Or Should I Say EX-Nanny?
I'm not the most maternal of people. I fully admit that I will probably hold your fuzzy, shedding, slobbering, licking, chewing new puppy before I offer to hold your brand new precious human baby. Other people's baby's cry when I take them and quite frankly it makes me nervous. Puppies like everyone. But of course I'm comfortable with my own kids and even I had that terrible, nagging guilt about leaving my kids in someone else's hands while I went to the office 40 hours a week. That said, I was given the opportunity to work part of the time from home with a nanny on-hand to help.
Initially I was nervous the kids would somehow become closer to a younger, more energetic nanny than me, the tired old mommy. How wrong I was...
This past Saturday, our younger, not-so energetic, pregnant nanny up and quit... in an email... with no notice! Thank you for that gong show NANNY! But when my husband initally told me I felt concerned and wanted to call her and tell her it was OK and wish her the best. Afterall, she is pregnant and perhaps this was all too much.
These feelings persisted only until I read her POS email, after which all caring feelings went out the open window like my dog in a moving car (yes, he did do that). My caring, motherly thoughts were instantly replaced with new emotions including, "YOU LITTLE #@*$&)@#!" The reasons for leaving cited in the 8 sentence slacker email were as follows:
- I'm not happy as your nanny.
- I dread going to work.
- I come home with headaches and my Dr. suggested I quit.
- And #4, my personal favorite and fuel for my newly found anger, "I just never connected with your kids."
Before you determine that we were too hard on the young pregant girl let me share her responsibilities and hours. She worked 2 and half days a week for a total of 20 hours. One of the full days she only had 1 child and 1 and half of those days I was home working and also helping her. She probably loaded and unloaded the dishwasher once a week. LOOK OUT - SLAVE LABOR!!!
I'm honestly an easy-going person, probably too easy-going and perhaps it was my demise. I noticed she wasn't having fun and wasn't playing with the kids in the way she described when she interviewed. But I gave her a pass because I know how it feels to be pregnant and tired. Mistake.
While it equally breaks my heart and angers me that she was so insensitive, in the end we chose to take the high road and sent her a simple response, "Ok, all good." But since a week has gone by and I'm still peeved at the irresponsible and insensitive girl, I will share my "I wish I had said this" list. Here goes...
- Maybe you could have connected with my kids if you would have ever gotten off your fat, lazy @&# to play with them.
- Maybe your ^&$#* wouldn't be so fat if you didn't show up with a fast food breakfast every morning. Come to think of it, maybe that's why you felt like crap on a daily basis. You told me you ate healthy for the baby, but I got news little honey. Chick-fil-A breakfast biscuits ain't healthy...
- I bet a connection could have been made if you would have put down your stupid smart phone and did your job.
- You didn't make a connection? Really? Are you joking? My child-fearing friends that will NEVER give birth made a connection. Know how? They chased them around the house... ONCE! And made friends for life. Yep, it's that difficult.
In the end there is a bright side to this story. Her short-sightedness has given me a new view of my children and every time I gaze up their little faces I feel that sense of pride and total adoration. I could not love them more. What I would really like to tell this naive young girl is this, "I'm sorry for you. I'm sorry you didn't take the time to see all the amazing, silly, creative, loving, and sweet things that I see. Good luck with motherhood. It takes two to connect."
To the tune of Eleanor Rigby (All the Lonely People) by the Beatles. Click here for reference...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaRNrDaoMqw)
Ah, look at all the tiny pieces (violins)
Ah, look at all the tiny pieces (violins)
The little kitchen, you can only imagine the gagillion pieces of plastic food,
Creates a bad mood.
We have 3 incomplete tea sets. One is purple, one pink, and the one that is blue.
This madness is true.
All the tiny pieces...where DO they all come from.
All the tiny pieces... where DO they all belong.
The little vet kit.17 tools scattered around the home is no joke,
I need rum and Coke!
How 'bout the castle. Thank you Santa for the 52 pieces of princess fun.
Get me the gun.
All the tiny pieces...where DO they all come from.
All the tiny pieces... where DO they all belong.
Ah, look at all the tiny pieces (violins)
Ah, look at all the tiny pieces (violins)
This one was my fault. 80 piece plastic set of giant mega bloks.
Send me away to the school of hard knocks!
Wicker basket o plenty. Overflowing with many a random toy.
The bright side for 1 little girl and 1 little boy.
All the tiny pieces...where DO they all come from.
All the tiny pieces... where DO they all belong.
Ah, look at all the tiny pieces (violins)
Ah, look at all the tiny pieces (violins)
...Ever wish your bank account would fill up as quickly as your sink?
The things we do for our kids... sometimes stupid things...
When my daughter was not quite 2 1/2 and my son the "easy" age of 5 months I received free passes to Disney. The only catch? They had to be used within the next few weeks. I'm no dummy, we were going!
More excited than I should have been for what was sure to be certain chaos, I immediately jumped online to research hotels so we could spend a FULL day at the park. So many thrilling plans I have for my children that they won't even remember...
I find the Nickelodeon Hotel has a 2-bedroom suite for just $99! And the bonus? I discover we can reserve a Breakfast with Dora the Explorer! Clearly my kid needs to eat pancakes with Dora. We've been traversing volcanoes, crocodile lakes, and following that despised map everywhere it told us to go in that incredibly annoying voice for over a year. Booked.
We make it to the Magic Kingdom by 10:30am. Having grown up in WI, we are complete Disney morons and have no idea where we're going. We wander the park aimlessly searching for Princesses and by some miracle we eventually find them. We do our time in the excessively long lines but eventually make it to Princess paradise. No surprise these events are a bit of a challenge with a baby but we power through. We got free tickets and a Dora breakfast in the morning, and damn it, my kids will like it!
Needless to say this is truly a mind-blowing experience for my daughter. We foolishly thought it would be fine and they would nap in the stroller so we would stay late for the electric light parade, oooh, ahhh... Unfortunately the nap never happened, nor did the light parade. Again, being Disney mega-morons we had no idea (until they were ushering us out of the park) that it was Mickey's Very Merry Christmas and we had to be out by 6pm. SOB. Probably didn't need that hotel room after all.
Our free tickets to torture town happened to be park hoppers so we head to Epcot. Wow. We ARE clueless. It's the final night of the Food and Wine festival and the park is packed. We drag our overly-tired children all over the park searching for a food line that doesn't come with a 30 minute wait. We find a table and the hunter went to find food alone. He finally returns after 20 minutes with 3 shrimp in some kind of sauce. Yes, that was clearly the food solution... We give up and head back to the hotel where the torture truly begins.
The baby got his own room and slept, well, like a baby. On the other hand my husband and I decide to share our bed with the rolling, kicking, 22lb terror too excited to sleep. In fact, no one slept. My child morphed into a whining, crying, melt-down monster by morning. The husband is also on the edge of monster town. At this point we should have cut our losses, but I had booked pancakes with Dora and I'm no quitter.
We spend our $50 bucks and hit the buffet. Jimmy Neutron waltzes up first and both kids are crying and terrified. Awesome. I'm so exhausted the dancing and singing mania feels surreal and the pancake line is too long so we eat cereal. Again, awesome. But finally, for the Love of God, Dora shows up. Everyone freezes. Her head is literally the size of a small planet and I lose it! CANNOT STOP LAUGHING! Why is her head so astronomically huge? My daughter is scared. I'm scared but equally want to punch the head and send it back into space where it belongs! I'm sure there's a lonely moon orbiting somewhere out there in space just waiting on Planet Dora Head to arrive.
And the bright side is, it's possible the outburst of uncontrollable laughter added years to my life. Years! Thank you Giant Dora Head.
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