As many of you, we have been home working our butts off, while also managing to parent our children and give them an environment to learn and grow as we look to make up for the lack of daycare and school for the moment. The stress of COVID-19 has affected us all in so many ways. Some of us have lost our jobs, some of us have taken pay cuts, some of us have even taken on more work without extra pay just to keep our job, but more importantly, some of us have lost loved ones to this horrible disease.
As we look to the future, may of us have a choice to make when it comes to child care. Do we take them back or do we keep them at home? As a family, we decided to put our little one back into day care. Now mind you, we live in New Jersey. While we were one of the worst states at the beginning, we are now one of the lowest, safest states, so our decision came because science and facts were on our side here.
Our day care managed to put a new set of procedures in place to ensure our little one was safe. They included the following:
- Curbside Drop-off: We are no longer allowed inside. We must drop off our little one with one of the teachers outside of the building each day. One of my favorite things to do before this pandemic, was to bring her inside, get her settled and watch her laugh and smile with her teachers as I left. This moment will have to be put on hold for the time being.
- Teachers & Staff Wear Mask (always): Another thing that made us feel comfortable is that the teachers and staff had to always wear a mask. We now know that if you have COVID-19 and wear a masks, there is a much lower transmission rate and by our day care having this in place, we felt more comfortable. I also routinely check the live feeds to check and they do, in fact, keep these masks on.
- Daily Temperature Checks: Everyone morning they take the temperature of our little girl. They do this to ensure no one with a fever steps foot inside. They are also doing daily temperature checks of the staff as well.
One of the main reasons why we made the decision to bring our little girl back to day care is because of the social aspect. She’s now 7 months old and we want her to be around other kids her age. This will allow her to learn and grow from others and ensure that she stays on track to hit milestones.
While this is a personal decision for everyone, we wanted to share our story.
Feel free to comment about your story below.
