Nanny Cold War: The Over/Under

Back in November, I wrote about what an absolutely gigantic pain in the ass it was to secure good, reliable child care. Looking back, it's amazing to think that it took us another month after that post to finally find long-term childcare. A brief summary is below:
  • November 17: Find out that our daycare has revoked our part-time spot.
  • November 21: Commence nanny interviews
  • November 23: Make an offer to a lovely Italian nanny. Feel pleased about the choice. 
  • November 24: Nanny accepts our offer; we send her the contract and employment forms.
  • December 2, 11am: Less than 24 hours before nanny is due to start, she calls to inform us that she has accepted another position.
  • December 2, 11:02am: Laugh/cry/curse the gods over the fucking nanny. 
  • December 2, 11:03am: Immediately email second choice nanny candidate, beg her to take the job. Learn that she has accepted another position, but mercifully can cover us for the month of December. 
  • December 5: Commence second round of nanny interviews
  • December 7: Make an offer to another nanny
  • December 8: Offer is accepted and contract is signed. 
  • January 2: Nanny starts... yay!
During this time, while I was mired in the chaos of trying to secure child care, there were a number of things that I didn't really think too hard about. Like the fact that having a nanny meant that some other woman was going to spend all day, every day, taking care of my child. In my house. I mean, I get that that is the point of having a nanny, but when it's actually happening, it's hard not to feel a little strange about the extent to which you are actually outsourcing your life.

The funny thing is that, six weeks into this arrangement, the things I thought would kill me are not at all the things that are actually killing me. Sure, some other woman spends all day with my kid, but it's abundantly clear that Avery knows who mom and dad are, and prefers us to everyone else by a country mile.  Yes, she loves the nanny, but she lunges for me when I get home at night. As long as that continues, I can deal with the "spends all day with my child" part. 

What is actually killing me is the "in my house" part. Why? Because the nanny is fucking with my toilet paper.

Mark and I are "over" people. We always have been. Why? Because this is objectively the correct way to use toilet paper. Seriously. Go ask the Internet.


The nanny, however, has not gotten wise to the correct way to put on the toilet paper roll. Every few days, I find myself confronted with an "under" roll in my main floor bathroom. Every time, I feel a tiny bit of rage. I'm now starting to wonder if she is actually switching the orientation of the roll in-between changes because of her crazy, backwards toilet paper preferences. 

What to do in this situation? Nothing. There is nothing to be done. I can't be that terrible psycho mom-ployer who nitpicks over things like the orientation of the toilet roll. There will be no conversations or leaving of notes or emails because I refuse to be an asshole over this. In the sane, normal part of my brain, I understand that the orientation of the toilet paper is not worth one iota of drama, even though in the recesses of my highly reactive lizard brain I nearly lose my shit every time I see this (yes, pun intended). 

So where do we go from here? Nowhere. There is nothing to be done but to continue the passive-aggressive cold war, swapping the orientation back and forth, back and forth, until this nanny no longer nannies for us. 

The road is rough, my friends. The road is rough. 


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