Eingewöhnung, or the daycare adaptation period
That raising a kid in Bavaria is fantastic is a well-know undeniable fact, but it definitely has its caveats. Starting off with the most obvious, being that with so many benefits (a cool year of partially paid maternity leave, “family money” paid by the government, almost full coverage of pregnancy and birth-related costs by your public health insurance, to name a few) people are bound to want to start and expand their families.
However, there is simply no room for all these kids at the nursery; so although a daycare spot is your right as a taxpayer in Germany, the reality tends to be different. The real options*, we have sorely learned, are: 1. Settle for something, errm, “less” than what you would like for your kid; 2. Become a stay-at-home parent (most likely mom) until your kid is old enough for Kindergarten; 3. Pay a ridiculous amount for a spot at a private, non-state subsidized daycare. We opted for the latter.
*For foreigners who live in the city center and learned about Kita Finder+ a little late, at least.
Wichtel Akademie is not only a wonderful nursery - it is also, most importantly, the only one that got back to us after close to a year of anxiously sitting on literally dozens of waiting lists, with no luck. And if we could, we would happily pay for S to continue attending it. As it happens, paying monthly 855 euros for up to 6h/day (1400 euros for full-time care!) is out of our financial scope. So he’ll be there for 3 months only, i.e. until mama goes back on maternity leave. We are hoping to find another spot at a daycare somewhere closer to us geographically and financially by January, but for now we have nothing but fingers crossed.
Anyhow, this is all just an introduction to the real topic of this post: the Eingewöhnung.
Let me start off by saying that I’m just happy we’re at the other end of the adaptation period by now. I tried to read up on the topic as much as I could beforehand in order to set the right expectations, but I kept on stumbling upon one annoying truth: it depends entirely on the kid, and there’s no way of really knowing how it will go in advance.
S is pretty detached from us on a daily basis, and since both of us have gone back to work for a few months already (he had been staying with my godmother), I assumed that it would be fine. That’s the issue, though - I could only assume. The instructor at the daycare said it could take anywhere from 8 to 12 weeks (!!). However, based on my motherly assumption, I decided to take “only” 3 weeks off work to accompany S during this period, obviously expecting, praying and hoping for the best.
Before I go on to describe how the weeks went, bear in mind that this is based solely on our experience. I know that different adaptation methods are used at different nurseries, but I am not a professional and S has only been to this one daycare so far, so all I can attest is what we, as a family, have gone through. Please keep that in mind, along with the fact that, obviously, every kid is different.
Week 1
The first week at the first daycare is a big question mark.
Everyone is learning. Your kid is learning to be around other kids, you’re learning to keep away from your kid and let him explore, the caretakers are learning about what’s ok or not for your kid.
With so much learning taking place, it can be utterly frustrating for one as a parent to stay there for a single hour at a time. To top it off, we missed two days due to a public holiday and a last-minute family trip. So after 3 days of sitting there for an hour at a time, anxiety started to consume me, as I wondered whether I’d be able to make it back to work in 3 weeks after all.
Week 2
That’s when it started getting interesting, as I was finally able to step outside for 15-minute increments (15 minutes the first day, 30 minutes the next and so on). S was NOT having it the second day, and part of me was moved by such a display of attention from a baby who is normally quite independent. But then we figured out he was just hungry; every morning since, the caretaker offered him a piece of bread right away and he almost instantly forgot all about me.
By the end of the week, he was at last able to stay a whole hour without me in the room - but I still wondered whether it was realistic to expect this one hour to turn into six by the end of the following week.
Week 3
As I arrived to drop him off on Monday morning, the caretaker announced that she wouldn’t be there for the next two days due a training she was attending, and that therefore I couldn’t bring him in. I nearly lost it. Some of my immediate thoughts (which I translated into a “polite concerned” tone before expressing them to the caretaker in question):
Can’t he just stay with another caretaker??
Couldn’t you have told me this sooner? That means I can’t go back to work next week!!
But we’re paying (a lot) for those days!*
*They promptly reimbursed us for those days after I wrote them a lengthy email.
Alas, the Eingewöhnung, such as most things, is taken very seriously in Germany. He couldn’t in fact stay with another caretaker because he was bonding with this one. It’s very important that he feels comfortable and safe there, and she had become the embodiment of that during his adaptation period. I understand this - but I also can’t help but think that other countries must have a very different (perhaps more abrupt) approach.
When I told her I was concerned about going back to work, she cooly reminded me that it could’ve taken 8 weeks or more and that S was doing exceptionally well at adapting. “Maybe you can delay your return by a day or two, or arrive late”, she very politely suggested. While I am indeed fortunate enough to be employed at a very flexible workplace, I couldn’t help but think “how is this ok?”. How can I be expected to take unpaid time off for 8 weeks or more, or to tell my manager I can’t come in because S’s caretaker had a training to do? I certainly can’t imagine this happening in Brazil or the US (where a 3-month leave is already a luxury), or even in France.
I’m aware that in Germany a lot of women - that is the reality - postpone their return to work from leave until their kid is well-adapted at a nursery. Which is ok, if you can afford it. I, too, could have asked to extend my leave, but that extension would have been unpaid - a luxury we simply cannot afford given the price of the daycare. So how does one solve this? Legitimate question.
Conclusion
For us, it fortunately worked out in the end because A. S is an exceptionally easygoing baby and pretty content as long as he has food and B. Yann-Yves has a flexible schedule that allowed him to accompany S on the two days after I’d gone back to work. So all in all, 3 weeks were in fact enough for us, had it not been the few setbacks.
But as someone who goes about life with a very organized, planned-ahead mindset, the adaptation period left me somewhat exhausted. Not knowing when I’d be able to resume working (and whether I’d have to be that person who postpones work because of this reason) was hard; feeling like I was failing to respect my son’s own time to adapt was harder. S doesn’t care about my responsibilities or expectations - and why should he, when he’s my number 1 priority? This, I guess, is undoubtedly what parenting is about.
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Fellow parents out there, how did you deal with this adaptation period? Is the approach any different where you live? I’m eager to hear your thoughts!
