Sick Child Program

Ella got quiet on the way in to work yesterday.  Somehow I just knew that something wasn't quite right.  Sure enough, before I even left her daycare, she threw up all over the place.

Of all days on which to get sick, yesterday actually wasn't all that bad.  Her timing has definitely improved since the first day of the academic year.  I had a miss-able meeting in the morning, and only four appointments in the afternoon--three of which could be seen during our on-call hours.  So I brought her to my office (where she puked again in the parking lot), packed up my laptop, and headed home.  After another round of vomit, I knew that daycare wouldn't want me to bring her in today, and since my husband had a day full of meetings scheduled today, I started looking for other options.

I remembered chatting with one of our instructors at the beginning of the year after I went home with Ella on the first day of classes, and she had shared with me that our University offers a "Sick Child Program", where they will pay for a nanny to come to our home and care for Ella when she is sick and can't go to daycare.  Sounds too good to be true, right?  But sure enough, I started looking into it, and yes--our University will pay $21 per hour, and we pay a $2 co-pay, for a finger-printed, background-screened, references-checked, CPR-certified nanny to come to our home up to twenty days out of the academic year to care for Ella when she is sick and I need to be at work.

It was quick and easy to register for the program, and the nanny showed up this morning as scheduled, and seems to be great so far.  I just chatted with her a few minutes ago (during my lunch break), and she assured me that aside from Ella not having much of an appetite (of which we were aware last night when she preferred to throw her food on the ground), she seems to be just fine.  

I know that I've complained about how our benefits cut out any infertility consultations or treatments of any kind (and I do still think that this is very unfortunate), but I am very impressed with the Sick Child Program service.  It really is a blessing to be able to work for an institution that values my contributions and helps me care for my family.  (And I promise that I'm blogging on my lunch break...not while I'm supposed to be working.)