5 nannies tell all about working during a pandemic
Photo: Patrick Leger [data-uri="www.thecut.com/_components/clay-subheader/instances/ck9io3apf00433h67pxs815su@published"] span.fancy-divider{display:none} “We are like items to them; they can’t go without us.” I’m a live-in nanny for an ultrahigh-net-worth Manhattan family. I have a degree in early-childhood education and decades of professional nanny experience. The family I work for is pretty high profile.
They have been sending me and my co-workers back to Manhattan on weekends in a private car together. But the driver doesn’t work exclusively with them, so there’s other people that go in this car at other times. One of my co-workers has a big family, they’re elderly, and also one of my co-workers’ husbands is really sick and is one of the delicate people that should not be exposed at all. Our employers probably don’t even know she has a family. It’s not one of the things they would wonder about.
I put my everything into taking care of these kids. So at least parents should see that and appreciate it without having to remind them. This is a crisis. And if it wasn’t for this crisis, I would be at work. Still, I’m not going to reach out to them, because why did other employers find it in their heart to pay me? I cook for an old guy in Manhattan, just two days a week, and he has sent money to me three times right now.
I feel like a lot of times, they’ll ask my opinion about things, like, “What do you think: Should we open up the pool?” The uncle really wanted to and then everyone else was like, “It’s kind of early.” And I was like, “I’ve never had a pool. I would have opened up the pool three days ago, and I would swim every day.” They just laughed.
They’re very aware of not infecting other people. They’re not going out and stuff like that, but that is their only worry. Other people are worried that they’re going to be homeless or they’re going to starve. It kind of makes me upset because I feel like a lot of people are about to be homeless when it would take $1,000 to pay their rent and then there are people that are like, “I’m really bored. I should get the boats out of storage.” If you have money, you have no fear.
Once I was there, I asked her, since I’m live-in now, how much you want to pay me? I normally make $800 a week. She said she wanted to charge me $300 a week out of my paycheck because my grandson was with me, because she said “we’re going to give your grandson food.” And I said, “I don’t want you giving nothing to my grandson. I told you I’d buy him food. I’d never think you’d want to charge me $300 a week.
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