I disagree with babies being in a daycare. I dont know how it is in america, but over here children go into a pre school around 3-4yrs old, and that to me is great. It gets them ready for starting proper school, helps them socialise with other children their own age, and get used to being apart from their mother. Pre school here is 2-3 hours a day either in the mornings or afternoons. In my opinion that is the perfect amount of time.
Socialising a baby isnt important...its a baby! People who say that are making excuses for using a daycare -imo. If you want to socialise your baby or toddler, (yes I did once my son became a toddler), there are lots of mother and baby/toddler groups you can join in your local community. Where you meet with other parents and babys to play and chat.

I dont agree with daycares at all. I could never have left my baby with complete strangers (a few conversations with the staff still makes them strangers imo), and in a place where they have 1 staff member to several babies. A baby and toddler need one to one attention, they deserve that and my son sure got it! like many others do.

I hate that some parents seem so desperate to have a baby, yet after the birth, they are both back working fulltime 5 or 6 days a week 8-10 hours a day, leave the baby in a daycare 10-12 hours a day, and the only time they see him/her is to get them up in the morning and put them to bed at night, thats it.

Imo you should either:
1)be a stay at home mom
2)do part time work at home
3)have a job with part time hours so your baby isnt left in daycare for long periods
4)have a family member look after your baby while you work
5)dont get pregnant

i think they say that if its less then 20 hours a week it is beneficial but much more that that can be detrimental.
the biggest thing in my opinion is to find a quality program that promotes education, and where you child will have a constant caretaker (if the child is in a kinder care or what not, having a new teacher everyday can cause issues.) consistency, the right program, and the right hours are vital and with those things i think that preschool is very important in preparing children for school. because of the socialization they are being taught, as well as the experience of the school setting and being prepared on what to expect when they start their elementary education.


plus mom's sanity is always a good thing lol

Daycare may socialize a child, but in my opinion, it is up to the parents to socialize the child. That is part of parenting-socializing your child, teaching them to get along with others. I don't understand why socialization goes under the category of "benefits of daycare" when it belongs under "part of being a parent" and shouldn't be considered some sort of extra perk for a child.

I don't think children should be left under someone's care until they are around four or five. Before that age, obviously it's okay to leave your child with a family member for a period of time, but leaving a child with another adult for an extended period of time shouldn't be happening until they are around that age. And I don't think they should spend more than 10 hours a week.

As for parents that rely on daycare, I think some people are just doing what they have to do. However, I don't think there is any excuse for a child who lives in a two-parent home to be in a daycare. Daycare is a necessity for single parents, not a luxury for married couples and I think it's unfortunate that it has become that. My parents worked opposite shifts when I was growing up because they accepted responsibility for my siblings and I. I think couples who rely on daycare need to be more proactive in their child's life.

I can understand your perspective but people who live in England and some other countries really do have it better than us in America. You get health care and a lot of other perks. from what I have heard. The health care situation make it close to impossible for some people to stay at home. Not everyone qualifies for government health care here. It is really a lousy system here.

I had no choice but to place my child in a daycare situation. We all have unique circumstances and it's just so easy to judge why a two-parent home family needs to both work. There are reasons. There are some states that are more expensive than others and it is basically impossible to live off of one income. In order to completely understand, we would need to understand individual circumstances. I guess it's so easy easy for us to so life through the perspective of our own limited perimeters...how we grew up or what we have seen by people we know. Does that make sense??

We did chose a home day care and not a facility and I feel that was better for our child. We were able to find a great person to watch our child the first year. Now I am able to stay at home part time (my son is almost four and I am expecting in four weeks). Are you saying that a lot of people in my situation should not even have children? We are in our now in our 30's and it was/is the right time to have children for us.

I feel I am darn good mom (who makes plenty of mistakes!), a developmental/school psychologist and spend a lot of time with my child (soon to be children). I am fully aware of the ramifications that putting your child in a daycare setting can cause. However, there are ways to counteract the negative affects such as making sure the ratio between babies and staff is small, making sure the staff understand about the different stages of development, can fully provide for the babies needs (i.e., giving the baby attention he or she needs instead of just letting him or her cry all the time), and one of the most important as Vanessa said is consistency. One of the biggest issues that I have seen when the children do not have a consistent caregiver. This can lead to anxiety, insecurity and sometimes even mistrust in adults. Yes, some of the research out there shows that if kids are in daycare for longer than 25 to 30 hours a week or more, they are at higher risk of developing emotional problems later. In general, they tend to be a bit more aggressive, defiant and sometimes have higher levels of anxiety in school. This is a generalization and does not necessarily imply that full time working parents will have children that have more emotional problems and are aggressive in school. My goodness, my child was in full time day care until recently. I am concerned but am doing the best I can. It is just up to us parents that have to work full time to do our best at finding a quality place that would meet the various needs of our children.

Yes, working full time isn't ideal but I can honestly say that my child was much better off with me as a mom who unfortunately had to work full time for a while than a lot of other dead beat mothers/parents out there.

I believe the best age to put kids into daycare/preschool would be around 3 years old. The "ideal" would be to start part time in a preschool setting. Prior to that, I strongly believe in getting involved in parent groups for play dates. Those are wonderful!!

i reeeeaallly hope my mom retires after this next school year!! i wouldn't want to put my baby in a day care but, my parental benefits will be running out before baby is 1 year old and at that point i will have to start looking for work. i will do my best to have either rich or i at home to take care of baby, but the problem is he works crazy long hours a lot of the time, so even if i did work nights, he would probably be working at the same time. i know that my mom will help us out as much a- she can if she retires but that will be limited too. she deserves to rest now that she has worked so hard all her life, but i know she will be happy to help when she can. i'm just not sure what we will do, but the thought of having my 1 year old in daycare already doesn't sound so great. i guess we will figure it out as we go and i'm sure we will find a way to work it out.

Both parents having to work doesn't mean you have to have day care.

True. There are home care situations or finding someone you trust to take care of your child. Not everyone lives near family. You really have to trust the person watching your child and sometimes that is very hard to find. Most abuse cases occur not in established, well-regulated daycares but in homes.
I am so thankful I found someone to watch my now four year old in his early years - an in home person I found from my church. I just found another woman to watch both children (my soon to be newborn and almost four year old) two days a week. I feel very comfortable with her.

My sister in law refused to go that route. She only looked into daycare centers. She is a social worker and used to work with abuse cases. She heard too many horror stories of in home daycares. That didn't stop me from pursuing in home first because that option just seemed so much better. Everyone has their reasons and most reasons have valid points.

I agree with you! For you folks who live in areas that have parental benefits, you're lucky. I would have given anything to be home with my daughter when she was young, instead of working, going to college, and trying to put food on our table, and .I would love to be home with my son, but unfortunately we don't automatically get health insurance and paid to stay home.
I actually really enjoy working and when .I come home .I love being with my kids. Sure .I would rather not have to work, but that isn't an option. Saying .I should not have had kids because .I work is silly.
My son stays with his grandmother, who runs a daycare. He's safe, in a loving and safe environment.

Someone here who shares my view on this subject
If its a 2 parent family, they dont both need to work fulltime. People say they do, but what they really mean is they have to in order to live a life where they can afford everything they want. -a big house, 2 cars, expensive vacations, designer clothes etc the list goes on. You dont need all of that, they are things you want. Cut back on things, spend less and you can live on one income.
If you really cant afford it for example because you both have no qualifications to get jobs that pay more than minimum wage, then wait until you have completed college before getting pregnant.
Why did you plan a baby or a second baby, if you honestly cant afford to be the one to raise it and take care of it all day? Dont have a baby in the first place. Its not silly to say that. My point is put your childs welfare ahead of your selfish wants to have a baby, and wait until you can afford to give it the care it deserves which is not being left in a daycare all day being raised by other people.
I wont say anymore on this debate here because a lot of you do use daycares and i really dont want to offend you with my opinion. i feel very strongly about it.

hmm try living in san diego, ca where the lowest rent you can find is two thousand dollars a month. while i agree with the sentiment of not putting your child in day care all day every day some people dont have the luxary of living near a relative or friend. Some people have no other option then to put their child in daycare in order to pay for the necessities such as clothes, food, and rent. Which would you rather have someone do have children and live off of government assistance or work and have their child in daycare for a few hours a day? not to mention their are those special cases of maybe the baby was a "surprise" or people have past debt? an emergency comes up where the extra money is needed. it easy to judge other people when ypu havent been in their situation before. if all of us in america had free medical insurance and wonderful maternity rights i doubt very many people would have to work. but that's not the way it is here. besides the fact that i dont think there is anything wrong with wanting to be able to provide your child with more then the bare minimum. I want my daughter to be able to go on field trips, have good school supplies, and be able to take her to a movie every now and then. If her being in day care for a few hours a day will provide her with a much better life then why not. Not to mention some kids actually love to be in day care. My niece loves that social interaction, always has. she asks to go because she has a lot of friends there and loves the organized activities there is to look forward to.

I have a friend who lives in California. They did the very thing Sick_Mama is talking about.

Thing is, if you have a child, it's your child. You should be the one caring for it. If you don't want to be a full-time parent, don't be a parent.

I did say planned babies. Ofcourse many babies are 'surprises' (mine was), I was saying dont plan a baby if you cant afford to look after him/her yourself.
If its so expensive where you live, try moving.

im pretty sure the military isnt going to let us just "move" cause its expensive. not to mention its hard to work different hours when your husband has to go away to war.

also, you dont stop being a parent because your child is at day care for 2-4 hours. but i guess its easy to throw stones when your not a parent and dont have to make sacrifices.

I wouldn't exactly say that .I live really extravegantly. I do own a home (the bank and .I). In that home, my roof leaks and it's $10,000 minimum to fix it. My car is a 2000 .Pontiac, with 142,000 miles on it's last leg. Vehicle insurance is mandatory here and they can take your driver's license if you don't have it. We have house insurance that we'd be stupid not to have. I pay $200 a month every month for heating fuel. Yes, .I pay that bill now in .June when it's 95 degrees, because it's around $650 to fill my oil tank if it's empty, my hot water is heated with oil, and sorry in the winter, .I really wouldn't want to have no oil when it's 30 below zero. Gas for my car is $296 a gallon here and from what .I read in the paper, that is cheap. The only designer clothes .I own, .I bought second hand at a yard sale, or a friend may have given it to me. We buy store brands when we can.
It isn't like .I go to work every day for minumum wage. I make a good living, and so does my significant other, and we still struggle financially. Did .I mention that we have to pay for our health insurance? Well, actually that isn't true...my health insurance is free with my salary, but it's $105 a week for my kids. We don't qualify for state benefits, not that .I would want to collect them. I work so other people can collect benefits.

My son was not a planned pregnancy, but oh well!!! We love him just as much as people who have the luxury to stay home with their children, if not more. My kids will learn that to get things in life, you have to work for them.

I think that daycare within a nursery is highly beneficial to children over two years old. they get to be independent and socialise with other children their own age. they learn about sharing and waiting their turn.

they also learn educational things and i believe that the whole experience prepares them for school. my daughter starts nursery in september when she will be 2 1/2. she will be attending from 1pm-3pm monday to friday. she is going to the same nursery my little sister went to a couple of years ago with the same staff and i have full trust in them. they are amazing and my sister used to love going to nursery every day as she loved socialising and learning pre-school curriculum. she now adores school so it has been a positive experience.

i am not putting my child in daycare for me- i am doing it for her- whilst she is there i will have her brother with me and it means i can spend some quailty time with him. if my daughter doesn't like nursery- i will of course take her out straightaway.

i work from home in the evenings when my kids go to bed so that i can spend all day everyday with them

[/quote]

Someone here who shares my view on this subject
If its a 2 parent family, they dont both need to work fulltime. People say they do, but what they really mean is they have to in order to live a life where they can afford everything they want. -a big house, 2 cars, expensive vacations, designer clothes etc the list goes on. You dont need all of that, they are things you want. Cut back on things, spend less and you can live on one income.
If you really cant afford it for example because you both have no qualifications to get jobs that pay more than minimum wage, then wait until you have completed college before getting pregnant.
Why did you plan a baby or a second baby, if you honestly cant afford to be the one to raise it and take care of it all day? Dont have a baby in the first place. Its not silly to say that. My point is put your childs welfare ahead of your selfish wants to have a baby, and wait until you can afford to give it the care it deserves which is not being left in a daycare all day being raised by other people.
I wont say anymore on this debate here because a lot of you do use daycares and i really dont want to offend you with my opinion. i feel very strongly about it.[/quote]

Mommy said it all beautifully. What she is experiencing is very common in the states. Due to all the necessary bills we need to pay, it is close to impossible to make it on one income unless you live in certain states. We recently moved away from family and everyone we know for I can finally work just part time. Not everyone has the option of moving.

You can feel as strong as you like but like you said, this is your opinion based on a very limited perspective. Everyone has very unique situations. For you to say that the people who say that can't because they just want more expensive things are extremely narrow-minded and makes me wonder how many people you have met in different situations. I am fully college educated as is my husband. We have two older cars and had a more inexpensive house in Arizona when we our first child was born. What in the heck are you talking about designer clothes? We have always bought almost everything used. We live frugally. Buying a house was better than renting because renting in the area we lived in cost more. Again, you don't live in the states do you?? Did you even hear about what we were saying regarding health care and the other perks we don't get but you do?? Expensive vacations?? We never had a honeymoon! We buy generic food. It's really not that easy.

I have many full time stay at home mom friends and most of them have insurance covered through their husband's work. Those that don't, qualify for government assistance and get free health care, food stamps and other assistance. Both are great in that the parents do get to stay home with their children. Again, some people don't have that option and not everyone is living extravagant lifestyles. I can't even begin to tell some of the people who don't live in the states how expensive health care is.

If some of us waited until we can afford to have kids, we never would. Is that what you are saying we should do? What a shame. Perhaps all of us should just get fixed so we don't ruin our kids anymore than we have

Jude - isn't it a lot more inexpensive to live in KY compared to living in some other states? By reading what you wrote, it seems you believe that if you live in a two parent household then only one person needs to work. Not everyone has the option of doing split shifts like your parents did, either. I think you are going into a perfect field for having kids, if you do work. You would be able to do the split shift thing like your parents did and probably won't have to work many hours. You will most likely get wonderful health benefits as well. Kuddos to you for getting into a wonderful field. I wish you the best.

My daughter really loved being in daycare much more than going to the sitters. I checked them out thoroughly through our .D.H.S before sending her. The ones .I chose encouraged a parent to stop by anytime. There were no tv's, they went out to play, and she loved it. At the time, we lived in an area where there were no other children in our neighborhood, and .I'm not one to go visiting my neighbors anyway. Only .God knows who they are.
My daughter is a loving, intelligent, and well socialized young woman, and other than a bit of an attitude at times, that .I'm confident she didn't acquire from attending daycare when she was young she's a joy to be around.
If .I could stay home .I would, but there are too many needy people that depend on my tax money for me not to work.

yeah well sick mama that's nice that you get the luxury of staying at home with your child because daycare is "so horrible" but my mom didn't have that luxury. she had to work 2 jobs my whole life, and families with 2 parents might just want to work, it's none of your business if they want to work or not. why do you think that's your decision to make? maybe they don't want to stay homea ll day 24/7, it doesn't mean that they don't love their child any less or tha they shouldn't be parents. you need to learn to think before you speak.

yes terra i honestly don't understand the logic behind- 'it's ok for a single parents to put their child/ren in daycare but not two parent families'

um... hello? the child is still going to have the same sort of daycare whether it's from a single parent family or not. the risks are there regardless. i just don't understand your argument. if you are against childcare then the reasons you are against it shouldn't change purely because of the amount of children bringing up the child.

if the family is on a low income- regardless of whether there is one parent or two- then daycare can be a nessecity.