u/FoundationSudden9398

We had the 1-on-1 with our nanny and the agency after the original incidents. For now, our current nanny is staying with us for about another month, but there have been more issues since then and I’m trying to get perspective.

The main concern is still our 5-year-old. Since my original post, he has continued putting his hands on the nanny. Another incident was that he took the lunch she brought from home and dumped it, along with her iced coffee, because she told him he couldn’t hit his sister. This has happened on several occasions.

We also hired a second nanny, and she quit on day 2 and reported the situation to the agency.

Our current nanny has responded by becoming much stricter and more structured with all 4 kids. She does a morning huddle every day where she goes over the same rules and expectations. She has them following a visual schedule. She has cut screen time down to almost nothing, except for a few approved low-stimulation or educational movies.

She is also using age-based timeouts. She has asked us not to intervene when the kids scream, bang, or call for us during timeouts/consequences, because she says it teaches them that escalating will get us to override her. We have caved a few times, and I know that probably makes consistency worse.

She gives timeouts for aggression, but also for things like saying “I hate you,” talking back to adults, or being disrespectful to her or to each other. She also takes toys away for the rest of the day when they are thrown, fought over, or used unsafely.

One example: our 5-year-old didn’t listen twice while riding his bike in the street, then stormed off and biked home. She took the bike away for the rest of the day. I can see that it was safety-related, but in the context of everything else, it felt like another full-day consequence.

She also tries to keep the kids outside of the house from about 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., aside from lunch, bathroom breaks, and necessary breaks and also a 2 hour nap they’ve been refusing.

This is where I’m torn. I know the aggression, unsafe behavior, retaliation, and disrespect toward the nanny are serious. I know we need to back her up more and stop undermining consequences. I also understand why she feels she needs very firm structure after being hit, having things thrown, and having her belongings dumped.

But I also feel like some of this may be too much all at once: mostly outside all day, skipped naps/rest, frequent timeouts for talking back or saying “I hate you,” full-day removal of toys/bikes, and being told not to intervene when they are screaming or banging.

So I’m asking honestly: given the behavior from our 5-year-old and the fact that a second nanny quit on day 2 and reported us to the agency, is our current nanny being unreasonable? Or are we still underreacting and this level of structure/consequence is what’s needed right now?

Cross posting here willing to take advice from all!

We had the 1-on-1 with our nanny and the agency after the original incidents. For now, our current nanny is staying with us for about another month, but there have been more issues since then and I’m trying to get perspective.

The main concern is still our 5-year-old. Since my original post, he has continued putting his hands on the nanny. Another incident was that he took the lunch she brought from home and dumped it, along with her iced coffee, because she told him he couldn’t hit his sister. This has happened on several occasions.

We also hired a second nanny, and she quit on day 2 and reported the situation to the agency.

Our current nanny has responded by becoming much stricter and more structured with all 4 kids. She does a morning huddle every day where she goes over the same rules and expectations. She has them following a visual schedule. She has cut screen time down to almost nothing, except for a few approved low-stimulation or educational movies.

She is also using age-based timeouts. She has asked us not to intervene when the kids scream, bang, or call for us during timeouts/consequences, because she says it teaches them that escalating will get us to override her. We have caved a few times, and I know that probably makes consistency worse.

She gives timeouts for aggression, but also for things like saying “I hate you,” talking back to adults, or being disrespectful to her or to each other. She also takes toys away for the rest of the day when they are thrown, fought over, or used unsafely.

One example: our 5-year-old didn’t listen twice while riding his bike in the street, then stormed off and biked home. She took the bike away for the rest of the day. I can see that it was safety-related, but in the context of everything else, it felt like another full-day consequence.

She also tries to keep the kids outside of the house from about 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., aside from lunch, bathroom breaks, and necessary breaks and also a 2 hour nap they’ve been refusing.

This is where I’m torn. I know the aggression, unsafe behavior, retaliation, and disrespect toward the nanny are serious. I know we need to back her up more and stop undermining consequences. I also understand why she feels she needs very firm structure after being hit, having things thrown, and having her belongings dumped.

But I also feel like some of this may be too much all at once: mostly outside all day, skipped naps/rest, frequent timeouts for talking back or saying “I hate you,” full-day removal of toys/bikes, and being told not to intervene when they are screaming or banging.

So I’m asking honestly: given the behavior from our 5-year-old and the fact that a second nanny quit on day 2 and reported us to the agency, is our current nanny being unreasonable? Or are we still underreacting and this level of structure/consequence is what’s needed right now?