Childcare fascist

I caught myself the other day being a real jerk.

It was about the kids. We no longer have a nanny – I used to have a girl who would take Sam out in the morning from 9-1pm, but when Sam started nursery, she left and now my only childcare is school and nursery. And BOY OH BOY am I a fucking self-righteous about it. In the last few months that I’ve been looking after my kids full time I have slowly become fully prejudiced against anyone who uses childcare for a lie-in, or during the holidays or any of that stuff.

I didn’t realise this was happening until I was talking to someone – also without childcare – about the importance of doing your kids yourself. “But it’s so hard,” she said. “IT’S GOOD FOR YOU” I said in my bossy voice. “Those bad shitty days when you shout at everyone and it’s just all about getting to the end of the day? Those days make you. You have to experience them – and experience them a LOT – to really be a mother. They teach you about yourself. They teach you about your…”

And then I stopped. Fuck! Fucking hell! I had become the childcare equivalent of a breastfeeding Nazi, whose functioning delusion goes like this: “I did this thing and suffered so it must the be best way – otherwise what was all my sacrifice for? AND YOU HAVE TO SUFFER TOO.” I hated those people, those people – men and women – who just wanted you to feel bad and small and like an incompetent spineless creep for not doing things their way.

Anyway: shame. On. Me. As a penance I crossed myself with a pair of Big Boy Pants and put away all the toys nicely, rather than just shoving them any old where.