Committing to an Au Pair?

[Anonymous]

I'm a new mom, with a 3 week old, and my husband and I, who are in our late 20s/early 30s, respectively, are considering an Au Pair. I can't decide if we want to commit to having another person live in our home full time for a year. What has your experience been with having an Au Pair and should I do it? This would replace daycare at a center and any nanny share considerations we had. Help!

[Anonymous]

Only you can know if this is right for you. I suggest you go on aupairmom.com and just start reading. There's a "new here?" Link that will get you started. Read the good, the bad, the beautiful, and the ugly, and at that point you'll have a better idea of what it means to host an AP and will have a sense of whether you think it's right for YOU right now. Plenty of people will have plenty of advice about whether it's wrong or right to get an AP for an infant but what is most important is what you and DH feel once you've educated yourselves on what it really means and entails to host an AP. once you've read a lot, you'll then likely have some more specific questions it you decide to go forward and then you can post those, which will elicit better advice than just "yes do it" or "no don't."

[Anonymous]

I've never heard of having an AP for a newborn. I thought the AP program was geared more toward families with older (2-12) children. I could be wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've never heard of having an AP for a newborn. I thought the AP program was geared more toward families with older (2-12) children. I could be wrong.

Au pairs care for infants all the time. An AP just can't be the sole care provider (alone w baby) with an infant under 3 months. You also will be limited to infant qualified APs. OP, if you're going to go this route you may want to consider Extraordinaire APs through APIA.

Good luck.

[Anonymous]

Longtime HM here. (and I have used an AP to care for an infant).

My strong recommendation to you is that Infant + First time host family = bad fit for the AP program.

APs can be wonderful. We are in our 6th year with the program. But the first couple of years I made some rookie host family mistakes. There is a learning curve.
Likewise, as brand new parents, you are just now embarking on the whole issue of child care. when my oldest was first born, I made some mistakes in terms of finding the type of care that worked for us. Again, there is a learning curve.

For that reason, I think having an AP for an infant once you understand the ins and outs of the AP program is still a challenge, but can work. (Our AP who cared for my youngest in his first year was outstanding!). But I would recommend alternative care for your child until he/she is a bit older. Then give the AP program a try. You'll be a more seasoned mother by then, and you'll have some ideas about the broader area of finding good childcare (what you like/don't like, what you need/don't need).

Good luck.

[Anonymous]

We had a Colombian AP care for our newborn and she was wonderful but it was our second child. I agree with the seasoned HM because becoming a new parent is involved enough without you having to worry about all that having an AP entails.

[Anonymous]

Completely agree with two previous posters. We have been with the program for 6 years and love it, but I don't think we would have been as succesful with an AP for our first newborn.

I think the program works great when roles, responsabilities and expectations are crystal clear. With the first newborn, it takes a while to figure this out, even between spouses!

It also takes a while to figure out 'what kind of parent am I' and 'what kind of care do I expect'. I am not saying the program could not work, but I think it would require a lot of learning in a short amount of time...

[Anonymous]

The lone voice of decent. I won't encourage you to get an ap for an infant, but we had great experiences for both DCs. We are in our fourth year with the program and our second AP.

First AP joined us when dc1 was 3 months old and she stayed through the birth of dc2. Second ap joined us when dc2 was 4.5 months old. Both were wonderful with our children.

I will say that having an AP join your family is a time of transition for everyone. And, needless to say, having a child, especially your first, is also a significant transition in your life and your relationship with your partner. The stress can quickly accelerate as a lot of the learning curve for both experiences is a process of trial and error - done in a sleep deprived manner.

So, it is possible to have a very positive experience, like we did, but I do recognize the challenges the PPs mention.

Good luck, OP.

[Anonymous]

That's a tough call.

We didn't need childcare until the kids were older (school age). We had nannies first, then decided to try having an au pair last year. We're on AP #1, who leaves in July. We are matched with AP #2 who arrives a week after AP #1 leaves. Obviously we were happy with the whole au pair experience since we are doing it again, but no I would not have an AP for my infant. That is just personal preference, though.

My kids are 10 and 11. If my circumstances were different back when they were tiny, I might have gotten an AP starting when they were 3 or so.

[Anonymous]

I dunno. We had an au pair for our first child last year (he was 4 months old when she came) and it worked out great. And she was 19 no less! She did have a significant amount of experience caring for infants, but it worked out fabulously for us. We're on our second au pair now.

[Anonymous]

I think this all depends on the family, the au pair, and a little bit the baby. For our first, we had an au pair starting at 6 months. Not a newborn, but still very much a baby. It worked out well. I am very type A and spent about a week transitioning to her, going over my way of doing things, making her comfortable, etc. She stayed with us for two years and was great. For our second, we ended up not getting a new au pair until recently (for work reasons).

I have had the luxury of not going back to work until ~6 months in both cases, but if I had to go back at 3 or 4 the flexibility of an au pair and the experiences we have had (going on #3) would lead me to get one. I do think you should screen heavily and train heavily....even if she has a lot of experience with babies...you will want to make sure you are comfortable.

To answer your question on having someone live in your house, I think it depends on the kind of people that you are. It REALLY worried me at first, but ultimately the flexibility that it provided (having someone there if the baby was sick, not having to do drop offs/pick-ups, clean bottles/prepare bottles, etc.) as well as the closeness developed between the kids and us and the au pair was great.

[Anonymous]

11:19 what were some of your rookie host family mistakes?

[Anonymous]

11:19 here: for me, I picked exactly what I was looking for -- but didn't realize what I needed.

I placed an emphasis on finding a very gentle, quiet girl who would not scare my sensitive oldest child. I also wanted a girl who didn't really want to party. I sacrificed a lot on the English capability, and experience, and I didn't dig into the driving skills like I should have.

I got a very nice Thai girl who was indeed gentle, and had no interest in partying. But she was extremely shy, and I didn't know enough about how to overcome those differences, and how to help her find a community of peers. I offered help, but after getting gently rebuffed, I kind of let her do it herself. She was not successful in finding a community of friends, and she got lonely (and ultimately left).

I think the lack of experience was also difficult (and there were some culture issues here too). She was very reserved, and would never tell me when things weren't going well. I heard concerning stories from my kids about things that were happening, but I think she didn't have the maturity and self-confidence to tell me things were not going well.

In future pairings, I've looked for APs that were a little more assertive -- as I think that works better for my needs.

[Anonymous]

Wow, maybe I am an exception to the rule but I am a first time host mom with a newborn and I could not be happier with my decision. Maybe I lucked out with my AP - she's amazing.

She's just a very good person who has a great attitude with just about everyone and everything. She takes initiative to find activities and play dates for our girl, and even though I had frozen purees and ready-made prepackaged foods for the baby she insisted on making everything fresh instead. When she works less than 45 hours in the week, she offers to let us sleep in on the weekends; she refuses to let us pay her for groceries she buys; she constantly gets our daughter little toys and such; when I work from home, sometimes she makes me snacks or a lunch and delivers it to the office. She is just thoughtful and sweet to our whole family. She rarely needs to be told anything twice and she tries hard to make sure we're happy with her and in return, I make her feel like she's a real family member and try my best to bring her on any reasonably affordable vacations, have the food that she likes around the house, etc.

I think if you interview carefully and choose thoroughly, it's a great choice with a lot more flexibility and a lot lower cost than daycare in this area. I did daycare for only a little while when I went back to work, and then we moved here to Bethesda and I had no child care lined up and was on a ton of waitlists. But getting an AP to join our family was the best decision ever. We are expecting another baby to join the family and while our AP can't extend because of a graduate program she's starting back home, we are not hesitating in finding another AP to take care of our now-toddler and our new infant. (talk about a savings on daycare then!)

[Anonymous]

I wont leave my newborn with an au pair most of them only 19 and they want to come to the US just for fun. I think Nanny share is the best way