When you have young children, getting to work on time can seem about as realistic an ambition as scaling Everest… in high heels. Yet every morning you attempt it. How many times have you finally reached the childcare/kinder/school drop off, glanced at your watch and realised that you should have been at your work desk ten minutes ago? The last time you looked, you had an hour.
Sigh.
Isn’t it strange how our little angels can turn positively demonic when all we need to do is get them out the door by 7.30am?
Of course, you do everything you can to avert the daily crisis: you’ve woken up at the crack of dawn to shower, dress in adult clothes and slap on enough makeup to avoid comparisons with an extra from Dawn of the Dead. Last night you diligently packed the children’s bags, prepped breakfast and popped matching socks in their shoes next to the front door.
What could possibly go wrong? Only everything.
Children don’t care how much you prepare, bribe, plead and threaten. In fact, they love it because it shows them just how much power they’ve got. You’ve got a meeting to get to across town? Maybe they’ll grant you an outside chance of making it, but certainly not until you’ve located that plastic doughnut toy that you last saw in 2015. Oh, and before they can even contemplate getting dressed they’ll also require French toast with some unattainable ingredient like dragon fruit.
Driven to the edge by your tiny terrors, you lose the first psychological battle of the morning and scream. “SOCKS! SHOES! EAT YOUR PORRIDGE! WHERE IS YOUR TEDDY BEAR?”
Your darlings slowly get dressed (sort of) and eat breakfast (sort of, but of course they reject the French toast). OK, they look a little dishevelled with their pyjama pants and un-brushed hair, but they’re ready to go!
Success! You allow yourself a sigh of relief, jangle the car keys triumphantly and set off for the car. Miraculously, they hop in and allow you to do up their seatbelts. And just as you ease the key into the ignition, one of them will announce, “Mum, I need to poo poo.”
You need to poo poo now? Of course you do. Why should today be any different?
With gritted teeth, you undo their seatbelts and lead them back into the house and to the toilet. It’s all so predictable: the faffing about with the toddler toilet seat, the straining, the insistence on inspecting whatever eventually emerges… When they’re finally done, you clean them up, round up the other child (who’s now eating the French toast, straight from the bin) and get them into the car, a broken person.
And that was the easy part.
Part 2 of your morning hell sees you battling peak-hour traffic to do drop-offs in multiple locations. Gripping the steering wheel manically, you feel your blood pressure hitting new heights. Time speeds up as the traffic slows down. You sit. You wait. You worry. You imagine your boss looking disapprovingly at his watch as you screech into the office car park 45 minutes late. You wonder which crucial file you’ve left at home in the frenzy today.
But what can you do? There’s no alternative, is there?
Actually, now there’s Happy. Happy is just like Uber for kids that’s run by qualified nannies. Thanks to Happy, you can avoid the morning mayhem. One of Happy’s nannies can help you get your kids fed, dressed and then they’ll drive them to school, kinder and childcare, while you get to work on time.
Working parents, help is here, the cavalry has arrived.
