The Spanking: In Hindsight

While schools are closed this week and the families I work for on vacation in various warmer climates, I have temporarily escaped to the house where I grew up to visit my parents and take a little vacation myself. I love to come back here, as it often helps me to regenerate and reminds me of what really matters in life.  Yet again it has helped to put things into perspective and makes me truly appreciate the way in which I was raised, particularly because of the children I look after and their lack of discipline. 

I am the first to admit that I was not a perfect child. I can think of more than one occasion where I truly earned a punishment, but I can also vividly recall the lesson I learned and the way it influenced my future behavior. Privileges were taken away, desserts seized, and - on the rarest occasion when I was at my worst - I was spanked. Of course, at the time I cried and screamed and loathed my life. Now, however, I actually look back and thank my parents for being brave enough to punish me and teach me those lessons. It can't have been easy to follow through on those threats of "Bite your sister one more time and you are going to regret it, young lady", but I think they understood the necessary level of fear required with children in order to teach them to consider the consequences of their actions and to value good manners and proper behavior. I am not saying that this lesson must be taught with physical punishment, but I feel it must be taught nonetheless.

This is what is lacking in the households where I work: this necessary fear of consequence and authority. I watch the girls scream and yell and hit and scratch and kick their mother on a weekly basis and I watch her reward them for eventually stopping by giving them candy and sleepovers and little toys. I've watched this lack of fear and respect for adults grow to encompass their life not only in their home but on the playground, in the neighborhood, in the homes of their schoolmates. And then I am privy to their insights that "Mommy is not strict at all." They believe, from a lifetime of lax parenting, that their parents - and now all adults by default - are powerless. I can't say I disagree with them.

After experiencing numerous events where the children have emerged victoriously untouched simply because neither parent wants to take on the inconvenience of being the disciplinarian, I find myself in a position where threats are empty.  Completely.  I now secretly await the next time that the children will misbehave just so that their mother will have an  opportunity to punish them, to see if she will, in fact, punish them. Chances are, she won't.

Ask, Don't Tell

Dear Mothers,

I am not your property.  You do not own me.  You have the privilege of employing me, but I am my own person operating under my own power.

When you would like me to work for you, please feel free to ask me my availability.  Should I find myself available on the particular evening of your request, I will consider accepting the job of watching your children.  Please do not assume that I am available and simply tell me when and where to arrive, as I do have a life outside of your household and I would hate for you to have to cancel your dinner plans because of my personal schedule.

I might also add that making me feel guilty for having a social life is unkind and unnecessary.  I do not make you feel guilty for hiring someone else to take care of your children.

Thank you,
The Nanny

Whose side am I on, anyway?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but a nanny is generally hired to look after one's children, not to be treated and chastised as one's child.   Last night, however, there certainly seemed to be some role confusion going on when, rather than supporting me in the governing of Child B, The Mom simply gave into the child's whims and undermined me completely.

Just for the record, I was right.  I was trying to demonstrate to Child B that demanding a glass of water is not the proper way to get a glass of water, prompting her to ask me and to employ kind words such as "Please" and "Thank you."  Perhaps she had never heard these words before.  I certainly have never heard them spoken at this particular dinner table, and it seemed to me that tonight would be as good a time as any to introduce manners to the kitchen.  When she began screaming and throwing her body around in response, The Mom walked into the room, stepped in front of me, and handed her daughter the water.  I understand that "the right" is not always "the easy", but the look she gave me as she appeased Child B spoke volumes as to the uphill battle ahead of me - against both mother and daughter. 

I do not mean to say that I expect always to have The Mom on my side.  Of course, I realize that our ideas of child-rearing will differ on occasion and that, as The Nanny, I am invisible whenever there is a divergence.  That is not the reason for my soreness.  The reason is that she took away my power completely, setting me up for unnecessary struggle in all conflicts to come with her children.  And, if there was any doubt about who "won" this battle, Child B smirked at me across the table, raising her water glass in the air and singing a little, teasing song of victory.  I was immediately transported back to my childhood and my own history of trivial conflict and stunned to have my intentions so blatantly thwarted - by both mother and daughter.

Uphill I go.