Babysitters

Let’s talk about babysitters for a minute.  Considering the fact that the going rate for babysitting one child with standard care needs is $10.00 an hour now, what the hell are families with disabled children supposed to do? Apparently there is an idea out there that if you give birth to a child with a disability, the money fairy visits the same day and blesses you with millions?  I guess I must have pissed her off because that chic never showed up!

I was lucky in the early years to have older children that could handle their little brother for breaks for work, volunteering and the occasional “date night”.  After my other children grew up and developed their own social lives, the need for babysitters rose considerably leaving me with two choices.  1.  Never go anywhere again as long as I live or,  2. Rob a bank to come up with the money I need to pay a babysitter capable of handling my son.  Don’t get me wrong here,  my son hasn’t maimed anyone yet!  His behavior is not violent towards other people; just himself. The problem is that he can make you kill yourself trying to protect him from himself!  How many people can really truly handle that sort of an emergency coming from a growing teenage boy?

This is what ends up happening in reality.  I have the sitter here waiting with my husband and I (all the while they are adding up that hourly rate) for my son to be still and asleep.  We leave the minute he is asleep safely tucked into his room and run out the door to the nearest “fun exciting place” I can find.   Usually we just settle for a good steak and quiet conversation and sometimes we can get through dinner or our errands before the babysitter calls to say they’ve heard a strange noise coming from my sons room or that he has become upset.  This ends the already hurried and stressful romantic night out and leaves us dashing home to check on what often times ends up being something only the two of us can handle and we send the sitter home with cash in hand for a job not even done.  Sound bitter?  Yup, I am when it comes to that part.   A decent hourly wage for watching TV and not cleaning up after themselves, yeah babysitters can end up as another asshole for the list!  Scenario #2 is worse and usually involves being called home for an episode that they were instructed on how to handle and could have easily handled.  I could go on but it might wreck the reputation of babysitters worldwide and get me banned from all babysitting service posting sites permanently.

When it comes to leaving my son with a babysitter, I go through the same range of emotions that any normal parent does “How fast can you get here? Hurry up I’ve got to get out of this place!”  Which is replaced soon by “You have how many tattoos? You’re from what twelve step program?”  And last but not least “Never mind I’ll just cancel my plans.”

 Now on top of that when looking for a sitter for my son, there is another list of crucial questions to ask:

1.             Can you put an Octopus in a sack?

 

2.             Do you have a sense of smell and can you remove it before you come?

3.             Can you curl eighty pounds of child with one arm while dialing the phone with the other?

4.             Can you thwart Ninja skills?

5.             Can you put faucet handles on and take them back off by yourself?

6.             Are you a digestive expert?

7.             Can you understand non-verbal Ninja communication?

8.             Can you do an “Abs of steel” video for six hours straight?

9.             Can you watch the front door, the back door, the side door, the fridge, the pantry, and the bathroom all at once?

10.         Do you already have a personal injury lawyer?

Well, there are a million more serious questions than that, but you get the idea.  Babysitters are few and far between and hard to come by around here.

The last adventure I had with babysitting went something like this:

I call the potential babysitter on the phone to see if they are available for the day in question.  Babysitter mulls it over and decides to get back to me later.  Much later.  This time I luck out and the babysitter calls back 2 days before the event and says “yes I can watch him”.  Now remember that statement “watch him” as it will come in handy later in this story.

Great!  I am thrilled that I get to go somewhere with my husband and the sitter is confirmed!  Hurray!

Two days pass and my excitement builds for a few long awaited hours of rest and fun!  The babysitter arrives right on time!  Super!  This is going awesome!  Dinner is ready for the sitter and I point out the plate of food on the table.  Now I do the rundown of vital information which doesn’t take very long because this sitter is familiar with the house and my son.  “Nothing should happen or require your attention at all because he is already in bed asleep and all you have to do is listen in case he wakes up”, I tell them.  No problem,  everything’s under control.

So I am out the door for the first social evening with my husband in a very, very, very long time. Out and about enjoying time with each other happens so rarely that every second of our few hours is an absolute treasure.  Every bit of it is soaked up and he and I are all smiles.  The food is great, the atmosphere is great and life feels really really good.  This is when one or the other of us looks at the time and realizes it’s time to head back home.  Ok, well, my son is asleep, there’s been no emergent call from the sitter, no reason the date can’t continue on after arriving home and sending the sitter on her way, right?  WRONG!  Never assume anything.   That is the rule to live by if you’re going to survive.  I walk in the door with my husband still on cloud nine from our time alone.  Giggling and laughing and holding hands soon gives way to an unsettling feeling as we don’t see the sitter in the family room area where the comfy couch and tv are.  Ok, so head down the hall a little faster now towards my son’s room.  This is where I find the sitter engaged in an all out debate with him.   The sitter is trying desperately to convince my blind son into dropping the “present” (we’ll call it that)  he made into a plastic bag that she is holding at the end of her outstretched arms in front of him and offering him some toy she found in trade.  At the same time I notice this, I also notice that the sitter is fighting back a distinct gag reflex.  My son is completely naked, he is laughing and refusing to comply with this strange request and his bedroom behind him is a work of art with every kind of toy and inflatable thing he owns strewn in beautiful abstract fashion all over the room.  The blankets for his bed are in the hall, the clothes he was wearing when I left are in the toy box, the legos are on the bed and the inflatable orca is somehow leaned up against the ceiling fan vertically resting on one tail fin.  To this the sitter stated “I’m having a bit of trouble here”.  Alright, no big deal, my husband and I quickly take over, all feelings of romance properly squelched, my son laughs hysterically some more, the “present “ is removed, he’s put in the tub, the room is put back together and scrubbed and the sitter is compensated way more than the hourly rate, offered a snack (which she declines) and sent happily on her way back home.  (I think there are still rubber tire squeal marks in the driveway from her rapid exit.)  Now my husband and I start my son’s day all over again knowing that it might end around 3 or 4 a.m. if we play our cards right.  I overheard a lady once complaining about how difficult it is to find a sitter that she’s happy with for her nine year old non-disabled daughter.  On the outside I smiled and said, “yes good sitters are hard to come by”, but on the inside I was thinking “oh you have no idea asshole”.