Everyone knows daycare for kids is expensive, so when this single mom found a diamond in the rough, she was over the moon.
That is, until her mother got jealous of the young teacher her grandchild had come to idolize.
When she insists the child be removed from daycare, the single mom had to make a tough call that left emotions running high.
Read on for the full story.
AITA for getting a babysitter because my mom was keeping her home
I’m a single mom with a 4 year old daughter, Anna.
Anna and I live with my mom. We both work and Anna goes to daycare full time.
Luckily, she got a good deal on a great daycare.
Daycare would be about half my income so I get a subsidy that covers $1,400 out of her $2,000 tuition.
The only condition of the subsidy is that she actually has to show up. If she misses too many days I lose the subsidy.
I go to work at 7:30 and daycare opens at 8, so my mom would be the one to take Anna to daycare.
She’s really impressed about how well her daughter has taken to her teacher.
Anna’s main teacher is a 20/21 year old girl. When I’ve talked to her she’s always been very animated and energetic. She’s great with the kids.
Anna always comes home saying this teacher brought stickers, she brought juice, she brought bubbles, she did face painting, etc. and always has fun crafts that she did with her teacher.
This teacher is her favorite person in the world right now and Anna often runs away from my mom to jump on this teacher in the mornings and hides when my mom picks her up because she doesn’t want to leave this teacher.
However, someone else isn’t so pleased with all the attention Anna’s teacher is getting.
My mom started to get jealous that Anna likes the teacher better than her so she started keeping her home from daycare on her days off/when she only has 1-2 easy clients (she cleans houses).
I found out Anna missed 5 days over the past 3 weeks.
I asked my mom about it and she told me she wanted Anna to spend more time with family instead of with teachers.
This starts a big fight between them.
I told my mom Anna needs to be in daycare unless she’s sick or I would lose the subsidy.
She was arguing that if Anna needs to be in daycare, she should be in one with more family values and not some “rich white girl trying to save the poor kids”.
(The teacher is a girl from a well off family marrying into a well off family and the daycare isn’t in the most well-off neighborhood.)
While the teacher may come from another background, she’s doing tons of great things for the kids.
She has bins full of clothes for the kids, gave everyone a water bottle with their name on it, has a much nicer classroom than the other teachers, and drives a car worth more than my mom and I combined could make in a year.
She’s setting up a field trip to the local airport so her fiance can talk to the kids about flying planes and so they can look at his jet.
The mom refuses to let all of this go just because of a little jealousy.
I told her I wouldn’t. This is the best daycare that takes this subsidy and I won’t be moving her just because she’s jealous.
So she makes the best of the situation and finds someone else to care for her.
She was still insisting on Anna either being with family or being in a more family based daycare, so I got her a babysitter.
I drop her off to my neighbor at 7:30 when I leave for work and she drops Anna off at 8:15 on her way to take her kids to school. She only charges me $10 a day.
I don’t love the breakfasts that she gives Anna, but I know she’s going to daycare and I won’t lose the subsidy.
Her decision has created an even bigger rift between her and her mother.
Now my mom is ticked that I’m keeping Anna away from her.
AITA for sending Anna to a babysitter in the mornings because my mom wasn’t taking Anna to daycare?
Sounds like her own mother needed parenting even more than Anna.
What did Reddit think?
This single mom’s instincts are spot on.
No matter what her jealous mother might say, this mom is doing the right thing.
Despite the drama, the pros of a good daycare still outweigh the cons.
Who cares if the daycare staff comes from a different socioeconomic background? A good teacher is a good teacher.
When it comes to her daughter’s future, stability comes first, no matter whose feelings get hurt in the process.
If you liked that story, read this one about grandparents who set up a college fund for their grandkid because his parents won’t, but then his parents want to use the money to cover sibling’s medical expenses.