I’m a caregiver with over 10 years of childcare experience, and I’m honestly feeling pretty hurt and confused by something that happened with a family I’ve been regularly working with for the past few months. I’d really appreciate perspectives from both caregivers and parents.
I’ve been caring for their infant almost every week/every other week since 4-5 months, and over that time, I’ve developed a really lovely bond with the baby and what I thought was a genuinely good relationship with the parents.
I’ve always tried to be especially accommodating with this family. Despite my usual hourly rate for infant care, I’ve been consistently accommodating and charged them considerably lower than my usual rate. I’ve also accepted last-minute bookings without additional fees and have occasionally held availability for them until the last minute. I genuinely adore their baby and have always enjoyed caring for her.
We had another booking scheduled for tomorrow, but tonight (13 hrs before the booking), the mom sent me a message with instructions for the next day and casually mentioned that the baby had been dealing with a stomach bug and will likely have frequent bowel movements tomorrow.
This was the first I’d heard about the illness.
I was honestly caught off guard because I don’t provide care for children experiencing potentially contagious symptoms/illnesses. I regularly work with multiple families, including young infants, and I try to be very mindful of potentially transmitting illnesses between households.
We hadn’t really had an explicit conversation about sick time care (in contagious situations), so I understand that the parents might not have known my boundaries. However, I also didn’t think it was unreasonable to expect a parent to disclose a potentially contagious illness and check whether their caregiver was comfortable proceeding.
I sent a warm, respectful message explaining that I wasn’t aware the baby had been sick and that I generally require 48 hours without vomiting or diarrhea before resuming care. I apologized for the inconvenience and wished their baby well.
The mom hearted my message and then changed it to a thumbs up 10 mins later instead. Since there was no reply, I felt like she was disappointed.
And then a couple of hours later, I discovered that she’d removed me from her Facebook friends. (She wanted to add me when I first started working with them, I do not prefer to add families on FB otherwise)
We had still been friends when I sent the message, so this happened shortly afterward.
I know a Facebook friendship isn’t necessarily a big deal, but given our relationship, the timing honestly stung. It made me feel like months of flexibility, accommodation, and genuinely loving care were suddenly overshadowed by one occasion where I needed to establish a professional boundary.
I’m not upset that she might have been disappointed about losing childcare at the last minute. I completely understand that arranging childcare can be stressful, especially with a sick baby.
What bothers me is that I wasn’t informed about the illness until the evening before, and the message seemed to assume I’d be comfortable caring for a child who might still be symptomatic.
I also feel sad because I’d developed such a strong attachment to their baby, and I genuinely thought I had a good relationship with the family.
I’m now questioning whether I handled this appropriately or whether my expectations regarding sick-child disclosures are unreasonable.
For other nannies/babysitters: Would you have handled this differently? Do you consider stomach bugs a reason to decline care, even if the family hasn’t previously discussed a sick-child policy?
For parents: Would you be upset if your regular babysitter declined care under these circumstances? Would you expect them to care for your child while they’re recovering from a stomach bug?
I’m genuinely interested in hearing different perspectives.