As a single father I often find it difficult to trust family members. You always hear stories about family members doing things to children and the statistics show that the vast majority of children who are assaulted are assaulted by somebody who is a family member or acquaintance. I am finding it difficult to reconcile that statistic with trying to find somebody to watch the kids.
Trusting Family to Watch the Kids
- Thread starter 2andalone
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FatherYoung
New Member
Well, I don't know about that... What family members are you talking about? In my family, we have complete trust in each other, and are quite close. I would never imagine my cousins or my sister-in-law doing anything bad to my children. As far as acquaintances are concerned, I agree that it is not advisable to let them watch the kids.
Independent
New Member
As a single dad, I feel that I have to trust my family members to help me. There is no way I could work if I did not have help with the kids. I have a close family, and I trust them all.
JenVarsity
New Member
We do not put our daughter with many in the family. Especially because of the reason mentioned. There is so much unearthed past on my fiances side, the rumors are horrifying, and my sister has her fair share of hellions on my side. While I would trust my parents, his parents, and a few immediate siblings (and there are 4 each on either side) - the rest we would not trust at all. We would prefer to find daycare or a friend that takes our daughter to a public place.
polamalu43
New Member
I'm not a single dad but I don't have any problem with any family members. I would allow any of my cousins (family), parents, brothers or sisters to watch my kids. My kids actually spend a lot of time with our family.
While I don't suspect any of my cousins or other family members being capable of doing any harm to the children, we still select only the most trustworthy ones to leave them alone with. Why take a chance? My wife is more protective than I am. Our grandson is twelve, and she still stands outside the restroom door when he's in a public restroom. She'd go in if she could.
I understand your concern, it's very haunting to remember those things you hear about in the news. But family is always supposed to be the best support you can have in this world and you have to trust them. I think the only bar of measure you can truly make is if you had a good time growing up with them, then you can rest easy that they will treat your son the same way.
I'm fortunate to say that I don't have issues with leaving the kids with a family member, like my Mom, sister or any of my in-laws. I am fully confident that they will watch over my kids well. Why do I know this? Because there are many times in the past that we have asked them to babysit for all of our five kids and thankfully, nothing bad of some sort happened. You would know if your kids wouldn't want to be left with someone - even a family member - because they would whine and beg for you not to leave them.
I suggest that if you really need to leave your kids in the care of a family member, make sure you know that relative well. However if you still feel uneasy about it, you can always pay a professional to babysit.
I suggest that if you really need to leave your kids in the care of a family member, make sure you know that relative well. However if you still feel uneasy about it, you can always pay a professional to babysit.
I think all parents, regardless of whether they are single, married, divorced or widowed, having issues trusting other people with their children. If you don't feel you can trust someone, you shouldn't leave your children with them, regardless of if or how they are related to you. However, grandparents are usually a good option (if they are willing) because you can base how they'll treat your kids on how they treated you growing up.
watching the children
Having a hard time finding, or should I say trusting family members to watch the kids? Wow, that's scary when you think about it. It's sad when we come to a point in our society wherein we are afraid to allow family members to watch our kids for fears of improprieties being committed. It used to be that family was the most trusted people you could rely on for anything, but that a family member could ever turn on his own family and betray their trust to do such an evil and despicable act is beyond words. I just hope you can find trustworthy family to be the kind of stand-up people they are supposed to be for this and other situations where you should be able to rely on them. It is incomprehensible to me to even think there are such sick people out there. I know if anyone ever hurt of voilated my family in any way, there would be no place on earth where they would be safe from me.
Having a hard time finding, or should I say trusting family members to watch the kids? Wow, that's scary when you think about it. It's sad when we come to a point in our society wherein we are afraid to allow family members to watch our kids for fears of improprieties being committed. It used to be that family was the most trusted people you could rely on for anything, but that a family member could ever turn on his own family and betray their trust to do such an evil and despicable act is beyond words. I just hope you can find trustworthy family to be the kind of stand-up people they are supposed to be for this and other situations where you should be able to rely on them. It is incomprehensible to me to even think there are such sick people out there. I know if anyone ever hurt of voilated my family in any way, there would be no place on earth where they would be safe from me.
It's very difficult to trust anybody in the society we live in today. Even when we trust someone there's still a risk of something happening. I'd say talk to your kid if he/she is old enough to talk so what's going on when they visit those family members...get your kids opinion, it matters. Even a small child knows whether he or she is being treated properly. If they ever decline to go with someone, don't send them.
Other than using you're own judgment and talking to your kid, all you can do is pray about it.
Other than using you're own judgment and talking to your kid, all you can do is pray about it.
joeldgreat
New Member
Does the statistics also shows how many people (not from your family, relatives nor friends) were treating badly to someone else child? I'm sure it would be much higher than what you had expected. Though maltreatment amongst children by their own relatives are getting higher, I think it would still be wise to entrust our kids to a relative rather than to people whom we don't really know their background. We do have a close inter-family relationships with our relatives, so I could only speak for my own experience to it.
Ownageprankers
New Member
Well, I don't know about that... What family members are you talking about? In my family, we have complete trust in each other, and are quite close. I would never imagine my cousins or my sister-in-law doing anything bad to my children. As far as acquaintances are concerned, I agree that it is not advisable to let them watch the kids.
I understand your concern, it's very haunting to remember those things you hear about in the news. But family is always supposed to be the best support you can have in this world and you have to trust them. I think the only bar of measure you can truly make is if you had a good time growing up with them, then you can rest easy that they will treat your son the same way.
I understand your concern, it's very haunting to remember those things you hear about in the news. But family is always supposed to be the best support you can have in this world and you have to trust them. I think the only bar of measure you can truly make is if you had a good time growing up with them, then you can rest easy that they will treat your son the same way.
flfsurveyor
New Member
If one could not trust family members them whom could you trust? If you could trust paid service providers (as in baby-sitters) who are strangers to take care of your children, i find no reason why you'd have concerns trusting relatives.
As an earlier posted said, I never had issues with leaving my children with relatives. They willingly did it and in fact the kids wouldn't want to go home when i came to pick them up.
As an earlier posted said, I never had issues with leaving my children with relatives. They willingly did it and in fact the kids wouldn't want to go home when i came to pick them up.
joeldgreat
New Member
We live in a country where there is a very strong family ties. Parents living with their children and adult children still living with their parents. I don't think that this statistics applies to our country since many of us still preferred our relatives to take care of our babies when where not home.