Loosing My Cool

At 1.30 PM today, when I returned to my workstation from the office's washroom, there were 2 missed calls left on my mobile.  The number was from Cherie Hearts, the kindergarten/nursery/infant care center that baby Jaden is currently enrolled.

Immediately, I returned the call but to no avail. To be more precise, I was instructed by a 'computerized voice' to 'hang up and try again later'. I then continued to make another 5 to 6 calls that ended up with the same outcome. Knowing that baby Jaden was having flu and cough since the past few days, my imagination began to run wild. Past memory of Jaden with his bruised right cheek, which according to his teacher, resulted from him falling off the chair by himself while the kids were having lunch began to haunt me. Not to mention that merely a week after his bruised cheek incident, I witnessed another 2-year old boy in his class having his right eyes and cheek bruised in dark purple and green. I was told that he ran and crashed into the door by himself.

Failing to contact the center, I contacted Ms. R, who is the owner/principle. My effort was in vain after 3 attempts. No one seems to answer the line. While trying hard to control my anxiety, I sent her a text message requesting her to check on Jaden's condition and contact me back as soon as possible.  

While my husband rushed back to Cherie Hearts from KL, I continued to make numerous calls for the next 45 minutes to the center but again, to no avail. While trying to keep myself calm, my phone suddenly rang. It was Ms. R. She said that Jaden's teachers were trying to call me but they could not reach me. That first sentence from her really made me blew my top. I couldn't help anymore but burst out all the disappointment that I chose to keep to myself all these while. 

Here are a few of them just to recap:

1) Jaden vomited in the center a few days ago. His shirt and pants together with food debris on them were put into a plastic bag, snug into his bag and handed to me in the evening. Yes, you are right, there was no effort taken to at least rinse off the debris. When I opened the plastic bag at home in the evening, the debris was almost harden up and it took me quite a while to remove them from the already stained fabric. 

2) I organized 3 medicine bottles and a syringe in a proper container and requested the teachers to feed Jaden accordingly. And guess what? When he got home, the syringe was found unrinsed (with stain of medicine syrup in the syringe tube) and medicine bottles were found leaking all over the container. 

3) In my opinion, it is a very irresponsible act for not repairing the faulty phone line immediately. How do you expect the parents to feel secure when leaving their kids in an unreachable environment? (We found out from the teacher on the same day that the phone line 'sometimes is in order but sometimes not'. Obviously, the problem has existed for quite a while.)

Ms. R apologized immediately and improvement was promised. I totally understand the stress of the child care center to keep up with parents' expectation. However,  from the day of enrollment, both my husband and I already knew that it is impossible to hope for top notch service as promised when you signed up. In fact, all these while we have chosen to stand on their shoes, justifying all the small hick-ups by understanding the mess they have to go through with so many kids running around in the center.   

I believe most parents would choose to take care of their own child full time if given a choice. Sadly, too many of us have to endure in silence, the dissatisfaction of the poor service provided by childcare centers. I hope things will improve but honestly at this point of time, it is better for me not set any expectation.   

P/s: The reason why the center called me in the first place was to tell me that Jaden vomited again due to vigorous cough. My husband brought him back home early.