While my daughter was in daycare for almost the first 8 mos of her life, she developed three ear infections for a 3-month stretch there; one for each month.  Needless to say, I was very unhappy about it.  Ear infections aren’t that uncommon in children though, so I’m glad that they’re actually trying to develop an ear vaccine for children.

The vaccine has been tested on, of all things, chinchillas, and can be administered via droplets rubbed on the skin.  Can you imagine, no needles!  (But why chinchillas?).

The chinchillas received the treatment once a week for three weeks.  A control group received a placebo.  The chinchillas that were vaccinated were then introduced to haemophilus influenzae (NTHi), one of the three main bacterial causes of otitis media, an infection/inflammation of the middle ear.  The result: rapid reduction or complete elimination of the NTHi.

It sounds promising, and I hope that we see this vaccine soon.  In the scheme of things, ear infections aren’t that serious, but many babies get ear infections at a frequent enough rate that a vaccine to prevent such an infection would certainly be welcome.

Looking after two kids, including one toddler who is smack in the middle of the terrible twos, and a daycare baby who wants everything the toddler has, means that there are a lot of tearing out hair moments in my house.

Like when Toddler pleads for mashed potatoes for lunch, then won’t touch them. Or when Daycare Baby and Toddler want the exact same toy. Or when Toddler wants to pour milk on Daycare Baby. Or when Daycare Baby crawls through Toddler’s block project, knocking it down. Or Toddler wants to put Daycare Baby in the trash. Or Daycare Baby touches Toddler and Toddler collapses on the floor wailing how much it hurts.

There’s the odd moment of peace, like when one or both of them are napping, but there are plenty of times where I have to do some deep breathing.

A couple of days ago, Daycare Baby was having her nap. “Where’s Baby?” asks Toddler, over and over again. I’m imagining that he wants her to get up so he can try to bop her with a plastic frying pan or lift her up by her feet. But no.

So when Daycare Baby wakes up, she spots Toddler. Big grin and squeals of joy! Toddler sees Daycare Baby. Big grin! Squeals of joy!  Toddler runs towards Daycare Baby, Daycare Baby can’t crawl towards Toddler fast enough, Toddler and Daycare Baby hug and squeal with delight to see each other again. It’s been a whole 45 minutes!

I’m thoroughly heart warmed. Then five minutes later, Daycare Baby snatches Toddler’s truck, Toddler wails and starts throwing things and screaming. Sigh. But like I said, the cute moments outweigh the crazy ones. I love my kids!

I know the little Belgian town of Dendermonde. I drove there several times during my grad study days to board our research boat berthed  there for our monthly sampling on the River Scheldt. A quiet, picturesque town. So of course it came with a shock when I heard the news about the Belgian daycare stabbing spree last Friday.

A man dressed like the Dark Knight character in the latest Batman film – face painted white while his eyes painted black – entered a daycare last Friday, January 23 and stabbed to death a caregiver and 2 babies, and injured 9 other little children and 2 caregivers. There were 21 babies in the daycare on that day and only 9 were unharmed. Others are still being treated with severe stab wounds.

The killer was caught and identified as a 20-year man with a history of mental illness.

Today, Sunday, more than 6000 people staged a silent march in Dendermonde in memory of the victims and their families. The Crown Prince Philippe and his wife, Princess Mathilde also visited the town over the weekend to offer their condolences.

Killing sprees are not that common in Western Europe. The fact that the daycare door was not security-locked is normal in most countries here where crime rate is generally low and personal security rarely a problem. This incident will definitely change a lot of things.

The incident was especially hard on mothers in this little country where almost 80% of women work away from home and therefore leave their babies at the daycare as early as 4 months after delivery.

This post might freak out some people who know me… I have one son but this week I’ve got a new baby. OK, she’s not actually mine, I’m doing daycare for a 8-month-old baby.

I’m hoping that this is going to have lots of the advantages of having a real little sister. I’ve got a baby to play with (she’s so cute!) and she’s light as a feather to carry around (two year olds are heavy) and my son can learn all about caring for another person, and make friends with another child in an environment he’s comfortable in.   And, I didn’t need to get pregnant, I don’t have to pay into her college savings, and I get to give her back to her real mom and dad at the end of the day.

There’s been lots of classic baby-toddler behavior. Baby taking toddler’s toys, toddler getting cross, toddler wanting whatever baby has (cheerios and stage 2 applesauce all around for lunch), toddler insisting that mommy loves him and not the baby, toddler refusing to be quiet when baby needs to nap.  I have new-found respect for moms of more than one baby.

And there’s the cute stuff too. She’s fascinated by him. One of his favorite things to do is to burrow under the comforter then pop out, and she thinks it’s a fantastic peekaboo game. He fetches diapers for her, and when she cries, he says she needs a bottle. And he even gave her a hug today. Then they both managed to nap at almost the same time, so there was 30 minutes of peace while baby and toddler were both asleep. Bliss!

We’ve had just one week together so far, so everyone is still getting used to the situation, but I’m really hoping that it works out for everyone. Please keep your finger’s crossed for us!

When I saw the title of the study touting “Kids Safer When Grandparents Watch Them“, I said, well of course! Grandparents usually don’t have 3 to 10 kids to take care of, as opposed to any type of day care. They’re also generally over-protective, and I would even say, overindulgent. They may carry the kids more throughout the day rather than putting them down to play. My own parents treat my daughter like she’s a china doll who’s apt to break at the tiniest pressure rather than the tough-as-nails baby that she is. I have literally seen her take a nose-dive to the floor from a trampoline. She barely whimpered, and I think I was affected more than she was.

The study also added that kids seem to have less injuries even compared to Mom. This gave me a bit of a pause. And I admit I was a bit miffed. But then I thought to myself, I do let my daughter roam freely, and give her a lot of room to fall in ways her grandparents would never do. That trampoline fall? They’d have been inches away from her, and would have caught her in time. They may not even have let her hands go on the trampoline. There’s a good chance, my dad wouldn’t even have let her ON the trampoline.

The study admits more research needs to be done.

“Additional studies of how households choose relatives to watch their children and the actual caregiving style of grandparents are warranted, because the protective effect of grandparents may depend on choosing the right grandparent”

I know I prefer my parents watching my daughter. But I also know of other parents who wish to hire non-relatives instead, to lessen tension because of differences of opinion. What do you prefer?

When my twin boys were 12-and-a-half months old, they started going to a daycare center 2 days a week from 8:30 till 2:30. Sounds normal and reasonable, right?

Not quite. That was Germany 2004. This caused a stir among the momfia in our little village outside Frankfurt as well as relatives and friends, for the following reasons:

• I wasn’t working (yet) so it was not a financially sound move.
• I didn’t have to work at all because a single income was enough to feed our family.
• One parent (and almost always the mom) is supposed to stay at home and take care of the kids, at least they are big enough to go to kindergarten at age 3 or school at age 6. At that time, my husband’s job required him to be away 4 nights a week, making it even more important to have a full-time stay-at-home mom.

In other words, without pressing economic reasons, only a selfish, negligent mom would think of doing such a thing.

My husband and I had our own reasons for placing the boys in a daycare – benefits for me and for the kids.

Me: I was suffering from extended postpartum depression and I was not well physically and psychologically. I needed time to recover.

The kids: They needed to socialize with other kids – something very important for twins.

Still, I was reluctant to do so, mainly for the very same reasons in the first list above.

My husband, who is a very pragmatic person, broke down my resistance with the following arguments:

• Health is more important than money. What would he do with the money? Throw a big party at my funeral?
• As the business person of the family, he looked at the cost/benefit analysis of the project. It’s not only the monetary returns that counted. The intangible things were also important such as more time for myself and the chance for the boys to socialize with other kids.
• He didn’t want and never wanted a zombie for a wife. He wanted his woman back.

So the boys went to the daycare despite my guilt feelings. And I started to build a new life – rebuilding the old one was not feasible anymore – where there was room for me, my children, and my husband. I started jogging again and slowly recovered from the chronic cough that has been bugging me for six months. I started going back to (unpaid) university research work a couple of hours week, then did some (paid) teaching during those days when my kids are at the daycare and slowly regained my sanity. By the time my boys were 2-and-a half, I was working 80% and they went to the daycare 5 days a week.

I must say it wasn’t always that easy. There were times when one of the kids or both were ill. Juggling job and kids with the husband almost always away was tough. It helped that my employer was very flexible and considerate when it came to mothers.

Despite the fact that things worked out well, some friends and relatives never understood the logic of what we were doing. They had kids themselves and they managed without daycares, babysitters, or cleaning ladies. We had less and less contact with them. I didn’t care as long as my mother-in-law was supportive of our decision 100% even though she was a full-time housewife and mother all her life. She wasn’t there physically all the time as she lived hundreds of kilometers away but she took time to visit us and help us out regularly. Most importantly, she defended me from all the bad talk. My father-in-law wasn’t completely convinced but he kept his thoughts to himself.

Things have changed since then. My twins are now 5, happy and healthy, fully bilingual and mastering their 3^rd language. My husband changed jobs so he need not travel so much but could spend more time with his family. This meant moving to a new country with a culture even less tolerant of working moms than the previous one. I gave up my job and now work from home.

Looking back now, I think we had made the right decision. The boys benefited a lot from the daycare. They didn’t have any major problems in the transition to the new country and preschool. They are close but not fully fixated on each other as some twins are wont to do. I benefited a lot from it as I got my health back, and my zest for life, and my self-worth. My husband benefited from it, too, knowing things at home are being managed smoothly while he manages his business projects.

I know that for some moms, daycare is not an option for many reasons. Financial, cultural and infrastructure constraints are just a few. I am simply grateful that it worked out well for our family and I wish all those in a similar position the best.

After researching 8,150 infants at 9 months old, half were primarily cared for by someone other than the parents, the highlights of the study are as follows:

• 40% of infants who had been in daycare since 3 months of age were less likely to have been breastfed and were eating solids earlier than those cared for by parents.
• Babies in part-time care had gained 175 grams or 0.4 pounds more weight at 9 months than those who were cared for by their parents.
• Babies under other relatives’ care gained 162 grams or 0.35 pounds more weight, and also began eating solid foods earlier.

Why worry about the weight gain in babies? There have been enough studies consistent in their findings that early childhood weight gain can be a a precursor to being overweight as adults. These infants were also less likely to be breastfed understandably due to lack of time (daycare is more often a necessity because both parents are working). Breastfeeding has been linked by some studies, as offering some sort of protection against weight problems later in life.

Parents of children in daycare, what can you do? First, see if you can rearrange finances and schedule so one of you can stay at home full time, part time, or work from home. If that is not possible, be very clear in instructions with daycare staff as to what and when and how much they should be fed. Third, practice a healthy lifestyle of balanced diet and exercise for your babies to grow up emulating. You as parents, aren’t helpless against conclusions from research. And your child is not destined to become overweight just because they are in daycare.

I am notoriously cautious about who I allow to watch my kids. My friends sometimes joke about how much happier I would be if I would just find some quality babysitters, but I assure them that I have one woman I use – a professional nanny – and I don’t mind just working around her schedule. She’s really busy because she nannies during the day and then goes to college at night, so my husband and I only get to have date nights when she had an open night.

For a brief period of time I was a little less selective about the babysitters I used. When my husband was in Kuwait last year I had a choice: either trust some more people with the kids or hardly ever get away. I started sifting through the pool of teenagers at church and had a few of them come over and babysit. Most of them worked out great, but there was one instance that made my trusting tendencies come to a screeching halt.

I hired a teenage girl to come over and play with the kids upstairs while I worked downstairs. I told her to let them watch one show on television and then they could all play until it was time for me to take her home. I could hear everything that was going on upstairs, so when the next TV show started playing I figured my instructions hadn’t been clear so I headed upstairs to clarify everything.

The babysitter was passed out on the couch, sleeping as though it was the middle of the night. Both of my kids were standing in front of her, saying her name over and over in an attempt to wake her up. She was one heavy sleeper.

Two things occurred to me at that moment:

1. Thank God I hadn’t left the house.

2. Thank God the kids hadn’t gotten into anything dangerous.

I tried to wake her up gently, but she was drooling and snoring and didn’t hear me. I wound up shaking her a little, and when she woke up she knew she was busted. I loaded everyone into the car, took her home, and vowed never to trust someone with my kids again who I didn’t know personally and fully trusted.

Now whenever one of my friends ribs me about being too cautious with who I use as a babysitter I just tell them this story and the ribbing stops immediately. Am I paranoid? Yeah, a little. When it comes to my kids, though, I don’t think a little paranoia is a bad thing.

A recent article in our local paper told of the difficulties that families have finding daycare for infants. I?ve found this to be particularly difficult in my case as I have had several special needs children. It?s hard enough to find child care, much less care for a child that has health concerns or other issues.

It is best to begin looking for child care options before your child arrives and keeping an open mind about the options. Flexibility is key here! I found it best to take as much time as possible off from work after the birth of the baby. At times, I was able to take 12 weeks off for maternity leave, but once, I got called in for a special project two weeks after my third child was born! I was able to negotiate with my boss, and he allowed me to bring my daughter with me, which was great.

When considering child care options, you might want to think about the following:

• Check into telecommuting options.
  Make no mistake about it, working at home is still?work. Nevertheless, if you are very organized and motivated, this may be an option for you. A flexible supervisor is a must if you are looking into this option.

• Check into sick day care options.
  Consider what you will do when your child becomes ill when you need to work. A backup plan is a definite when you have an infant. If sick care is not available in your area, make sure to check on the availability of relatives just in case. If you have handicapped children, there are, again in certain areas of the country, providers who just take handicapped children.

• Ask relatives and friends for help.
  Although I was able to telecommute for most of my working career, there were times when I simply could not accomplish a project with the children in the house or after they went to bed. I had contracted out with friends and relatives who were at home to be ?on call? for me during these times. You may or may not be able to ask family and friends for assistance depending upon a number of variables. Be sensitive to the needs and feelings of your relatives and friends when using this option. Note that some relatives may expect you to pay for their services! It?s best to discuss expectations openly when you are using this option(for example, your relative might only be willing to watch you child so many days a week for so many hours. They may or may not expect to be paid).

• Avoid the issue all together.
  Many working mothers avoid the issue all together by finding jobs with flexible schedules, job sharing, or finding a telecommuting job. Other mothers choose to work a shift opposite than the hours their husband or significant other works. This way, there is always one parent home with a child.

Realize that your child care needs will change as your child grows and develops. As with all things pertaining to parenting, flexibility is a must!

More and more companies are allowing their employees to bring their infant children with them to the workplace. This article in Time magazine reports that the newly established Parenting in the Workplace Institute lists more than 70 U.S. companies that allow babies at work, and organization founder Carla Moquin says she is constantly including more.

The article reports that a research study showed that while workers at baby-friendly workplaces often anticipated disaster, there was rarely a negative effect on coworkers or productivity. In fact, having babies around could actually boost employee morale.

What do you think? Would you want to bring your infant to work with you? Or would you want to work with someone else’s child in the next cubicle?