It comes as no surprise to me that a male nanny is up for the childcare industry's biggest gong. Like Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow, Jemima Khan and Britney Spears, who all have given birth to boys and pretty quickly hired mannies, I've known that males make the best nannies for years.
No disrespect to the many girls (or, as we must call them, "childcare providers") who have cried themselves to sleep in my spare bedroom and endured the many privations of my home (including sharing a nursery bathroom with boys who rarely point Percy at the porcelain). I still exchange Christmas cards with some (I had 19 nannies and au pairs including a Moldovan housekeeper-cum-prostitute before I stopping counting) and am Facebook friends with others but the truth is, I haven't even considered hiring a girl for years. I am unashamedly the opposite of a friendly, inclusive employer.
The only sort of person I usually consider is a twentysomething Aussie or Kiwi male. Kris Pohl, 46, the man who is up for Professional Nanny of the Year, and who lives in Kentish Town but cares for a toddler in Wandsworth, is actually from Michigan. I've had a brilliant British manny called Guy for a few weeks and I am therefore prepared to accept that despite being a middle-aged Midwesterner rather than young and Antipodean, Kris Pohl is worth his weight in gold.
"When I first started 20 years ago there was no such thing as a 'manny'," says Kris. "But I'm very proud and confident of my role and to be able to say at a north London dinner party, 'I'm a nanny'. (Like actresses who take themselves very seriously and call themselves "actors", career mannies such as Kris prefer to be called nannies.) "Being one of the very few can be ego-affirming."
You tell em, Kris! It's time more parents realised what a fantastic job men do looking after children, and it's about time more young men considered becoming mannies. Only five per cent of 115,000 full-time nannies are mannies and trust me - it's not enough.
It's not just about providing "strong male role models" and all that, young men just get on with it without complaint or atmosphere and without any reference to their moon cycles at all, and more mothers are taking note. As childcare agencies My Big Buddy.com and www.tinies.com confirm, demand for mannies is outstripping supply, with parents even seeking mannies for daughters as well as sons.
For my part, I absolutely love the fact that I have under my command an unflappable, energetic young man who replies "no wucking furries, mate" when I ask him to take the boys to buy trainers at Westfield, followed by tennis and swimming, and who then happily submits to hours of "rough-housing" in the garden. You can ask mannies to do anything, and the bliss of it is they just do, without giving the dark look that says, "Taking the dog out is not in my job description".
The more you ask of mannies, the happier they appear to be. OK, they may not wipe the milk bottle's bottom before replacing it in the fridge but who cares? When I come home the house may not be in 100 per cent apple-pie order but my children are smiling. My last incumbent, Guy, never baulked at anything: he did dinner parties and dog-walks, shopping, football. In fact, after only a week in my house, my youngest son was calling him Mummy, and had appeared to have forgotten I ever existed.
Rachel Johnson is editor of The Lady magazine.
September 9, 2009
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When it comes to childcare, I prefer the PARENT
I literally just finished a year long au-pair/manny stay with a family in The Netherlands. I was living in The Netherlands to finish my masters degree. As a 24 year old American needing to find a job in 3 months before moving from one country to the other is IMPOSSIBLE. Thus, a friend of mine recommended looking into this au pair thing. I did, and sure enough, within ONE DAY I was contacted by at least 4 families. One of which, is the family I eventually did my stay with.
The first month started off great, but as time went on....I realized that I was doing most the things a PARENT should do. I realize I was hired for a purpose...but there comes a point when either of the parents should have stepped up. However, esp. in the town I was living, au pairs are common, and therefore, families grow more than addicted to them...BUT...literally rely on them for any order or sustainability in their homes. It came down to the point where the children, 12, 10 and 8 years old would come to me for advice or even to ask if they could go to a friends house etc....WHILE THE PARENTS WERE SITTING THERE!!!!
O.k. you might think this is a one in a million case or that I am venting. I wish I could say that. Being an au pair of course I met many others, esp. through taking Dutch language courses. We all had the same stories. Yes I was the only male and yes I can say for a fact that when I was asked to do a number of things back-to-back I bit my tongue and gladly did them...FOR THE KIDS!!! But that did not mean I was happy or had no "words" running through my mind.
The men you hire are MEN, we don't normally share our emotions or publicize them. You have no idea how many times I would Skype with my friends and family and say exactly what was going on. How I almost felt sorry for the family. I am one of three boys raised by a single mother...so how can two parents with a maid, an au pair and constant family support (as the grandmother came every Monday to help out) be so desperate, ungrateful and unkind to their help?
What got me and still gets me the most with the whole au-pair nanny experience, is how they are treated by the host parents. Literally...as the days tick on they are taken advantage of. What are we supposed to do, if we live with our employer, get paid by our employer...tell him/her NO!!! No, I am not going to go play with your son for 3 hours and then be expected to come back and do the dishes...UHM>>>excuse me, how awkward would that be?
Anyways....why then did I stick around for a year. Well, simply b/c I had to. Without a job I would have had to leave the country and would not have been able to finish my research...PLUS for the kids. I loved the kids and still keep in contact with them. Of course I am cordial need I speak with the 'ouders' but not my preference.
I say this to not falsify the experiences you speak about, but simply say that there are two sides to this experience as well, YES even for men. Perhaps it simply comes down to personalities and the clicks that can occur or NOT.
My conclusion: Men do make good child-caretakers of course! Would I say they are any better than girls, NO! Different yes! But again, this all relies on the personality of the aupair and the parents and children of the house they are at.
Travis Rice
Amsterdam International Community School