I have been a day care worker in an infant center, a preschool teacher, and a private nanny before getting married, having my own children and deciding to take on a new role as wife and mother.  I want to address all of the working mothers, working pregnant women and those considering having children in the future, because I'll tell them what none of their friends will.

I do not love your children.  That's right.  As much as you would like to think I love them and treat them as my own, the reality is I CANNOT love your children. I did not give birth to them.  I did not bond with them.  I am doing a job for a paycheck.  I enjoy working with, interacting with and helping children, but I do not love them.  I like them a lot.  I care for them.  I tend to their needs, and because I am one of the good ones, I will show them loving gestures, like big bear hugs, holding hands, and picking them up throughout the day.  What I won't do is look lovingly into their eyes while feeding them their bottle, or putting them to my breast so they can feel my warmth, smell my skin and hear my heartbeat.  In fact, when I leave your home or that daycare center, I won't even think about your child until I see them the next day.  Your children are not mine.  They are yours.  When they fall, they call for you.  When they are sad, they cry for you.  They ask for you, and they get me - because you aren't there.  They need you throughout the day.  Not because I'm not tending to their needs but because they have a biological need and an emotional want to be with their mother.  

If you're looking for someone who will treat your child like their own and someone who will give your child a loving mother's care, look in the mirror.  Don't listen to people who tell you to go against your instinct.  I'm someone who has spent years taking care of other people's children and I did a great job, but all of my experience and all of my dedication couldn't hold a candle to the love and care that I put into raising my own children.  Don't fool yourself into thinking I could possibly love your children the way I love my own.  It couldn't even come close.

The Nanny