When our first child arrived, daughter Clara,  I was lucky to be a stay at home mum until she was 1.5 years old. It was a natural thing for me to do as the norm back in the Czech Republic was to stay at home and look after a child for 3-4 years. I was young, had no serious career behind me and no clear picture of one ahead of me and therefore there was not too much to think about when deciding about staying at home and looking after my own child. However that time in Ireland the official maternity leave was about three months and I was quite surprised to find out that many women had to return to work after the three months were up, otherwise they may loose their job.

It was a ‘funny peculiar’ thing when I decided to join a full-time employment work force because in Ireland I was considered very lucky to have been able to spend 1.5 year with my child while back in my native country I was frowned upon as an irresponsible mother for voluntarily terminating the time of minding my own child!  The reality was that I had to go back to work to earn a living and also to stimulate my mind that was somehow less active and focused mostly on feeding times, nappy changing times and trying to get some sleep times! I was craving adult’s company, especially I did not have that many friends in Cork then. We have found a local childminder, a lovely lady in her late 40s with older children, for 3 full days a week. It took our daughter 3 weeks to settle in as she was used to being with me all the time. The minder has told me during the week 4 that should the crying have continued also that week, she was not sure if she could continue looking after our daughter. Thank goodness Clara was great from the 4^th week on!

We have not considered au pair as an option of affordable and suitable child care because the house we lived was too small. Every au pair is entitled to a private, clean, bright and warm bedroom and nobody should even consider having an au pair unless they can provide these basics for them.

Once Clara reached 2 years of age, we moved house and she has started attending a full time crèche (4 days a week) till the time she started school (she was almost 5 years old then). The crèche was relatively expensive but since she was our only child, it did not take more than half of my monthly income and therefore it made sense for me to keep working (to earn money of course but also because I really enjoyed what I was doing). The care they provided in the crèche was excellent and Clara continued to attend the afterschool that they run as part of their operations once she started school. She is a very sociable child and we believed then and now, that she has benefited from this type of care.  It seemed to suit her personality and she also had opportunity to socialise with children of her age. When baby number two arrived, seven years later, things were very different!

Photo by Jana Rabenhauptova

I did return to Cork the following summer but not as an au pair as I could only spend two months there and that was not enough time to commit to a family as an au pair. I believe that 3 months are really the minimum a person should stay as au pair so the children and the family and the au pair herself/himself can build up rapport and relationship.

The family I au paired for the previous summer had a new au pair but they kindly allowed me to stay with them free of charge while I worked in a local guesthouse. I don’t think I have ever really thanked them enough for putting me up that summer. I should send them a card all these years later and tell them how I appreciated it and what a great help it was to a penniless student from Eastern Europe.

That summer I met a lovely Irish man and we could leave it here by saying ‘…and the rest is history’ but let’s rather say ‘…and the rest is the start of a second part of my journey through the au pair world’. I have returned to Cork again the following summer after finishing my university master degree and stayed till today.