Like Dominic Cummings - and oh, what’s that, absolutely every parent in the country right now - I currently have 'particular childcare issues'. Mine, though, don’t involve a farmhouse, a castle and some curious concerns about my vision (although my eyes are permanently bleary from having paintings of rainbows thrust into them while trying to remain composed during 25 person Zoom conferences).
My particular childcare issues are that I have a full-time job, and so does my husband, and we also have a four year old and a two year old at home. All. Day. Long. I know, groundbreaking in these times. And I’m not going to dress this up, but I simply cannot hack it anymore. I’m doing them a disservice with my lacklustre attempts at stimulation and they are driving me slowly - actually, not that slowly - bonkers. Right now I would pay all the money in the world for someone more competent than me to take them off my hands for a day, or ten minutes.
Because do you know who’s amazing at looking after children all day without going bonkers? People who work in childcare. Early years professionals. Teachers. And that’s why, unlike many of my peers, all things considered I do feel ready to send them back to school and nursery.
The guilt is intense - I feel like a rubbish employee and a rubbish mum. I was great when they were babies, successfully leaning into watching 11 episodes of Grey’s Anatomy in a row while sustaining life with my boobs, but this bit, where their needs have become incompatible with full-time employment, a pandemic and, most of all, each other, is just too hard.
This was going to be my year (yours too, right?). I started a snazzy new job at the end of February - ironically, at tiney, a childcare start-up, and so I bought new clothes; I revelled in my shorter commute to a buzzy bit of central London; I ramped up my eternal quest to find a genuinely life-changing mascara.
Three weeks later… oh, hi Covid, nice to meet you, you absolute plonker.
Right now 0-5 year olds in this country are picking up that their parents are stressed, exhausted and unable to give them everything they need.
I’ve now reached a point where, while the physical health of the country is incredibly important - and that’s why I don’t know when we’ll see my shielded parents, who I miss hugely - so is the mental wellbeing and social development of my kids. And this isn’t just an excuse for wanting to eject them from my home because I can’t concentrate for more than 10 minutes without being asked for a breadstick; it’s based on the many decades of research which I hear about at tiney every day.
I know that the early years (that’s zero to five) are the most important of all, and that the education and care children receive during this time lays the foundations for their teens and beyond; not just for their literacy and numeracy skills but for their social and emotional development. And I know that what they pick up at home is even more important than the stuff they learn through play in educational settings, but right now many of the 0-5 year olds in this country are picking up that their parents are stressed, exhausted and unable to give them everything they need because they’re too panicked about losing their jobs and not being able to give them anything they need.
The Duchess of Cambridge knows all this - in January, before everything went nuts, she launched her own campaign to highlight the significance of the early years - and thousands of normal women (and a few men) have realised during lockdown that it’s a mission they want to get onboard with too.
While the childcare sector is in flux right now, on the other side of all those now dog-eared rainbows there could be a pot of gold: at tiney, we train people to become 'tiney home leaders' - our millennial rebrand of childminders - and in the past six weeks of lockdown, we’ve received over 2,000 applications, more than 10 times the usual number of enquiries. Most of them come from parents who, unlike me, have realised they actually quite like doing the whole home-learning thing, along with furloughed nursery workers and professionals from other industries, from teachers to city execs, all with one thing in common: they want to make a big difference to children’s lives during their fascinating formative years, and coronavirus has shown them that a homely environment is the best place to do it.
We train people to become 'tiney home leaders' - our millennial rebrand of childminders - we’ve received more than 10 times the usual number of enquiries.
As a parent who desperately needs a hand, I find it super-reassuring that 2,000 people have realised that, contrary to your hazy memory of the woman at the school gates your mum used to slip a tenner to every couple of weeks, modern childminders are savvy early years professionals. Professionals who happen to possess the patience to talk to young children all day, the creativity to keep them entertained, the catering skills to stop them from getting scurvy, the boundless energy to do star jumps with them, the sensitivity to comfort them when they need it and the plate-spinning skills to do all of the above without crumpling into a ball, pouring a gin and whacking on a two hour YouTube loop of Baby Shark.
At tiney we’re now optimistic that when 'all this' is over, there will be an army of brilliant early years educators ready and waiting to open their doors to our kids and show them a good time while we’re busy making sure we can keep a roof over their heads.
For now, though, here we are, a nation of frazzled parents who are starting to turn on each other across social media, simply because it’s all so hard. Sure, things have eased up in some ways - I see you enjoying your socially-distanced park wine while I try to stop my toddler launching herself at your miniature dachshund - but for those of us with little ones at home, not much has changed.
Just because the prime minister says schools and childcare settings can open from June 1st, in reality they’re all still deciding how best to roll out a 'phased return' and most parents still don’t know when their kids will be able to go back, or even if they should. While Ezra’s mum says it would be irresponsible for any parent to send their child back until at least January 2030, Ella’s dad thinks the teachers are simply too busy sipping prosecco in the sunshine to do their jobs (names have been changed to protect the thoughtlessly opinionated).
Most of us are a little more measured, but can definitely see the impact all this being cooped up away from friends is having on a whole generation. Our two year old daughter is happy at home, albeit destructive (so far the casualties are a Macbook Air, two phone chargers, a remote control, a Fitbit, three gin glasses, one pair of prescription sunglasses, an Orla Kiely duvet cover and… deep breath… the entire contents of my makeup bag), but our son seems troubled. He turns five next week - I have a Sonic The Hedgehog cake to make to compensate for the total lack of party - and is normally a chilled-out sort of kid, but is now frequently emotional, aggressive, clingy and frustrated. He needs to be back in an environment where his carers don’t have one eye on the quarterly sales stats, where there’s genuine enthusiasm for constructing a papier-mache solar system and where he can release all those months of pent-up energy with friends his own age.
And we’re the lucky ones: we have jobs, we’re in good physical and mental health and we live in a friendly and supportive community of people who drop cakes and books on each other’s doorsteps. If we’re struggling, what about the kids who aren’t so fortunate? Who aren’t officially on the 'vulnerable' list, but due to the stresses this crisis has put on their parents, now probably should be?
Our kids, and all kids, deserve proper care. Looking after them is a proper job, and I’ve never felt more respect for the people who choose to do it.
READ MORE: Are You Happy To Send Your Children To School And Nursery When They Reopen?