True Confessions: Daycare and a Tiger-Momma

How do you balance having your beloved child in daycare with a natural tendency of being a tiger-mom? Well, the long and the short of is, you don’t. So you learn to figure out what things are important and what things you are willing to let go. Here are a few of the things that I decided to accept as is:

1. My child is going to eat things at daycare I would never allow in my house. i.e. pop tarts and canned peaches. Yep, I don’t believe either is going to enhance the health of my two-year-old, Lucan.
2. Lucan will inevitably come home covered in sand and dirt. Everyday, without fail, Lucan could use a good scrub. It’s like he rolled around in the sandbox and then put fistfuls in his diaper to take home.
3. Lucan’s diaper is changed whether he needs it or not. I err more on the conservation side (a damp diaper is fine!) diapering. Daycare does not. I was initially interested in cloth diapering, but most daycare providers are not interested in scooping poop out of a cloth diaper.
4. He probably watches more television than I care to know about. For example, he correctly identified Dora the Explorer and Barney the other day. I don’t even know what channel Dora is on (we don’t have cable) and I loathe Barney, so the show is NEVER on. As a rule, I don’t have major issues with a little kid-friendly tv, but I’m not advocating the tv being on just for the sake of being on.
5. With Lucan being at daycare, I don’t have a good handle as to who the other kids and parents are. There’s a part of me that wants to require that all new daycare children must first be cleared by me, but I acknowledge that’s ridiculous. I get zero say in the matter, but the tiger-mom in me wouldn’t mind at least having a vote :)
6. Everyday Sometimes I get reports that Lucan has been hitting other the kids. The crazy mom in me thinks that the other kid probably deserved it – quit taking my kid’s toy from him! He had it first! Then I recall Lucan hit me this morning because he didn’t want to put on his coat or leave his night light at home. So … Lucan might have aggression issues we need to work on. Especially since I later found out that Lucan appears to enjoy hitting other kids and then putting himself in self-inflicted timeout.

Like I said, I’m a bit of a tiger-momma. But if there is one thing that parenting has taught me, it’s to let the little things go. A few germs are okay. Learning how to get along with others is a natural part of growing up. Socialization is good. Routines are a part of life. Elmo isn't the end of the world. Pick your battles and figure out what’s important. So each day I remind myself that Lucan has fun at daycare, enjoys the experiences he has there and likes his little daycare friends (for the most part). Even if I don’t know all of the other daycare kids' birth weights and APGAR scores :)