First, let me say that Miss Montoya is great, my son bonded with her right away. However, the day she left for maternity leave, everything changed...
On Monday Sept 8th, I arrived to pick up my son and he was in the onesie he had spit up profusely on while we were heading into work, despite that my husband had asked them to change it upon dropoff, and informed them there was a spare onesie in his bag as usual. He had several outfits there. This onesie was hard as a rock and crusty all the way down to his bellybutton. He was also laying alone and crying on a receiving blanket that had been seriously damaged in their laundry process, where he could have been putting loose strings in his mouth. I was appalled. There was no excuse. I have filed a complaint with DFPS.
We arranged a meeting on Tuesday, around 3, on my husband's lunch hr. I left work early for it. They played a video from Mon showing that our son was only not within view of a care provider for less than 10 seconds, however they didn't show the part where I walked in so I cannot be sure this was the correct time. Further, my son was on the floor fussing, and not being soothed as far back as they rewound. Nonetheless, when I arrived Monday, Miss Jessica, picked him up to soothe him. Any parent knows that when you arrive to pick up your child, you do not want to be 'babyblocked' to go pick up your kid. It gave me the impression that she was trying to make me feel like she cared about him, but I preferred how Miss Montoya did not intercept me to hold him or handed him to me without delay.
Also during the meeting, I asked them not to feed him too close to closing time since it works best for my schedule if I can feed him when we get home. Miss Sophia, the director was very paternalistic in asking me "are you sure?" and suggesting a scenario where if he had not eaten since noon or 1:30 if I wanted them not to feed him after 5:00 then; a strawman argument twisting my words into something less reasonable. I told them not to feed him after 4:15 -4:30 and that we'd communicate if we needed to deviate from that for some reason. It seemed they were apologetic and committed to making things right and taking care of our son the way we preferred then. With the prices charged, and the licensing standards, one expects a certain level of quality. We understood that they were in a transitional period with one employee out and many new babies having recently enrolled but we did not want our son to bear the brunt of that.
On Wednesday, the day after the meeting where we thought we had cleared up any misunderstandings, which was also the last day I had my son there, he had not been fed nor was there a record of trying to feed him after 1:00. Miss Sophia, who was filling in for the absent worker, seemed eager to see my son get fussy and commented that he looked a little bit grumpy. He grunted at me a bit while putting him in my carseat but was all smiles for me, as usual. I could see the disappointment in her eyes and I wondered if perhaps they had let my son go hungry and not even tried to feed him between 3 and 4pm out of spite towards me for wanting things done a certain way rather than deferring to their way.
Previously, we were given unsolicited parenting advice on how to make their job easier. For example, Miss Jessica had suggested we bottle feed my son more often the first week we were there but I let that go. We told them we breast feed primarily. However, they did replace the damaged blanket and agreed not to do his laundry anymore - the least serious issue.
Weds I also gave them detailed instructions on how I wanted him cared for on a new infant care sheet form, which included an instruction not to delay me from being able to hold my son, and to be direct in telling me about his day. Miss Sophia called back for clarification on that & during this call, suggested I call first if I do not want to be delayed. I told her that I did not want to announce my arrival after what had happened earlier in the week and she hung up.
I called back explaining this was temporary until trust was rebuilt. Miss Sophia then got inappropriately accusatory about some late paperwork that she had emailed to my husband and I, two weeks prior, as if that warranted neglecting my son in retaliation. Skewed priorities, and perhaps hiding something..? I reminded her we were discussing my concern for my son's safety and well-being. Ultimately, we decided to withdraw our son. What unprofessional conduct. If the paperwork was so important, she should have given it to us when he had enrolled, &/or verbally communicated with us confirming we had received it. I had already told her it had gotten lost in a mountain of email/presumed spam while everyone in our house was ill and on antibiotics, had returned it and she said it was fine. That was petty and shows her customer service skills really need work. It's not clear if there's danger to babies, but it is NOT 'quality care.' read more