Trust Me, It'll Be Good For You

Months before sending our son to daycare, my wife and I talked solely of the benefits of him being around other kids. We specifically thought about how great it would be for his immune system. Never before had the immune system become so important to me. Every time someone would ask, "How are you feeling about daycare" with a clear undertone of you should not be OK with this, I would confidently answer, "It'll be great for his immune system." "Is the daycare close to where your wife works?" "It'll be great for his immune system."

There is little else you can defend yourself with when asked about sending your child to daycare. The fact is, most people send kids to daycare because they have little choice. That was certainly our case, we felt good about sending our son to daycare because we had to. Economic and time restraints made the decision for us. For some reason though, I found myself trying to convince everyone that I was sending my son to daycare in a conscious effort to increase his antibodies.

I don't want to sound like I frown upon sending kids to daycare. I do not. As a child, I was taken to many daycare facilities and babysitters, and from this background, I could feel fairly confident that daycare was far from the worst thing for my son to endure. I will say though, those first days were tough, but only because I imagined the strangers taking care of my child would not understand that crying means he's upset, and sleeping means he is tired. The fact these people were professionals, educated in the field of child development, while I was merely five months into an immersion course and had only picked up a few key phrases meant little to me. The entire first day my son was in daycare, I couldn't imagine any other scenario than him crying for hours while the daycare staff just stood around stumped as to what to do about it.

My worries were immediately relieved the first time I was able to pick him up from daycare. Upon walking into the room I found him smiling while sitting in the lap of a caretaker. As I walked over to him, an adorable little girl who was just starting to walk, was leaning over as if to talk to him. A new friend, I thought. As my son looked up at his new friend, the girl who was now only eight inches away coughed loud and wet directly into his face.

This is when the scene turned grim. All the cute little kids I had just imagined my son getting to know better, started to look more like runny nosed zombies. I couldn't believe I had left my son here with these people. It wasn't until after I had him in my arms outside and realized he was still smiling that I started to calm down. Though I was pretty convinced I saw a rash starting to form, and literally the next day he developed a cold, I knew I needed to get used to it. It's very hard to tell your five month old son, as he's struggling to breathe through a stuffy nose, why it is you think spending time in a cesspool of disease is good for him, but I figure he'll thank me when he's finally immune to every ailment, like a superhero.