A babysitter has taken to Reddit to seek second opinions on whether or not her decision to involve the police when the parent failed to return home on time was the right call.
The 28-year-old called the police when the childrens’ mother, who was due home at 9 pm, still hadn’t returned at midnight.
The mother staying out later than planned was a regular occurrence, the babysitter wrote.
When she called the police, they also couldn’t get in touch with her so cops dismissed the babysitter and took the children to the police station.
Now, the babysitter says a Department of Children and Family (DCF) investigation has been launched against the mother.
Posting on the ‘Am I The A**hole subreddit’, she explained that she babysits at the weekend to make extra cash.
Although she acknowledges she should have “fazed out” this family by now, the kids are cute and it’s “easy money”. Despite the kids being great, her gripe is that the mom is “never home on time”.
The mother used to not give the babysitter a return time, but since it made it impossible for the babysitter to make post-work plans, she started asking for them. However, the mom would “never stick to them”.
Last Saturday she agreed to babysit between 6 and 9. As she had plans with friends, she explained to the mom that she needed to get off work on time.
When 9 rolled around, the mother still hadn’t returned. Despite calling and texting, she heard nothing.
When the clock struck midnight, she said she felt “p***ed” and “exhausted”, as her plans were ruined.
She then called and texted the mother telling her that if she wasn’t home within the next hour, she would call the police. She tried calling again 30 minutes later and it went to voicemail, so she texted again. This time, she said she was left unread.
The Redditor said that if the mother had communicated with her, she would have stayed. As she doesn’t know any other family members of who the kids’ dad is, she wasn’t able to call them.
After giving her a “grace period” of 15 minutes, she called her again.
Finally, she decided she had had enough and called the non-emergency police line.
She said the police came by and she showed them the arrangement she had made with the mother over text, including confirmation that she would be home by 9. The police tried contacting her themselves but got no reply.
They then dismissed the babysitter and brought the children to the police station. The Redditor said she then went home and went to bed.
She said: “I am awoken at 3 am by a frantic call. It’s her. Where are the kids? Why am I not here? I tell her I followed through on my threat, check the police station. She cursed me out, I hung up and went to bed.
“The next day, she sends me an essay saying the kids’ father was called and there’s a DCF investigation launched against her. She called me every name under the sun but I didn’t think I was wrong until I spoke to a friend with kids. She said I should’ve just waited it out and refuse [sic] to ever sit for her again. She asked if her potentially losing her kids was worth me being petty.”
The top comment, with over 33,000 upvotes, was on the babysitter’s side. The commenter wrote: “One thing I’ve learned from True Crime is the wait 24 hours to file a missing person thing is a myth. She wasn’t where she said she’d be when she said and wasn’t responding to any communication. She was in fact a missing person at that point.”
Another Reddit user branded the mother’s behaviour “absolutely irresponsible”, adding: “She deserves a DCF investigation if she can’t be bothered to even respond”.
One person wrote: “3 am she notices!?”
Another commenter said that although 30 minutes would be “excusable”, telling a babysitter you will be out for three hours but staying out for nine hours “is not something that happens by accident”.
Parents failing to return home on time is one concern for babysitters, but another babysitter previously shared the scary reason why childcare professionals should never accept a sleeping child into their care.
