October Leaves
In Search of Child Care, By Mindy Gullen
Lovely October. All the signs of fall have arrived. The leaves turning (in California we just pretend), we start pulling out our favorite soft sweaters, enjoy roaring fires, bake cookies, and kids are back in school, all things cozy and warm seem to begin in October. As a kid, I loved all these cozy, fall things except for that one part about going back to school, what was so great about that? What made it even more offensive was listening to my mother’s happy banter around then to anyone and everyone, “yes the kids are FINALLY back in school”. Once I remember seeing mother actually roll her eyes while yammering on the phone to the neighbor lady…I was repulsed…“what a traitor” scowling to myself wondering how could she be so happy sending us off to purgatory? Well, all it took for me to finally understand was to become a parent, a single mom no less, to see that with school in session comes that familiar routine, new school clothes, figuring out Halloween costumes and mostly having that comforting sense that I knew where my kids were until I picked them up in their after-school daycare. What would I have done without that program, I’ll never know. Even now I appreciate the sweet lady in charge of the day-care program who suffered from, of all things, narcolepsy…always something.
The reality is that unless you’re a single mom with a trust fund, or have a willing and able family member close by, or an incredibly great ex-husband who pays his child support on time (although that would be an oxymoron), the responsibility of securing the highest quality of daycare for your children, outside of yourself, is one of the most important decisions you’ll be making during their formative years and one that will affect them the rest of their lives.
CoAbode, bless its heart, is currently expanding the base of information and support services they provide to all its members by listing daycare providers within the communities of it member base. That being said, it is still each mom’s responsibility to check references, conduct background checks on workers (easily done on internet in your pj’s). A few things you can do to ease your mind before you decide on a child care provider is to drop in unannounced to see what a typical day is like in that home or facility, make sure they are trained to do CPR, there are no pools or access to one, they have a safe and reasonable ratio of childcare providers to the number of children, and all this is just for starters.
All of us single mom’s are, in a way, sisters. We recognize each other in the grocery store, at the parks, in the work place and we watch each others children. We understand the pressures, the fears and the loneliness each other goes through from time to time while raising our children alone. Thankfully, we also know the pure joy and pride of being on the front line of our children’s growth and discoveries as they reach for their own stars in life. Overall, our children and we as moms get to learn a few things about living by grace, dignity, and humility, and, at times, mix it all up with a healthy dose of our own genuine moxie. We’re a good bunch. Take care of yourselves, your children and say hello to one another when you’re out and about.
***************************************************