, OP. It’s a truly foolish economy to risk with such a young baby. Just hire the nanny for your child only and cut back in other ways until there is a vaccine or far fewer cases.

OP here. Thank you for speaking up. Unfortunately, a nanny share is already a huge percentage of our budget - we're really scrimping and pinching to make that happen. So, the options are nanny share, or juggling childcare with work. How would you define "far fewer cases"? What are the metrics you'd be looking at?

I will only pipe in to say that you should definitely try to find a family that will host (at least most days). Your experience teleworking at the kitchen table is one of you at the table (other engaged with the baby) and one newborn. This will shift over the coming months and things will be much different. We're talking two babies, plus a nanny, plus both of you teleworking, and the babies moving out of the less mobile and more quiet newborn phase. Also would just be so hard on a nanny I think. Anyway I think it's reasonable to think about and search but I would not make a long term plan with a share at your house.

I’ll be the opposition, OP. It’s a truly foolish economy to risk with such a young baby. Just hire the nanny for your child only and cut back in other ways until there is a vaccine or far fewer cases.

OP here. Interesting. I thought there would be more opposition to this.

As someone currently in a closed loop nanny share, I think now is fine with a considerate, cautious family. You will definitely want them to host given your living quarters.

Anonymous wrote:I think ethically you are fine if you pay a good enough wage that a nanny agrees to take the risk, and the nanny and other family agree to limit exposure - no partnering up with a "house party right now" family because you're now also responsible with limiting the risk to the nanny/her family. So that's my answer for 2&3. For one, trust your reading of the guidelines.

Are you going to host while both teleworking? Because that sounds tough unless you have a lot of separate spaces in your house.

Ha. We're in an 800 sq ft one bedroom apartment. So space is TIGHT but we would both be willing/able to just sit with headphones on at the kitchen table. My husband did that when I was on maternity leave, and I'm doing that while he's on paternity leave, and we are both very able to just stay in our little bubble. The nanny may find that unsettling though, so probably someone else hosting would be better.

Reading the guidelines left me more confused. But I'll admit I only skimmed them.

Anonymous wrote:Start looking now. You want to make sure you and the other family are a good match and that takes time and lots of questions.

OP here. Sorry, I realized I wasn't clear. We are starting to look now. The question is, when will it be okay to actually start participating in the share, once we find someone.

I think ethically you are fine if you pay a good enough wage that a nanny agrees to take the risk, and the nanny and other family agree to limit exposure - no partnering up with a "house party right now" family because you're now also responsible with limiting the risk to the nanny/her family. So that's my answer for 2&3. For one, trust your reading of the guidelines.

Are you going to host while both teleworking? Because that sounds tough unless you have a lot of separate spaces in your house.

Start looking now. You want to make sure you and the other family are a good match and that takes time and lots of questions.

My husband and I will both be "back at work" (remotely) in mid-June. Our son will be five months old then. Our plan was to get a nanny share with one other family. If we're going to do that, we really need to start finding folks - we have a recommendation on a great nanny, but have not yet started looking for another family.

But we're really unsure of when it's okay to start this. For context - both our jobs are safe and completely doable remotely. We are not essential workers by any definition. Neither of us would be fired if we were having to juggle work and childcare. My job would be super understanding and completely flexible - there are already people working remotely while caring for their children. Lots of mid thirties professionals with kids, so everyone's kinda in the same boat, but it's also a tech company, mostly men - I think most people are doing half or less of the childcare, not 100%. His job would be a bit less flexible. Again, he's not going to get fired or anything, but the people on his team who are caring for children are using leave for part of the day. We're not yet sure exactly what the deal is on that, but it wouldn't be as flexible. He'd probably have to eat up at least some leave to do childcare during the day, and it may not be long term sustainable if he's taking leave, as he doesn't have much saved up (used a bunch of it for paternity leave). Plus, beyond even official policies, we would both take a big hit in productivity, which we don't feel great about.

So my questions: 1) We're in DC. When is it okay based on the official DC guidelines for us to participate in a nanny share? Seems like right now, that would go against at least the spirit of the stay-at-home order, but that ends in early June. I believe they've announced what the "phases" of reopening will look like. At what phase would this be okay? 2) When is it ethically okay, in our situation, to participate in a nanny share, assuming that's later than what the guidelines would allow? 3) Do either of these answers change depending on the nanny and/or other family's social distancing situation?

As a guiding principle - we're not extremists on either side, so if you're gonna say "social distancing is for suckers, we're having a house party right now" or "you cannot interact with another human until there's a vaccine" that's not really helpful. We're just concerned citizens trying to do the right thing for our community, our jobs, and our family, while recognizing in a ton of ways, we're very, very lucky, particularly right now.