Infant care arrangements other than ifc, relatives or helper

Question

I’m writing to seek some advice. My 9 month old kid is currently attending an infant care centre near my place. The school has frequent cases of HFMD and conjunctivitis, despite their best efforts to step up their hygiene. In the 5 months I’ve been sending my kid to infant care, there has been 3 times they’ve rejected my kid for getting spots, as they’re worried about potential HFMD. When I bring my kid to the doctor, they’ll just say that it doesn’t look like it yet, but instruct me to bring him back in 5 days time to check further. But in these 5 days, he can’t go to school because he’s being treated as potential HFMD. 5 days x 3 times = 15 days of no school. This is just a prominent one. There are also some when he just has runny nose when he’s cold and I’m also being asked to bring him home. In the past week, this has been a breakdown of what happened: Thursday: greenish mucus and sent back home after 1 hour (makes sense, this is ok) Friday: potential red spots, rejected immediately at drop off Monday: went polyclinic and found a nice doctor who said nope, just sensitive skin. Not hfmd and issued a memo saying as such and kid could go back ifc on the day itself. Tuesday: eyes having greenish discharge, looks like conjunctivitis, to bring to doctor on Thursday to check and get a memo if all ok. I’m a teacher in a secondary school and it is impossible to work from home. My husband is the same, he doesn’t have flexible working hours. We have limited leave days to take. Other than getting a maid, or getting the help of relatives (they live very far away), could you share if you went through something similar, and how you solved your problems? TIA!

LB · Answer

My kid fell sick so often (once every 2,3 weeks), and it was really disruptive to our work, so we ended up hiring a helper, plus send the kid to ifc coz I didn't want to let the helper tc of the kid full time. That costs more, but at least he's able to learn some skills and be exposed to other people, and when he falls sick, the helper would take care. Sorry, I can't think of other ways around this alrdy.