Children, parents and their caregivers
Dérahonon Djédjé is a seasoned nanny with over twenty years of experience in getting children to eat their vegetables. She is the author of Babysitter Log and Senior Caregiver Log. We Are Vegetables, Who Wants To Eat Us? is her first book and will be followed up by Why They Call Me Black, Grandma? I Am Brown and Orange-Green Bird, Where Have You Been? She currently lives New York.
The people who are most afraid of vacations are nannies and housekeepers, whose employers leave for several weeks at a time and don’t give them paid vacation.
If there are a few nannies who don’t get paid during vacation, the majority of housekeepers in many cases do not get anything from their employers, especially the ones who work once a week or every other week.
Since they clean for many families, every summer, most of them lose anything from two weeks’ to two months’ salary. What is more upsetting is that for security purposes, most employers don’t even bother to tell them the days they will be gone, which prevents housekeepers from planning their own vacations or finding other employment.
If you read this blog, please give something to your housekeeper or at least let him/her know one month in advance when you are leaving for vacation and are not going to pay her.
You can go and have fun with your family, which is normal! You deserve it after working hard year-round, but your nanny and housekeeper deserve it too.
I wish you all a wonderful and peaceful day