To be a Nanny

I am a professional nanny. I am not an au pair or a babysitter or just a "nanny", I am a PROFESSIONAL nanny. Because my vocation is important to me I tend to be pretty passionate about it. It honestly bothers me that here in the States people stick up their noses toward nannies. I understand why. I know many unprofessional so-called nannies who have not chosen being a nanny as a career choice, but just as an "easy" job while going through school or to travel for "free" or even to earn some cash before going on to an unrelated field.

Because being a nanny is such a huge part of my life I will be spending a lot of time relating parenting styles and the pros and cons from my point of view. I will talk about my own personal techniques and why I feel they are effective. I'm even open to questions or topics from others, with the understanding that whatever my responses may be, and no matter how passionate I am about anything shared, these are stories from my personal perspective as a nanny (not a parent) and any parents who have issues with how things are stated or if I openly put down your parenting style or techniques I am not personally attacking you as an individual, just as a parent (hehehe). These are my opinions and this is a blog about my life after all.

First, let us discuss the differences between babysitters, au pairs and nannies.
Babysitter: If you don't already know what a babysitters role is...what rock have you been under? Babysitters are usually young adults (teenagers) hired for occassional days and a few hours at a time. They are there in your home to keep your children safe while you are away or even while you're home just as an extra pair of hands.
Au Pair: which literally means "on par" or "equal to" and is defind as: a foreign national domestic assistant working for, and living as part of, a host family. Typically au pairs take on a share of the families responsibilty for childcare as well as some house work and receive a small monetary allowance for personal use (wiki). Added to this I will say that nannies have a bad reputation because of "au pairs". I'm talking about the illegal aliens who are working as au pairs and are sorely taken advantage of...so they tend to be neglectful toward the children and spiteful toward the parents. There is a site called isawyournanny.blogspot.com and if you have the opportunity please check it out. These types of "au pairs" are why nannies are looked down on.
Nanny: I am taking this definition from the INA (international nanny association) website. "A nanny is a child care specialist. A nanny's workplace is in a family's private home and his/her job is providing one-on-one attention and the best possible care for the family's children. The work may be full-time or part-time, and the nanny may or may not live with the family. The nanny's role is to provide support to the family by serving as a loving, nurturing and trustworthy companion to the children. A nanny tends to have special child care skills and a deep love and understanding of children. A nanny offers the family a convenient, high quality care to meet each child's physical, emotional, social and intellectual needs." I will add that many professional nannies also have training/schooling in child development. Like me!!!

Now that we've taken the first step toward understanding what nannies are all about we can move on to parenting/child care issues. But not today, no need to overwhelm everyone. xD

I will end this post with a little story.
My current kiddo, that we'll call P from now on, is such a ham. Yesterday while taking her nap she started to stir and so I picked up the monitor (which has a webcam so we can spy on her!) and she had lifted her head but then layed right back down, so I kept watching for a few moments to see if she was going to sit up or go back to sleep. Out of nowhere, while still laying there, she laughs a full belly laugh. Then is silent. Goes right back to sleep for another 20 minutes. I seriously LOVE this happy child a little bit more during moments like these.