Why We Pulled Mia Out of Daycare

This whole pandemic thing - it's kind of crazy, huh?! If you have kids, what are you doing with them? Is it back to school or daycare or camp as usual, or are you keeping them home?

Just wanted to start out by saying that this is a judgement-free zone. No judgements here in what you've decided in terms of your own childcare or school choices, I just wanted to share our story.

Omgggg this photo is from March and how freaking cute is that squish?!?!! 

I had in my brain that Mia was going to be a daycare kid until she went to kindergarten. And then two weeks ago, we decided to officially pull her out of school.

Our daycare closed on March 13th, and initially I was shocked. At the time there were less than a hundred cases of COVID-19 being reported every day, and the general consensus was that COVID wasn't affecting kids. Some of my coworkers in California had their daycares close the week before, and I really didn't think it would happen to us.

Having Mia at home at first was hard. If you have kids, you know. If you don't have kids, you've seen the memes. I had wanted to figure out how to spend more time with Mia, but trying to work full time while taking care of her wasn't quite what I had in mind.

It turns out though, we're lucky. Jeff and I both have bosses who are very understanding, and my company in particular has been very accommodating. March was impossible, April was hard, but now we've fallen into a rhythm of splitting our days and taking turns working and parenting.

My job has been amazing about scheduling "fun" meetings, this is the actress who played Angelica Schuyler in Hamilton doing a singalong! And yes this is what our kitchen usually looks like 🙈

Our daycare reopened in mid-June, and initially we said Mia would definitely be going back, but not for a couple of weeks. We were expecting cases to keep falling in Illinois, but instead since mid-June they've rebounded. The date was getting closer to when we thought we'd send Mia back, and suddenly cases in Illinois were worse than they had been since May.

Our daycare has 32 children plus 15+ staff members, which means sending her back to daycare, no matter how careful the staff are at cleaning and wearing masks, we have to trust that 32 other families are all social distancing and being as careful as we'd like them to be. We know some of the parents, but even in Mia's classroom of eight kids we haven't met all of them. It's a level of trust that I just didn't have, especially with case numbers continuing to increase.

Jeff and I sat down and talked everything through, and since we couldn't figure out when we'd be comfortable sending Mia back to daycare, it would be better just to pull her out rather than basically paying college tuition to hold her space indefinitely.

So what's our plan?

Basically, we're winging it 😂. Jeff's mom and brother are taking Mia when they can, and we're trying to arrange a weekly playdate or "preschool" situation between Mia and her Aunt Izzy (in case you're new around here, Aunt Izzy is Jeff's (almost) two year old half sister). And besides that, we're going to keep on keeping on with our crazy split schedule of work and parenting. I also put Mia on the list for the feeder daycare that ours goes into when the kids turn two with the hopes that she'll be able to go back to daycare in March.

So there's our little story! I hope you're hanging in there with this whole quarantine thing. I tend to waver between weirdly loving the situation and the extra time with Mia, and being totally overwhelmed and anxious about the future. If you're struggling, just know that even if I share rainbows and sunshine over here, we're all having a hard time.

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Motherhood Monday: On Starting Daycare

Mia started daycare last week, and we are slowly adjusting over here. It's such a funny thing, to go from spending literally every second with your baby to only seeing her an hour in the morning and an hour at night. It has been a hard adjustment for me and a very easy adjustment for her! I just wanted to share a little bit about why we chose daycare for Mia, the process of getting into a daycare in Chicago, why we're starting daycare now, and how it's been going.

Why We Picked Daycare

Deciding what's best for your child is such a personal thing, whether it's staying at home, hiring a nanny, or finding a daycare. My mom stayed home when I was growing up, I think she was a full-time SAHM for 16 years! For me, it was an amazing experience and something I hoped I'd be able to do for my kids someday. But as Jeff and I talked it through, we weren't sure it would really work for us based on the lifestyle we want. Jeff went to daycare starting as an infant and he thought it was really good for him. Who knows if it's related to daycare or not, but Jeff is a much better sleeper than me and has a better immune system, and 100% has better social skills 😂Obviously all of that can't be from daycare, but I like the idea of our kid being adaptable and learning from the get-go that everything isn't always about her. I also liked the idea of Mia being able to socialize with other kids all day. I also wanted her to experience some of the Montessori concept if I could, because I went to Montessori pre-schools growing up and know first-hand the amount of independence kids gain from it. And while every nanny or babysitter is different, I've heard some true horror stories from some of my friends which made me nervous about having one person alone with my child all day. A nanny also might make more sense if we had more than one kid, but based on pricing for daycare vs a nanny in Chicago, for one kid it was less expensive to do daycare.

Finding a Daycare in Chicago

Once we decided we'd be doing daycare, it was time to dive into the craziness that is the Chicago daycare scene. We started looking back in November when I was six months pregnant, and it turned out we were already way late. I don't know when other people start applying to daycares (the day they find out they're pregnant?) but every place we looked at had at least three kids in line ahead of us for our same start date. It turns out the spaces are really competitive to get, so the recommendation is that you apply to three or four daycares and pay a non-refundable $50-100 fee at each to put your name on the waitlist. Then you just pray (and annoyingly badger via email) that a spot will open up when you need it.

We ended up applying to five places back in November/December/January for a mid-August start date, and in June I started hearing back from each place that they definitely wouldn't have a place for Mia. I was starting to freak out that no one would have a spot available for us and we'd have to scramble to find a temporary babysitter or figure out how Jeff and I could take enough time off of work to watch her.

Finally at the end of June, I got an email that there was a space opening up at our first choice daycare (a Montessori), but that she would have to start in mid-July to hold the space. I read the email and immediately started crying, both out of relief but also sadness since it was cutting short the time I'm supposed to have with her before I go back to work. I managed to negotiate the start date back a week and have her going just part-time until I go back, but I still was pretty upset about the whole thing.

Our Experience with Daycare So Far

The first day was so rough. Jeff and I walked her there and got her settled with her teachers and everything was great. Mia seemed just fine to be hanging out on the floor with all of the new toys she could put in her mouth, and didn't appear to even notice when Jeff and I left the room. Of course, I started crying immediately! It was just so sad to me knowing that she was going to spend all day with strangers instead of me - I missed that little girl the second we left. Mia, however, had a blast! The teacher showed us pictures from that first day of her playing on the floor with the other kids, smiling in a swing, and even holding her own bottle (which I still can't get her to do at home!). She has been having a harder time adjusting to napping there and has been exhausted every time I've picked her up, but the teachers say she's been pretty happy despite that.

While Mia is adjusting easily, it's definitely still hard for me. I've found that I need to schedule stuff for me to do during the day to distract myself. It's been nice to be able to exercise and get stuff done, but I still miss that little girl! I'm hoping things get easier as we go. While I would have preferred we start a month later, the slow transition from part-time to full-time has been nice, and I'm definitely glad I didn't have to adjust to getting Mia in daycare the same day that I had to go back to work!

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