Have you ever wondered what goes on at your daycare center while you’re at work or having a personal day? No need to wonder now. These daycare horror stories will fill you in on what really goes on.
“I worked with a co-teacher who threw a little girl’s shoe at her when she wouldn’t put it on,” says Lauren Geiger, a daycare teacher who is currently working at UCI’s Early Childhood Education Center. “It didn’t hit or hurt the girl physically, but she started to cry because it scared her. At the same center, there was a teacher who would yell and point at the kids until they listened to her.” While these incidents didn’t happen at UCI, she tells Parentology that they are just one of many daycare horror stories throughout the years.
Geiger has a little over six years of experience and explains that being a daycare teacher isn’t an easy task. And this can be so much harder when parents are being found in situations like this: “One time I walked in on a parent using the children’s potty!” she recalls. “When I opened the door, she stood up and continued to pee all over herself.”
But, it seems like the parents aren’t the only ones having accidents. Their kids are, too.
Accidents in Springfield, Oregon
Jessica Stoner (not her real name), a daycare provider from Springfield, Oregon tells Parentology about how important it is that parents are informing them about their kids’ potty-training experiences.
“The school would call me and tell me that the little boy I was taking care of had a little accident there. Or, he would come from school and five minutes after being in the house, he had pooped himself. He was eight years old. How do you approach a topic like that?” Stoner asks.
“I have talked and talked to the mom so many times and for so long. I was ready to say, ‘Hey, no more. Either you do something about it or I will.'”
Stoner continues, “I’ve had to clean him a couple of times, which we aren’t normally required to do. But what was I going to do? The smell was horrible. I would call the mom to come get him because he had an accident and she wouldn’t seem too concerned.”
Pen Markings in Perris, California
Evelia Retano has more than 13 years of experience in her at-home daycare facility Retano Family Child Care. She admits that her job only gets tough when parents don’t communicate with her the way they should.
“There was one time where this four-year-old girl was brought to me in the early morning. She was wearing her school clothes and she was asleep when she was dropped off. The parent laid her on a mat until it was time for school,” Retano explains. However, “When I was on my way to her school, she began crying that she did not want to get out of the car. It turned out, she had pen marks all over her body,” she says.
“Her mom got really upset for not having forced her to go to school, but I wasn’t going to force her. The principal was outside and I wasn’t going to cause a commotion and force her into school.”
Apparently the pen marks were due to her siblings and her playing around. Nonetheless, Retano believes she should have been informed. She says it’s not their responsibility to inspect the children and she had never had a problem with that parent prior.
Pomona, California
Mrs. Perez (she asked us to withhold her first name) has been a daycare provider since 1999, and says her daycare horror stories are innumerable. However, Perez will never forget her first client from nearly 20 years ago.
Perez gets most of her kids from programs connected with the Pomona Unified School District. One of her biggest suppliers is Social Services. She admits that this comes with drawbacks. A majority of the children she cares for come from broken families and unfortunate circumstances.
“Social Services called and asked me if I had space available for eight kids from one parent. I said yes. I did have space available,” Perez says. “I was so happy. It was my first client.” Two hours later, eight kids hopped out of a beat-up old van. The youngest one was a one-year-old and the oldest was 9 years old. “I could see from the driver’s seat that [Mom] was expecting baby number nine.”
Things took a turn very quickly when Perez noticed the kids all had lice and she hadn’t been told in advance.
“They had eggs in their ears from the lice and three of them had bleeding rashes in their diapers. The diaper bag was infested with cockroaches,” Perez says. She called the mother but got no response until she showed up that evening. “I told her that the social worker [said] she needed to take care of the problem.” The next day, the eight kids showed up with shaved heads.
Then, three weeks later, the mother arrived with her newborn baby in a shopping cart.
“‘Here’s the other baby,’ she said. It was a little boy and he was about three days old. She went inside my home, washed her bloody body off in my bathroom sink. She left blood everywhere. That was my first client, I will never forget.”
Perez says she still gets herself into the craziest predicaments when it comes to taking care of kids. The highest cost of childcare doesn’t seem to be the pay-rate for parents, but the experiences.
Daycare Horror Stories — Sources
Lauren Geiger, a daycare teacher at Early Childhood Education Center UCI
Evelia Retano, daycare provider in Perris, California
Jessica Stoner, daycare provider in Springfield, Oregon
Mrs. Perez, daycare provider in Pomona, California