Boundaries Boundaries Boundaries

🎙️  Boundaries in Childcare

Jessica and Katy dive into the importance of setting and maintaining healthy boundaries in childcare. From parent communication and staff relationships to work-life balance and professional expectations, they discuss why boundaries are essential for creating a respectful and successful environment.

They share real-life experiences, challenges providers often face, and practical strategies for communicating expectations clearly while still building strong relationships with families and staff. This episode highlights how healthy boundaries can help reduce burnout, improve workplace culture, and support long-term success in the childcare industry.

Whether you’re a teacher, director, owner, or parent, this conversation offers valuable insight into one of the most important — and sometimes most difficult — parts of childcare leadership. 💡✨

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:13

Hey everybody, welcome to Childcare Confidential. We like to dance a little in the background, you know, while we're getting ready for the fun podcast we are about to tell you about. But first, I'm Jessica Hampton and I am one of your co-hosts with the lovely Katie Dang. Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Hi. All right. Hello, everyone, and welcome back. We are actually together today, which we don't always get to do, but when we do, we celebrate. So snaps all around for that, I think. Um, today's episode, this one is personal, um, more so for me than just, and we will tell you why, you know, later on. Um, but it is personal. This is the episode that I think so many childcare providers, teachers, directors, assistant directors, assistant teachers, floaters, and actually probably everybody in ECE desperately needs to hear. Because today we're just talking about boundaries. The B word.

SPEAKER_02 1:14

Boundaries. What's that?

SPEAKER_01 1:16

I know, I know. But more specifically, we're talking about why childcare providers are not, not, in all caps, doormats. We are not. And why having boundaries isn't actually selfish. It's not rude. It's not poor customer service, it's not being difficult, it's necessary.

unknown 1:36

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 1:37

And honestly, I think this field has normalized self-sacrificed to such an unhealthy degree that most people almost feel guilty for protecting themselves when it matters, which is crazy to me. Um, we have somehow created this expectation that if you really care about these kiddos, that you should work place, skip your breaks, answer the messages after hours, answer and accept disrespect from families and parents. Uh no. Ignore your own mental health, which Jess is a huge advocate against doing. Don't ignore your mental health. No. Overextend yourself constantly, but while we're at it, let's smile while we do it. No. And if you don't, then suddenly you're just not passionate enough about these kiddos and which we're supposed to be teaching. And I need us to talk about that. Because passion shouldn't require self-destruction, especially not to ourselves. And I think there's so many educators that quietly are drowning right now because they were taught that saying no makes them a bad educator. So today we're going to unpack it. All of it. The guilt, the burnout, the parent pressure, the unrealistic expectations, the emotional toll and labor that it takes on you, and why boundaries are actually one of the healthiest things you can have if you're in this field. So this episode is for you, if you're listening.

SPEAKER_02 3:06

Absolutely. I want to start with this. Child care providers are caregivers. Somewhere along the way, society started treating child care providers and caregivers like they are endlessly available emotional support humans with no real limits. I am sure you have been there. I know I have been there. Um, the expectations in this field have become just unreal. They're not realistic for us. No, they're not. You're expected to teach clean comfort, document, document, document, stay it again, sanitize, sanitize, sanitize, plan curriculum, manage behaviors, and there are a lot of behaviors these days, support families, oh, all while you know, meeting licensing requirements, maintaining ratios, handling emotional crisis left and right. Yes, communicating professionally, of course. Of course, and somehow, somehow, some way we are to remain calm and smile like everything is always okay.

SPEAKER_01 4:28

It's always okay.

SPEAKER_02 4:30

And I never say that's too much. But why? Why are child care providers expected to absorb everything? And honestly, I think a lot of it comes from the fact that childcare is such a deep emotional work.

SPEAKER_01 4:51

Yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_02 4:53

I mean, we're passionate about what we do, that's why we do it. That's huge. And it it matters. What we do, it matters. But somewhere along the line, supporting families has turned into accepting mistreatment from families and sometimes employees, being constantly accessible, sacrificing our own well-being. And trust me, I have been there. Stress can do a number on your mental and your physical health. It's crazy, and all of those things are not the same thing.

SPEAKER_01 5:46

No, they're not.

SPEAKER_02 5:47

It's not. We can't be accepting mistreatment. And we cannot constantly be accessible if we also want to be accessible for our families.

SPEAKER_01 5:59

Yeah, no, I couldn't families. Right. I couldn't agree more. But before I dive into like boundaries as a whole in childcare, Jess, I know that you don't super love to do it, but I do think it's super important that you should kind of explain a little bit because I feel like you sacrificed your own well-being and your own mental health so much within the last couple years that it really did take a toll until you finally started setting these boundaries and helping yourself. But you are a very successful human, obviously. You run fantastic childcare centers with beautiful teachers, beautiful everything, which is great.

unknown 6:38

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 6:38

But I also think yeah, I think it's important for you to share a little bit of what that looked like for you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Yeah, I can do that. Um, so for those of you that don't know me very well or don't know kind of the things that I have been through in the last couple of years, obviously we were all essential during COVID. Um, and right? I put the quotes there for you. I don't know what's happened since, but we were all essential during COVID. And you know, you're going to work at 5 a.m. and nobody was on the road. No, that was beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 7:13

No construction at that time either.

SPEAKER_02 7:14

So however, during the process, I was overstressed. I was breaking out in stress rashes. Um what they are deciding to call long COVID was a high white blood count for years. I had gained a lot of weight. Um, I mentally couldn't sleep at night. There were nights I just didn't sleep at all. Um, and we we I we can't do this to ourselves. No, I was killing myself day by day from the stress of everything that was happening at the school, everything that was happening in all of my staff's individual lives. My phone was always on. I had kids that were, you know, graduating high school and college and doing other things that I was trying to be there for, trying to be there for my husband, and everybody. But who I wasn't trying to be there for was me. Yeah, and it took a toll. So this year um I focused on getting healthy and getting mentally and physically where I needed to be to be a stronger leader, to show people that we can do it without taking that toll on ourselves. And so that was really important for me in the process. I have lost over 75 pounds.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Yes, you may have noticed. I don't know. Yeah, they did. Everybody's noticed, yes. Don't worry.

SPEAKER_02 8:43

Thanks, guys. Appreciate you all for cheering me on along the way. Um, but more than that, it wasn't all about a weight loss journey for me. It was about being healthy and strong. And that means mentally strong too. So I went to therapy and I started working on myself and started being there for myself. And through doing that, I'm showing up better for other people.

SPEAKER_01 9:07

Yes. Yeah, you are, and you're doing a fantastic job. Just in case nobody's told you that. I know you send me my little motivational things all the time. This is yours just on a grandiose platform. You're doing great.

SPEAKER_02 9:18

I really appreciate it. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 9:19

Thanks for letting me share the clip notes of the journey.

SPEAKER_02 9:23

The clip notes.

SPEAKER_01 9:25

But with Jess talking about how she was, the constantly accessible, the fact that she was allowing this like mistreatment and not so much of like the negativity, but more so she was just taking it all in. And that's so hard. But that's what I think one of the biggest problems in childcare is that boundaries are often viewed as hostility. And it's not, it's not hostility at all. But the second provider says, No, I'm sorry, but we can't do that. And you could say it as professional as you want, right? People immediately take it personal.

SPEAKER_02 9:57

They do.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

If a center charges late fees, parents get angry. Oh, I'm sorry that you were late. Um, if a teacher doesn't respond after hours at 9 p.m., people are offended. I'm sorry. If policies are enforced consistently, which they should be in any quality early childhood education program, suddenly that provider is just so mean. No, I'm consistent. I'm not mean. I'm consistent. Um, and honestly, the mindset is part of why so many educators are, if they're not already burnt out, they're getting there.

unknown 10:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

It's because providers are constantly pressured to bend, break, and mold. We're supposed to bend policies, bend schedules, bend expectations, bend emotional limits. And I can tell you that legitimately, so we're getting geared throughout the week. But earlier this week, I had a parent that came to me. They were late. We have a very specific late pickup fee that we apply to every family, regardless, unless you had like something like a family emergency or something crazy happen and you communicated. We're not mean, like in that aspect.

SPEAKER_02 11:07

I mean, we do enforce it to a team pretty much.

SPEAKER_01 11:10

I mean, if you slid off the road and that's why you didn't pick up your child on time, I'm gonna give you grace.

SPEAKER_02 11:16

Right.

SPEAKER_01 11:16

But because you decided that you wanted to work in Timbuktu, and so you didn't make proper like scheduling timelines to get here on time, you're gonna pay that even if you're upset about it, because unfortunately, everyone is required to do the same. I've created a boundary that if you don't follow that expectation, this is the consequence, and I don't change it.

SPEAKER_02 11:37

No, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 11:41

Eventually, I feel like if you don't do these things though, or if you continue to do the bending, the changing, everything else, you break.

SPEAKER_02 11:49

Yeah, exactly. I also think that childcare providers are just we're put into impossible emotional positions constant constantly. Yes. Why? Because we care, we care so deeply. Yeah, and I know some of the owners out there and directors, you feel me when I say you got that negative Google review and you couldn't sleep that night, and it ate you at your core. Yes, absolutely. Because not like we don't have those and people we've never seen before. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Shout out if you did that once upon a time. We appreciate you.

SPEAKER_02 12:30

Yes, yes. Um, but you know, we care, we care deeply, and I unfortunately that also does not help us in our business sense and following practices and policies and systems the way that we should. Right. Most people who enter this field don't enter it for the money. What? Because yeah, yeah, if you did, uh you picked the wrong industry, y'all. Um if you're just doing it for the money and you're not passionate about it. My best advice to you would be run. Run far away. Far, far away. Because you have to care about what you're doing, especially in this field. People enter childcare because they genuinely love educating young children. Absolutely. And unfortunately, caring deeply sometimes makes it easier for people to take advantage of you. It makes it easier for the staff member that you poured into their lives to write that bad review or something negative about you on social media, even though you're back there going, Wait, you said all these things online, but the last thing I heard from you was a glowing message about how sad you were to leave and how much you loved working with us.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

And how we had the best culture that you've ever had the opportunity of being in.

SPEAKER_02 13:59

So it's really weird. But somehow we see a different thing online sometimes. Who knows? It's weird. Um, but but unfortunately, caring deeply also gets you taken advantage of sometimes, and that be whether it's families, staff, or other things. Um, people know that caregivers have the biggest hearts. Yeah, that's right. And suddenly providers, educators in early childhood feel guilty for not the key word. Taking time off. Pay time off. Sorry. Did you did you not earn it? You know, I'm so scared.

SPEAKER_01 14:41

You should so scared to take that.

SPEAKER_02 14:43

I'm a big stickler on you need to have pay time off to take pay time off. Yes. But if you have earned it, you absolutely should be using it in the right manner.

SPEAKER_01 14:57

I feel like you you very much push us with the I I can attest to it because I know that I'm supposed to have something coming up in the near future, right? We're in Indiana, the weather is uncertain, we might not be able to do said thing because it's gonna be gross out, right? Right. Um, old Jessica Pooh here says, Yeah, I don't actually care if we can't go do that. Um, I'm gonna need you to take that PTO and go get a massage, go do a something for yourself because you still deserve to have the time to yourself.

SPEAKER_02 15:24

100%.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

That's how you should look at us.

SPEAKER_02 15:27

Because if we don't take our paid time off days like we need to be, we're going to burn ourselves out. So it is important to schedule yourself a mental health day off that you can look forward to it. Take time, go shopping, get your nails done, whatever you want to do. Yes, but schedule it the right way and really plan out those days because if you just keep burning that midnight wheel, you are going to get burned out. You should not feel guilty for taking pay time off. You should not feel guilty for calling in sick when you are really sick.

SPEAKER_01 16:02

I like the emphasis on that, Jess. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 16:04

I feel like how I'm like when you are really sick because come on, people, your employers know. They're not dumb. They know. Um, you should not feel guilty, in-home providers, especially for closing for holidays.

SPEAKER_01 16:18

Yes. Enjoy those holidays with your families.

SPEAKER_02 16:21

This is your career path. Yeah. You are not somebody's doormat. Um you should not feel guilty for enforcing your payment policies. You have bills to pay. If that child's not attending that week and there's no vacation weeks to be taken taken, they should pay for the week because they still have to pay their rent when they go on vacation. They're paying for the spot. Right. Unlike what our good old president thinks right now. Oh no. That another time. But make sure you take lunch breaks too. I mean, I have to force Katie out the door sometimes to go take a lunch break.

SPEAKER_01 17:00

I'm not super great at it because I feel like I like to be married to my work. Obviously, married more to my work than married to anybody else. Wink wink. Um, but yeah, no, I will forget to take lunch breaks often because I feel like it makes me so much more passionate, but it doesn't. It actually makes me more burnt out. And when I do go take a lunch break and come back, I'm ready to go. And I, yeah, taking lunch break.

SPEAKER_02 17:24

Exactly, exactly. Even working from home, which I forgot to mention earlier, but as you can tell, we are not in our normal setup right now. We have been traveling around, meeting with different coaches, doing different things um on the sidelines. So this is a little bit different version, but we wanted to get on here still with our portable studio.

SPEAKER_01 17:43

Portable, I like the way that you phrased that.

SPEAKER_02 17:45

It's beautiful. I do what I can, I do what I can. Um but you know, it's important to normalize things like taking a lunch break. I found for myself, even when I'm working at home, I will work, work, work until my mind is just going crazy and I'm not actually accomplishing anything. I'm running in circles. But if I would have taken that 10-minute break about an hour ago when I knew I needed it, instead of just mind-boggling myself.

SPEAKER_00 18:17

Not mind-boggling, right?

SPEAKER_02 18:20

It would have been so much better, and I would have been more productive. So you need to plan out your time. You need those lunch breaks, you need to take the 15-minute walk around the school to see how things are going and get up and move away from that desk sometimes because we are not robots. Oh no, you don't social human beings, even though we're not treated like it sometimes. Here, okay. You are actually allowed to be sick, you are allowed to have a family, you are allowed and hear me, you are allowed to protect your peace. Yes. How many times have you been laying in a bed and it's 11 o'clock, and all of a sudden somebody is blowing up your phone for something that can wait until the next day.

SPEAKER_01 19:17

Often, right?

SPEAKER_02 19:18

Often. Put that phone on quiet, turn it off, whatever you have to do. I know on Sunday nights.

SPEAKER_01 19:29

On Sunday nights, that she is putting it on mute, do not disturb, and she is living her best life and making sure she can do all of the things that she wants to do. Um, you are allowed to log off. You do not have to be 100% required to be on all the time. Please hear me when I say do not do that to yourself. It's not good for your mental well-being. You're allowed to stop answering emails at 10 p.m. You can actually stop answering them as soon as your school closes for the day, if that's how you really want to do it. It is up to you to make those boundaries and stick to them. And honestly, if your workplace or your families make you feel guilty for basic human boundaries, that's a problem. So let's talk about after hours communication for a minute, because this topic, people have opinions. Some parents genuinely expect 24 access to childcare staff. They think that we're actually available 24-7 and we're not. I can tell you I have two small kids, and I have a hundred percent pushed myself to if it is my kids' time where mommy needs to be present with them, that means I'm not present for anybody but them. They deserve my time. Late night text. I will listen, there's a few, like, I will give you some grace on a couple things, okay? If you send me a late night text because something crazy happened in your family, you already know that there's an emergency, you're not gonna be in the next day. I appreciate you. Thank you so much. Yeah, if you send me a late night text that says, Tomorrow, do you think that we could play with um slime? Um, and it wasn't in my lesson plan, but I really want to do that. Is that cool? I'm not answering you. Because what do you mean? You could have asked me this in the morning, and I probably would have been like, that sounds great. But you're a weirdo and you thought I needed to know that at 10 p.m. No.

SPEAKER_02 21:19

Did you just call them a weirdo?

SPEAKER_01 21:22

Uh, I wouldn't actually say that to our employees. Actually, I probably would, to be honest, knowing me and how I pray yes.

SPEAKER_02 21:27

No, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 21:29

Ask half of our employees, and the reason why our culture is different is because I do not look at them like they are employees. These are people that we have entrusted to take care of these tiny people. But every single one of them knows they can come to Jess or myself at any point in time for anything.

SPEAKER_02 21:46

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 21:47

Just not about ridiculousness because you will get called a weirdo. I have just decided. We can messages from parents, especially. This drives me bananas. Hey, just let me know, Sally's gonna have. Dentist appointment next Thursday, okay, great. On Monday, I'm gonna respond and say that sounds wonderful. Thanks for letting me know.

SPEAKER_02 22:06

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 22:07

Why do you need to send that to me on Saturday? And for me to respond, no.

SPEAKER_02 22:12

But to interrupt, real quick, I think a good point in that is as a parent, I may remember on Saturday that I need to let you know.

SPEAKER_01 22:20

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 22:21

And so I may send off a message really quick. Beautiful. But as a parent, I'm not expecting your response on a Saturday either.

SPEAKER_00 22:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 22:29

That's the hard part. Yes. And so it's very important that parents have the freedom to communicate when they need to. However, you have to enforce with yourself and your team that you do not respond unless it's during these working hours. And we have put that rule in place with our team.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

Yes. Now, I one more there's always so many butts, isn't there? But I will say the only, so I'm our executive director. So I ever see both of our locations. I, Jess and I both equally tell that our direct tell our directors that if there is ever like a situation where their parent is super unhappy because an incident happened, 100% I'm gonna get back to them as soon as I see whatever is happening because that just clarifies that I care what you're saying. But that's a me thing and not something that I expect of our staff. So if people who are listening have someone that is like me that oversees the schools, I think it's 100% okay for you to be the one that communicates if there's those giant issues that are happening that need to be taken care of right then and there. Just saying. But I do understand that emergencies happen, but constant accessibility is not sustainable and is downright just crazy. And the issue is once the boundaries disappear, the expectations are just going to grow. They're gonna grow and increase and be out of control. And if you answer one midnight message, then suddenly parents assume that midnight access is now acceptable. Do you want that?

SPEAKER_02 24:00

Absolutely. They sure do, don't they?

SPEAKER_01 24:03

Yeah, Jess, I added that just for you because that's your favorite thing to say.

SPEAKER_02 24:08

Yes, they just all of a sudden, if you do that one time, whatever it is, whether it's responding to a parent at midnight or not, then they expect that that's the expectation. And so you need to stay consistent with your policies and systems.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

Oh, you and your consistency, but I do agree. I do agree.

SPEAKER_02 24:27

I love a good system, y'all.

SPEAKER_01 24:30

But providers, they start training people to expect unlimited emotional labor, Jess. You're guilty of this one. I was guilty of the last, and I can attest to that. You're guilty of the unlimited emotional labor. I know that there is multiple times where you have given Christmas gifts and you have been a listening ear for someone's big issues. Maybe I'm talking about me for the emotional issues because she's my sounding board. Um, but you can't do it unlimited. Like, that's just not, it's not sustainable. It'll it's gonna burn anybody out. It is dangerous.

SPEAKER_02 25:01

It is, it's dangerous. And if you're like me, you may internalize a lot of that, even though it's not directly affecting you, it in turn is affecting you because you're taking it all in and you care so deeply.

SPEAKER_01 25:17

Yes, that's called a being an empath, Jess. You're just an empath now, you gotta accept it.

SPEAKER_02 25:22

All this therapy, I tell you what.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

Because what what it comes down to though is this field already consumes so much of us emotionally, like you already have these spots saved in your heart for each of these children in which you care for. So you're just adding more to it when you're already spread so thin.

SPEAKER_02 25:42

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 25:43

And if educators never mentally crowd, then burnout burnout becomes the inevitable, and that's unfair. And I think directors especially struggle with this because the directors carry everything, and when I mean everything, I mean everything: staff problems, parent complaints, licensing stress, financial stress, enrollment concerns, classroom coverage, behavioral issues, which are more and more now. We know this, and directors directors often become the emotional dumping ground for everyone around them. They take that all in. I know ours do. They do a good job of it too. Everyone needs something, everyone has an emergency, everyone has expectations, and eventually you realize you haven't had a moment where nobody needed you in weeks. The level of emotional damage changes people. And another thing that we need to talk about parents are customers, but childcare is not retail. It's very, very vastly different. And I think that parents need to understand that. I know that sentence alone might make some people uncomfortable or make some parents feel up and roar, and I don't mean it like that, but it is true. This is not the customer is always right because the reality is that sometimes parents are wrong. Sometimes expectations are unrealistic, sometimes policies exist for safety reasons. Sometimes providers have to say no. They don't want to, but they have to. And somewhere along the line, some centers become so terrified of upsetting their families that they stopped enforcing the boundaries entirely. But then your staff suffer. Because when leadership constantly bends to avoid the conflict, and they're like, oh, I just didn't want to have an issue. Educators learn very quickly their well-being is gonna come second to a parent, and that destroys your morale and your culture. Is that fair? No. I also think social media has intensified entitlement in childcare. And again, I know that people are gonna have maybe an uproar about it, but people watch aesthetic daycare videos online all day and suddenly expect individualized concierge-level service while paying less than a car payment for full-time care. And providers are exhausted trying to meet impossible standards. Parents expect constant updates all day long, perfect communication, immediate responses, spotless classrooms, academic readiness, healthy meals, zero illnesses, zero behavior incidents, and individualized attention all at the same time. And while the field remains massively underfunded and understaffed, providers are expected to absorb all of that pressure silently and somehow manage to do all of these parent expectations. But at what cost are they doing that to themselves? I would also like to address another something that is uncomfortable to some. Being nurturing does not mean I tolerate disrespect. I think women, especially in caregiving professions, are conditioned to prioritize being nice over having the boundaries. So providers apologize constantly. They overexplain, they over-accommodate, they overextend because they're afraid of being perceived as difficult. But healthy boundaries are not cruelty. Saying that policy applies to everyone is not rude or mean. Saying I am unavailable after business hours is not rude. We cannot safely saying we cannot safely accommodate that request is not rude. And honestly, people who benefit from your lack of boundaries will often react negatively when you finally create them. That doesn't mean the boundary is wrong necessarily. But I think it means providers need to stop glorifying burnout culture. This field loves to romanticize exhaustion. I swear I'm probably one of them too, because I used to think that this meant I was more passionate, right? I cared so much. But our staff and our educators are bragging about I never sit down. I work through my lunches, I come in sick, I work off the clock, I stay late constantly. And I understand why it feels like we need to brag about those things because this field requires a lot. But burning burnout should not be a badge of honor that you wear.