Critical Reading Response #1

---“The Nanny Dilemma”

            As New York parents increasingly tend to focus on working and earn more money for their family, the task of raising children is left to nannies who are mostly come from Philippine, Irish, and South and Central American. According to Susan Cheever’s “The Nanny Dilemma”, it’s the deal between “the demands of money” and “the demands of love” which both sides would get what they expect; however, such job situation has caused a lots of issues between the relationship of nannies and families, on both trust aspect and emotional aspect.

             The first issue which Cheever addresses is the legality of nannies since most of them arrive America with the visa for just few months and many agencies also lie about nanny status to families who want to find someone to raise their children. If such illegal status is found, it would make the family difficult to trust the nanny they employed. As what Cheever illustrated at the ending paragraph, according to the job description, after a nanny raising a child for more than few months or even one year, she would likely know everything about this family. On the opposite side, since the family know nothing about the nanny, it would cause parents to be skeptical to the nanny. Whatever the nanny is trustable or not, the relationship between nannies and families would become worse and worse.

             Another absolute issue which could not be avoid is the bond which nannies form with the children they raised since the times which children live with their nannies is probably more than the times they see their parents. To nannies, they also don’t want to deal with parents’ jealousy caused by this situation. But the truth is such job make both the parents and their children totally depend on nannies. Even during weekends when nannies deserve to release from their daily works, they would sometimes be called by the family to solve some kids’ problems since they are the individuals who know their kids better than themselves. According to Sally’s words that when she felt sick and could not show up to raise kids, she would feel worry about whether their parents know their daily schedules like when to meet the friend and whether they have made the meal for these children. Therefore, since nannies could not accompany kids forever, it would always leave devastating issues to both parents and children.

             Eventually, since a family really depend their nannies, sometimes nannies may be asked to do things which are not listed in their job description. For examples, they may be called to help raising their employers’ friends’ children which make them feel they are bought to lend to everywhere. Moreover, nannies are also treated strictly by some families, they are told to be businesslike and since they are the person who would accompany their children during most times, some nannies are even asked to change the words they used to say. It’s not uncommon that the family think the behavior of how nanny act in front of their children would affect their children, but the freedom and the flexibility of this job is really destroyed.

              Above all, this job is still needed between the demands of money and demands of love, but the balance need to be kept for both the parents and nannies they found. Whatever the status of the employers and their employees, they need to respect each other’s private times and treat each other equally based on human rights.

Reading notes:

-Nannies are from Philippine, Irish, and South and Central American.

-Full time worker who take care of babies while most New Yorkers don’t have enough time on taking care of their babies since they need to work and earn money.

-Finding a good legal nanny is difficult, most arrive with visa for few months. Sometimes, agencies lie about the legal status of nannies.

-Dominique got her green card from her fist family.

-Then describe what she did during daily times follow a particular timeline, also what she saw and some of her thoughts. How she live self-sufficient. Cook her meal, buy foods for kids and buy herself shoes.

- She didn’t see her daughter for three years, her daughter lived with her sister, hope the money she earned could but her daughter the education, she doesn’t hope her daughter would live like her in the future.

-She doesn’t like dealing with parents’ jealousy of the bonds that she forms with their children. [One of the most intransigent problems of being a New York nanny.]

-Another problem: when work hours turn to be more flexible, like services which is not included in the job description and when the host lend them to another family, it’s like they are bought, not feeling so well. Lateness = deduct salary. Even when they went home, they may be called again.

-Sometimes, they are told to be businesslike, actually hard to be businesslike when going to someone’s house and taking care of their children.

-When nanny sick, she would think about whether the someone could remind the daily schedule of the kid she raised. ---treated badly

-It’s the deal between the demands of money and the demands of love.

-On the opposite, raising a family’s own children make them to be familiar with everything of this family, but employers know nothing about them which make the situation worse and there is always the issue between nannies and a family whatever the problem is caused by nannies or the family.