Mom Punishes Daughter After Babysitter Quits Then Asks If She Was Too Harsh
As a parent, leaving your child in the care of a babysitter is a huge trust exercise. You want to choose a sitter who your children will like and enjoy spending time with, but they also need to be someone who is good at their job and can keep your children safe.
So if you had finally found the right sitter, and then your child drove her away with her bad behavior, do you think it would be fair to punish her? That's what one mom on Reddit wants to know.
Hiring A Little Extra Help Around The House
Posting in the "Am I The A**hole" community, Reddit user Relative-Ad654 came to find out if she was in the wrong "for telling my daughter it's her fault that her babysitter quit."
This mother has three children, ages 6, 4, and nearly a year old. She hired the babysitter while she was pregnant with her third child. The sitter does all the usual things you'd expect like picking up the two eldest kids from school and taking care of them while Mom and Dad are at work.
An Attitude Started To Make An Appearance
"My eldest loved her babysitter but she began to develop a huge attitude."
Her eldest daughter has a friend who has a nanny who "she's basically allowed to boss around with little consequence." Mom believes her daughter may have developed an attitude after seeing her friend behave badly toward her nanny.
Making It Clear Who's In Charge
When they first noticed the change in attitude towards the babysitter, her mom and dad made it clear to their child that her sitter is in charge.
Mom reminded her that "she's to respect her, not to demand things of her" because the babysitter was the one with the authority.
The First Incident
Unfortunately for Mom and Dad, their daughter seems to have ignored that memo. A few months ago, there was the first real confrontation between their daughter and the babysitter.
When her sitter asked her daughter to grab the baby's diaper bag, their eldest responded with, "You can't tell me what to do, I'm the boss of you!"
Trying To Shut It Down
The babysitter told Mom that night about what had happened earlier, and Mom immediately addressed it.
Mom explained to her daughter (in front of the sitter) that the behavior was not acceptable, that she's not the boss of anyone even if they do pay the babysitter, and then she took away the child's TV privileges.
It Was Not An Isolated Incident
Just a few weeks after the first incident, they were back yet again having a conversation about the 6-year-old needing to respect the authority of her babysitter.
While the babysitter accepted the apology from the child, you can't blame her for starting to get frustrated. It's also possible that there were smaller moments of disrespect happening throughout the day beyond the large outbursts.
Mom Understood Why The Babysitter Would Be Frustrated
Out of guilt over the increasingly hard time her eldest was giving her, Mom gave the sitter a raise.
More importantly, though, she took actions to limit her child's contact with the friend who she thought was likely influencing her daughter's new attitude the most.
Is There A Larger Issue Here?
Some people in the comments after the story was posted were suggesting that perhaps there were some bigger issues behind the behavior.
Mom attempted to address that with her daughter and noted that her daughter in the moment always seemed to understand the conversation.
The Final Straw
The third major incident was the one that broke the camel's back, so to speak. On a particularly challenging day, "my daughter was acting up, sitter had tried several de-escalation tactics but finally told her to go have quiet time in her room."
In response to that, her daughter screamed "I'm the boss of you! I'll get you fired!"
Calling It Quits
After that outburst, the sitter had enough and phoned Mom, asking her to come home immediately.
Upon Mom's arrival, the sitter promptly quit and left, leaving mom "furious" at her child. Now she needed to deal with her upset child and come up with an appropriate punishment that would hopefully get the message across.
Her Daughter Wasn't Happy After The Fact
Being that she's only 6, it didn't occur to the child that if her babysitter was fired there wouldn't be anyone available to take her to all those fun activities like swimming lessons or playdates, but that's now her reality.
Now Mom wants to know: was she too harsh by telling the child that it was her fault the sitter quit? Her husband apparently thinks so, and Mom was looking for some public opinion.
Most People Agreed With Mom
As far as Reddit responses go, most people commenting seemed to agree with this mom's reaction.
Yes, the child is only 6, but commenters also pointed out that if she's old enough to understand the concept of her babysitter being paid to watch her, she can understand that her behavior wasn't appropriate.
Mom Will Be Happy Her Daughter Learned The Lesson Now
While her daughter may not be happy about it right now because she has to miss out on swimming lessons, there's a good chance mom and dad won't be seeing that kind of behavior with any babysitters in the future.
It's probably a good thing that she learned this lesson young—maybe now she won't grow up to be someone who treats employees and service staff poorly.
