r/MadeMeSmile • u/mindyour • Jan 30 '25

Wholesome Moments Daycare CCTV captures a baby's first steps, and her mother is overwhelmed by the workers' excitement.

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177

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '25

U.S is fucked up.Moms shoud skip such a beatifull moments.My country moms,have 2 years with their babies.

226

u/datGAAPtho Jan 30 '25

As a Dad, i would also like to witness this moment. - Sad American

44

u/banti51 Jan 30 '25

I'm the same, I was there when my daughter was born and I was so fortunate to be there when she took her first steps.... I'd be gutted to have missed it

47

u/munchkickin Jan 30 '25

I was working when my son said his first words and took his first steps. In fact I missed all of his milestones. I’m a sad American mom.

30

u/Matzie138 Jan 30 '25

Oh I’m so sorry. And mad on your behalf - if she had any firsts at daycare, we did not hear a peep about them. They let us have those moments.

44

u/Initial_Ground1031 Jan 30 '25

I worked at a daycare part time in college and we never told the parents if they took their first steps. We wanted them to have those moments. They would come in so excited the next day. I just could not take that away from them. 🥹

6

u/brackenandbryony Jan 31 '25

I know this is often advocated so I was really explicit with my daycare that I want to know if he does something new haha I want to know about it when it happens, and I don't like being lied to. I assume I'm in the minority 🤣

26

u/kmc6989 Jan 30 '25

I worked in an infant room at a daycare and then as a nanny in college. The closest I’d ever get to telling the parents was saying their child looked really close to taking that first step (or whatever milestone) that day so they would be on the lookout even more. I never wanted the parents to feel like they were missing all of the moments.

5

u/Invisible_Friend1 Jan 30 '25

Yeah! I’m shocked they share this video- I’d never have said a thing.

8

u/corkscrewfork Jan 30 '25

Might be a place where parents can watch the cameras, so they'd have been able to ask for the footage to save at pickup. I worked at a place with a similar setup, and the worker waving at the camera and trying to get the kid to do the same supports that to me.

5

u/Inevitable_Phase_276 Jan 30 '25

It looked like she was pointing to the camera afterwards and waving, so they likely know that the parents are watching or will tell them to.

12

u/MaryQC Jan 30 '25

My parents watched my oldest when I worked. She did all her firsts when I was around so said my dad. I’m just choosing to believe him.

2

u/MamaBird828 Jan 31 '25

Never stop believing him!!! My son was in the NICU and I missed things. I have to remind myself that it’s about our memories together. He will not remember and I will choose happy memories for us both!

6

u/MechEJD Jan 30 '25

I got so lucky with my first. He had been cruising on the coffee table for what felt like months. I was working from home one day and my wife was screaming my name. I panicked and walked out to my son who stared me down and took his first 10 steps over to me. Can't believe I didn't miss it.

75

u/meanteeth71 Jan 30 '25

Right? My former boss was back at work 10 days after giving birth. It’s crazy!

That said, America has always had a weird relationship with work.

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u/avlopp Jan 30 '25

That's no excuse though. In Japan, who has a notoriously toxic work culture (some would even say the worst), employers must provide 14 weeks of maternity leave, 6 weeks of prenatal leave (before the expected delivery date), and 8 weeks of postnatal leave (after the birth).

43

u/sibre2001 Jan 30 '25

I think they did all that because their birthrate is so low. And it didn't help. Though God forbid we help families for the sole reason of helping families.

One of the best reasons I've seen for our plummeting birthrate around the world is that we've always had a hard time getting animals to breed in captivity.

40

u/avlopp Jan 30 '25

I think parental leave for both parents should be considered a human right. A child needs time to bond.

I am so glad I live in Sweden where this is the norm.

First off, since my wife has a physically taxing job she could apply for pregnancy leave from the 60th day before the estimated birth date.

When my daughter was born I was first of all granted ten days of IMMEDIATE leave to bond with my child and help take care of my wife once we left the hospital. All I had to do was message my boss and tell him my wife had given birth.

One child equals 480 days of parental leave. Ninety days are reserved for each parent and cannot be transferred to the other parent.

My wife stayed home for a year, and then I took over for three months before my daughter started kindergarten.

Now I'm using up the remaining days for school breaks and the odd long weekend, since I can use them until my kid is twelve.

3

u/sibre2001 Jan 30 '25

God, that sounds amazing. My wife got six weeks of leave because she was in the military.

I got to finish my deployment and meet my firstborn when he was six weeks old.

3

u/gjoeyjoe Jan 30 '25

a society that cares for its children, cares for its future. i could only DREAM of my tax dollars going to something as tangibly beneficial as having kids cared for and fed.

4

u/chicken-nanban Jan 30 '25

The other person is right. They did that to try to encourage people to have kids.

Some notes on this:

All of that is unpaid.

As a woman of childbearing years, you’ll probably not get a decent job in the first place because they assume as soon as you have a kid you won’t be working.

They don’t have to keep the job open for you to return to if they can justify needing you replaced. And the justifications are flimsy.

Because of the birth rate issue, one way the big brained government here has decided to tackle it is by not teaching anything about sex Ed. They actively want teen pregnancies.

There are a whole lot of problems with womens lives in Japan. To a great extent, I think Americans have it better, save for the insurance costs. At least in America, you only marginally less likely to be hired for a job you’ve trained for because you’re a woman. Versus Japan where you’re the oddity to actually have a job with upward mobility if they know you are planning on or have children.

2

u/avlopp Jan 30 '25

Thanks for clearing that up. That's really sad. One would think that it'd be greatly encouraged if increasing the birth rate was the stated goal.

3

u/meanteeth71 Jan 30 '25

I did not say it was an excuse. I'm offering it as an example of what's toxic about current American work culture. But thanks.

4

u/avlopp Jan 30 '25

I didn't mean it like that. I meant that the American government shouldn't use Americans weird work relationship as an excuse not to give you guys federally funded parental leave. I'm sorry if I came across as rude.

3

u/meanteeth71 Jan 30 '25

I appreciate your apology. I was taken aback. We are making the same point.

2

u/Dav136 Jan 30 '25

They're given all that but they're still very pressured to not use it

1

u/Invisible_Friend1 Jan 30 '25

Not to be annoying, but none of that would allow for a parent to see first steps.

16

u/kel174 Jan 30 '25

I couldn’t imagine..10 days!? My down there would not have been ready for that. I didn’t even want to get in a car because sitting was painful. Don’t get me started on the massive pads I had to use afterwards too, so much blood 😳

5

u/meanteeth71 Jan 30 '25

It was insane. Her (male) colleagues (all fathers) weaponized her pregnancy to get up to shenanigans. We contained it for 10 days.

5

u/Cultjam Jan 30 '25

Not surprising at all.

3

u/CPUforU Jan 30 '25

Weird? That's putting it mildly.

1

u/meanteeth71 Jan 30 '25

Hey . . . we're on a thread that is supposed to make us smile.

1

u/Aksi_Gu Jan 30 '25

America has always had a weird puritanical relationship with work.

32

u/Unusual_Sherbert_809 Jan 30 '25

Same here (Canada). Only here it's 1 - 1.5 years.

Sadly we were in the USA when we had our daughters and didn't know any better. The USA excels in making sure you don't know there's a better world out there.

Truly if there is one thing that exemplifies just how messed up the USA is, it's their paternity leave. We had to send our babies to daycare when they were only a couple of months old. Some moms have to be back at work within weeks (if that). It's so incredibly wrong.

8

u/chicken-nanban Jan 30 '25

My friend was working up to her due date. Her water broke as she was heading for work that morning.

She had a tough birth, and was in labor for 26 hours. Full tear down there, major sutures. Do not Google episiotomy if you’re a woman and squeamish.

She was discharged from the hospital the following day, about 16 hours after giving birth.

She was lucky in that her family was around to help with the baby, but she needed to work to have a place to live.

She was back at her job 3 days after giving birth. She could barely walk, was still bleeding all over, and in pain because her milk hadn’t come in yet. But she had to work at the grocery store she managed the bakery in, or they’d be homeless. To say nothing of the bill from the birth she got (roughly $800 in 2015 monies) after her (surprisingly good) insurance.

1

u/BarefootandWild Jan 31 '25

This breaks my heart. I don’t think i’ve stopped to realise how fortunate I am. My first born was 31hrs, a full episiotomy and was born with a previously unknown birth defect, requiring several lengthy surgeries as a baby. I thought I had it bad (yes of course it was painful and emotionally traumatising) but I didn’t have to return to work and could be by his side fully for every single moment. I couldn’t even BEGIN to imagine how excruciating this would have been for her. 😞

45

u/khaleesibrasil Jan 30 '25

Cost of living here is too expensive to have people stay at home usually. Or the fear of losing their job and not being able to find a new one because of a gap in their resume if they do take a break.

16

u/Hunger_Of_The_Pine_ Jan 30 '25

Think the commentor is saying they give 1) statutory parental leave, which means an employer can't fire you etc for taking leave, 2) probably have better employment protections overall, so you are unlikely to be dismissed whilst on mat leave for some bogus alternative reason, 3) the government pays and/or company's give paid leave so you can afford to stay home. Because you're still getting paid.

2

u/gcsmith2 Jan 30 '25

But comment or is saying their country is still biased against dads :-)

11

u/littlemsshiny Jan 30 '25

And gap in health insurance. Employer-based healthcare is dumb.

2

u/Militantnegro_5 Jan 30 '25

Yet Americans will swear up and down their cost of living is extremely low because they believe Europeans are being taxed into poverty.

0

u/khaleesibrasil Feb 02 '25

I have never in my life heard an American say their cost of living is low

4

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '25

Thats what im saying capitan obvious....America is fuckedup

7

u/khaleesibrasil Jan 30 '25

I was agreeing with you? No need to be rude

11

u/Garviel_Loken95 Jan 30 '25

Why are you being a jerk about someone agreeing with you

2

u/Fit_Hospital2423 Jan 30 '25

Or you could do like i and my wife did. She stayed home and raised the kids and we lived very very frugally in a little place with an old car… and I worked my ass off 70 hours a week. Now 40 years later, the kids are grown ….And we’re in a way better place financially and she has all those sweet moments and memories.

2

u/Inevitable_Phase_276 Jan 30 '25

That takes a certain type of marriage, and health. As ideal as it might seem it’s also very dangerous for a stay at home spouse to put faith in that. Finding a job with flexible hours for a single parent after a decade out of the workforce is very difficult, and usually means starting in a lower position then you were in when you left your career. One salary also is no longer enough to raise a family on in most cases, at least not in the US.

1

u/Fit_Hospital2423 Jan 30 '25

Yes indeed. The kind of marriage that God intended. One that is till death do us part. And you mentioned health. Actually by my mid 50’s I was unable to work…..And my wife carried us thru to retirement age. And you say it takes a two income marriage these days. That’s a ridiculously broad-brush statement.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '25

[deleted]

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u/Fit_Hospital2423 Jan 30 '25

Right. So I guess you think that both parents oughta stay home and watch the kids grow huh? You’re gonna have a hard time with reality.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '25

[deleted]

1

u/Fit_Hospital2423 Jan 30 '25

I doubt if you’re familiar with farming, and lots of other ways of making a living as well, that regularly work 60-70 hours a week. Do the math…..If you work 65 hours a week and you sleep eight hours a night you still have 47 hours a week to spend with your family.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '25

[deleted]

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u/Fit_Hospital2423 Jan 30 '25

Who said it was necessary for both parents to work those hours. I guess it was you…cause it wasn’t me.

2

u/haterofslimes Jan 30 '25

The fact that you don't even seem to comprehend how fucked this is really drives home the point on how brainbroken a lot of Americans are.

2

u/Fit_Hospital2423 Jan 30 '25

What? That people have to work hard and be very careful of their budget in order to raise a family? I believe it’s been that way for thousands of years, buddy. I don’t know what fantasy world you live in.

0

u/haterofslimes Jan 30 '25

I believe it’s been that way for thousands of years, buddy.

Yeah maybe in your 3rd world country you have to work 70 hours, live in a shitty house with a shitty car just to barely make it by.

That's kinda my point. You don't have to do that in other Western European countries that understand the value of families. But you can't even conceptualize that idea, hence, the brainbrokeness.

1

u/Fit_Hospital2423 Jan 30 '25

You’d have a hard time proving what you say.

0

u/haterofslimes Jan 30 '25

Please, let me know which part of my comment you need a source for.

1

u/khaleesibrasil Feb 02 '25

That’s not something to proud of. If you’re working 70 hours a week, how much time did you get to spend with your child?

0

u/859w Jan 30 '25

So we need to change the laws/the whole system! Use your imagination for a god damn second instead of just thinking "well it could never possibly be another way!"

3

u/Ocsh21 Jan 30 '25

Agreed. In the US here. When I had my child I only had 6 weeks off before I had to go back to work. My mother watched my child while I worked. She probably saw all of their firsts. But she pretended she didn't. And so the first time I saw my baby walk, those were their first steps. We both know that my mom saw them first, but it means a lot to me that she would try and make me feel like I was there for it.

1

u/LinwoodKei Jan 30 '25

It would be nice

1

u/Particular_Worker109 Jan 30 '25

I think here in Germany it's one year and in that time you get paid 60% of your income

1

u/Zealousideal-Sir-560 Jan 30 '25

School is really great for a toddler if done right. Socializes them with others, gets them used to not always being attached to mom, can teach them independence

1

u/rumbleindacrumble Jan 30 '25

Literally my first thought. I’m Canadian and got 15 months with my baby and got to be the one she walked to when she took her first steps.

1

u/Basboy Jan 30 '25

Yup...funny thing is that because of COVID, I was able to go full time remote and see my daughter's first steps. Thanks Obama.

1

u/RGB_Muscle Jan 30 '25

I agree. Wish there was a good/easily obtainable solution.

1

u/MamaBird828 Jan 31 '25

I agree. But, I’m so thankful for this beautiful lady and her excitement for this sweet child. That baby should have her momma, and dad if possible. But, since she didn’t, I’m glad she had this wonderful human!

1

u/Kowai03 Jan 31 '25

It's fucked up in most places

1

u/Impossible_Door_8925 Feb 03 '25

I spent all of 23.5 hours with my daughter on the day she started walking. It was the 30 minutes I went to the supermarket alone that she took her first steps towards her dad. Can’t catch all those moments unfortunately.

0

u/serpentinepad Jan 30 '25

Ayo, America bad!