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[Neonivek]

Never seen one before this thread, I should have been in one when I was young though :b

Also, don't America have kindergardens and afterschool activity places? Fritidshjem in danish, can't find a good translation, so I guess not.

Yes but people are afraid to let their children use them because they are made by pedofiles and the sandboxes are full of syringes and broken beer bottles.

[SalmonGod]

In America if you don't have a great network of helpful friends/family or considerable disposable income, you really have no options regarding child-care.  You're on your own.

My wife and I have no local family besides my siblings and parents, who are all either working or going to school full-time.  Our friends are almost all in their twenties and incredibly busy and/or have no experience with or can't stand kids.  We're living paycheck to paycheck.  Our oldest is diabetic.  We haven't been child-free for more than 8 hours in 6 years.  My mom or my oldest brother will occasionally (average three times a month, I'd say) babysit for a couple hours so we can watch a movie or something.  That's the best we get.

Edit:  And someone mentioned malls with free daycare centers or something like that.  I've never heard of such a thing.

[Neonivek]

Yes but people are afraid to let their children use them because they are made by pedofiles and the sandboxes are full of syringes and broken beer bottles.

You have no idea how many times my mom warned me about syringes and broken glass buried in the sand at parks.

You think I was joking?

Though I should have replaced Pedophile with Kidnapper. All the Kidnappers hang out in parks and give out drug laced candy if they don't just nab the children right there.

[Maggarg - Eater of chicke]

It's kinder than taping them to the garden gate, which is what I did to my brother once. He didn't mind too much.

[Funk]

i cant see a lot of times when you cant just keep hold of them, and it is so safe to let them run off on a leash.


 

[freeformschooler]

i cant see a lot of times when you cant just keep hold of them, and it is so safe to let them run off on a leash.

There are times, yes. One time when me and my little bro were toddlers, my dad had brought us along to help pick out a Christmas tree, like we did every year (me and my bro loved doing that back then). He was trying to talk to the Christmas tree salesman at the same time as keeping track of us, trying his best. But, unfortunately, within the span of several seconds, my bro darted off into the open road. He was less than 10 seconds from being run over when my dad thankfully found him, ran and grabbed him.

Not every parent would be as attentive as my dad, and my bro was 1 or just barely 2 at the time, too young to understand the repercussions of doing that. Fact is, as much as I cringe when I see a kid on my leash, for another kid in the same situation it very well could have save their life.

[RedKing]

Yeah, people don't realize that childcare is fucking EXPENSIVE. Our two are in daycare during the week so that my wife and I can both work. It's almost a wash to have dual incomes, because one of the incomes basically goes to pay for the daycare. My daughter is in Monday-Friday, my son is in Monday-Wednesday and I work crazyass hours so that I can have Thursday and Friday off to play Mr. Stay-At-Home-Dad. We do this so that we only pay $2000 a month instead of $2500 a month if he was in there a full 5-day week.

Once our daughter is in public school, it's going to be like having a giant payraise because we don't have to pay for it (other than through property taxes and whatnot, which we do already).

Tacking on $30/hour drop-in daycare on the weekends or something so that we can go shopping is just not happening. Especially when we *want* them to have the regular experience of going to a farmer's market or an outdoor concert or a festival.

[SalmonGod]

Especially when we *want* them to have the regular experience of going to a farmer's market or an outdoor concert or a festival.

Yeah, people don't take this into consideration either.  They think that kids should be kept out of public as much as possible until they're not kids anymore, when they'll magically have the knowledge of how to behave.  It doesn't work that way. 

Proper public behavior has to be learned like anything else.  Part of learning is making mistakes.

[Lysabild]

In Denmark, you can have your kid taken care of freely from the age of 0 to about 8-9, going like Vuggestue > Børnehave > Fritidshjem, rougly translated as Cradleroom, Kidsgarden, Freetimehome. Once the kid is 9 there's Freetimeclubs(Fritidsklub), which cost a maximum of 50$, a month, more usually something like 30$ I think.


Growing up like that, I can help but feel you guys are being tortured by your government somehow :/

[DJ]

Yeah, I don't get how it's so ridiculously expensive in USA.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

If your child is old enough to run away from you, they're old enough to be taught not to run away from you through reinforcement. If that doesn't work, just hold their hand and refuse to let go. You know, a method of restraint that doesn't involve treating them like a dog? Child leashes are sick, and I would classify them as child neglect. Child harnesses are only usable on infants and small toddlers due to size limitations, and that's alright since they can't walk on their own, or at least not enough to keep up with their parent.

Yeah, I don't get how it's so ridiculously expensive in USA.

Providing for one child and turning a profit is expensive, much less a whole group of children.

[Leafsnail]

My parents did fine without leashes, but I don't think they're very culturally acceptable over here.  I don't know, I feel like there's something kindof... cold about it, when compared to holding hands or using a pushchair or something.  It's specifically and only there to restrain rather than to provide support or transportation.

[SalmonGod]

infants and small toddlers due to size limitations, and that's alright since they can't walk on their own, or at least not enough to keep up with their parent.

You'd be surprised.  Yeah, they can't outrun you.  That doesn't mean it takes more than a couple seconds to disappear.  There's a decently long period somewhere between 2-4 years where they're quite capable of running and moving decent amounts of weight (my oldest could push/pull about 70 lbs over carpet at age 18-24 months), clever enough to problem solve their way out of or into things you wouldn't expect, and at the same time their psychology is nothing but raw emotional impulse.

I agree with you, but you have to be realistic at the same time.  No one's going to argue that, like Leafsnail says, parents have done without them.  That's just one consideration for a weighing of pros and cons.

Providing for one child and turning a profit is expensive, much less a whole group of children.

I imagine it's pretty easy when they're asking for over twice what most people make in hourly wages per child and they're usually watching multiple children at a time.

[GlyphGryph]

I don't hate them, but I think they can be prone to abuse, like many helpful parenting tools. I think its fine if used in limited situations, but as they say, when you have a hammer...

Anyways, mostly I wanted to comment on this:

which if you're trying to eat healthy by buying real food that isn't saturated with preservatives, means at least every other day

D:
How!? That doesn't even make any sense! When I was living off fresh only ingredients, for the month or two when I had both the time and the money to cook, I was still only shopping at most once a week.

Fruits easily last up to two weaks, especally if you buy at different variations of ripeness by planning ahead, grains last longer, green veggies last at least a week most of the time, root veggies significantly longer, nuts and rice and frozen veggies last practically forever. Eggs last a month, though what your best using them for varies as they age and sometimes they'll end up bought towards the end of that. Pickled stuff is fun to make and lasts months if not longer, cultured stuff holds for weeks to years with no problem if its kept in appropriate conditions... Where exactly are you getting this need to shop every other day?

Really, what food goes bad in a day?

[Jackrabbit]

Eh, I'm not against them, I just think they look weird. I wouldn't really use it after they were old enough to walk and then, what's the point of using one? But I'm not a parent so I'll accept that there are pretty good uses for it.

But just wait till they develop a Child Choke-chain.