Am I Being Too Picky?

[Jenniferdawn]

DCM wanted me to put sunscreen on her son everyday. Even in the middle of winter. He is half black. :confused: I said no. In my handbook my policy states if you want your child to wear sunscreen, you need to put it on before they come. I only re-apply if necessary in extreme sun and water play.

Now they are asking me to add a vitamin pouch thing to his water everyday. It flavors his water. Looks like he is drinking Kool-aid. I said no. Its in my policies that no drink or food comes from home. The kids all make a fit when someone gets something special. They are not happy.

So, am I being to picky???

[WImom]

I don't think so. Not sure why they can't do that at home. He should be able to drink it before he comes to your house or when he goes home. Probably just easier for her to inconvience you.

[Country Kids]

No your not!!! Just keep reminding yourself this is your business and the way you want your business to run is up to you and no one else.

The whole sunscreen thing is going to change in my childcare this summer also. If they want them to have it on they can do it. My number one reason is I'm tired of the kids rubbing their eyes IMMEDIATELY after I'm done and then start crying and we have to come back inside-.


I really do not want the liablilty of it anymore. The more I put back on the parent the less they can get mad at me. How I control my business is up to me not the parents.

By the way, the child can drink water without it being flavored! Another thing you could do is once again put it back on the parent and let them know they will need to provide one for each child everyday if they feel their child needs special.

[permanentvacation]

No. I would have told her the same as you did. She can apply the sunscreen at home every morning. She can also give her child vitamin packs in his drink at home before daycare and in the evenings after daycare. I do not do any special requests like these. If a parent starts asking for goofy little things like this, I usually suggest that they get a nanny to come to their house rather than take their child to a multi-child daycare.

[EntropyControlSpecialist]

We are an interracial family. I apply spray sunscreen to my black husband (unfortunately for him). I'm a big sunscreen fan.

The only sunscreen I'd be willing to put on a child is the spray kind. It's easy and fast.

[Unregistered]

Not too picky w/ the water. That's absolutely not necessary for him to have and a pain in the behind for you.

I can't agree with you on the sunscreen though. Drs. recommend sunscreen in all weather-it's not the heat that burns it's the suns rays and they can still do damage in the winter. My children are biracial and wear sunscreen. If they don't they burn...just like a white person

[GretasLittleFriends]

I would not put sunscreen on the child every day, only when absolutely necessary. Yes I understand the child needs to be protected by the suns UV rays (regardless of skin color), but I would fear unnecessary exposure to too much chemicals in the sunscreen. I don't want to sound like a chicken-little or something, because I'm not generally a holistic kind of person. (And to clarify, there is nothing wrong with a holistic lifestyle!!)

I also agree about the vitamin thing, I would not allow the child to have it in my home. Thought there being, like you said, everyone else would want some and find it unfair when Johnny gets colored/flavored water and they don't.

It seems the OP is questioning whether the child needs sunscreen because his skin is darker, and the mind-set is he would less prone to sunburn. I mean no malice or harm, but it makes me giggle thinking about my best friend growing up. She was born here in the states, but her parents were immigrants from India, so she was a much darker color than my pale white. I will never forget the first time I saw her blush, because for some reason I didn't think she could because of the darker skin tones. We won't talk about the time she and I fell asleep in her back yard while "tanning". We both had bad sunburn blisters.

[Jenniferdawn]

LCLC, I thought that darker pigmented skin did better in the sun than lighter pigmented skin?? Anyways, its up to her, but it seems a bit excessive for them to want me to put sunscreen on in the middle of a huge storm here.

Thanks for all the support. I'm still growing my backbone here.

[EntropyControlSpecialist]

LCLC, I thought that darker pigmented skin did better in the sun than lighter pigmented skin?? Anyways, its up to her, but it seems a bit excessive for them to want me to put sunscreen on in the middle of a huge storm here.

Thanks for all the support. I'm still growing my backbone here.

Darker people may not burn as easily, but they're still at risk for skin cancer (and premature skin aging).

[SunshineMama]

My children are half Filipino and have their father's (Filipino) complexion. I only do sunscreen on really sunny days or days we are out a ton.

I use the organic sunscreen- the chemicals in regular sunscreen scare me.

[Jenniferdawn]

Off topic I know, but there is new research that suggests a lot of the skin cancer we are seeing is actually caused by the horrible chemicals in sunscreen, NOT the sun its self. And that we are a very Vitamin D depleted society, due in part of the excessive use of sunscreen. And new recommendations are coming out to spend more time in the sun without sunscreen. Just one more hot topic to debate.

[Meyou]

Personally, I would ask for the vitamins to be given at home since it shouldn't be a big deal but I wouldn't give them at DC. I would ask that sunscreen be applied before the child comes and then I would reapply to exposed skin when we went out again later in the day if they provided a note saying that the extra sunscreen was medically required.

Skin cancer doesn't discriminate and doesn't care about skin color. While lighter skinned people may burn and it shows but darker skinned people still receive the same invisible damage that everyone else does.

Have you asked if there is a history on skin cancer in the family or WHY mom wants DCB to have sunscreen? There is a possibility that one of the parents had a skin disease as a child which puts there children at much, much greater risk.

As someone that burns in the winter I think sunblock year round is important but I'm not willing to jump through hoops for a paranoid DCM so I would require a note.

For those of you that don't apply sunblock how do you go outside other than first thing in the morning? I reapply the sunblock hourly to all my kids and even then we had a couple of days last summer that myself and one of my dd's got a burn.

[Meyou]

Off topic I know, but there is new research that suggests a lot of the skin cancer we are seeing is actually caused by the horrible chemicals in sunscreen, NOT the sun its self. And that we are a very Vitamin D depleted society, due in part of the excessive use of sunscreen. And new recommendations are coming out to spend more time in the sun without sunscreen. Just one more hot topic to debate.

Australia had a problem with vitamin D deficiency a few years ago when they pushed a sun safety campaign. But they had since added the recommendation that 15 minutes twice a week when the UV scale is higher than 3 with exposed face, hands and arms is enough exposure to get all the vitamin D you need. I thought it was pretty cool that it only takes 30 minutes per week to get the Vitamin D you need even without fortified milk. They add Vitamin D to our milk in Canada, I'm not sure if they do that in the states.

[Kaddidle Care]

DCM wanted me to put sunscreen on her son everyday. Even in the middle of winter. He is half black. :confused: I said no. In my handbook my policy states if you want your child to wear sunscreen, you need to put it on before they come. I only re-apply if necessary in extreme sun and water play.
Now they are asking me to add a vitamin pouch thing to his water everyday. It flavors his water. Looks like he is drinking Kool-aid. I said no. Its in my policies that no drink or food comes from home. The kids all make a fit when someone gets something special. They are not happy.

So, am I being to picky???

No, she is. If it's so important to her she can do it. :P

All children should have sunscreen on in the summer so she'd better get used to applying it in the morning. You would be responsible for re-applying it in the afternoon. If you can do it, so can she.

That was my biggest pet peave when working the summer camp. What takes 2-3 minutes for a parent to apply to their one child at home becomes a half an hour to an hour fiasco when you've got a boat load of kids. (And you can't go by the kids to remember because if they don't like getting it on they'll tell you they already have it on.)

Best advice I have is to have an extra area on your sign in page in the summer for the parent to check off that they've sunscreaned their child, with signature. If they've forgotten, they can stop and do it right there. Make sure each child has their own bottle before summer starts. (provided by the parents - the stuff is expensive!)

[momma2girls]

DCM wanted me to put sunscreen on her son everyday. Even in the middle of winter. He is half black. :confused: I said no. In my handbook my policy states if you want your child to wear sunscreen, you need to put it on before they come. I only re-apply if necessary in extreme sun and water play.

Now they are asking me to add a vitamin pouch thing to his water everyday. It flavors his water. Looks like he is drinking Kool-aid. I said no. Its in my policies that no drink or food comes from home. The kids all make a fit when someone gets something special. They are not happy.

So, am I being to picky???

I have the exact thing in my contract for summer. I normally don't have any children for the summer, but just in case. I used to have 5 children in the summer, that I would have to apply it to. This took a lot of time, and one Dad actually complained that his daughter was really sunburned. I looked at her the next day, and it there wasn't anything on her at all. That is when I made the new rule!! Then I also do not have to keep 5 bottles of sunscreen for everyone as well.