There are three of us in this marriage – and I have to say I’m rather thrilled by this development. Our problems started shortly after the birth of Thing Two. He came complete with an allergy to milk and a sensitive nature which meant he screamed (still does, mostly) whenever anyone other than his mum tried to hold him. Consequently, for the first six months or so, he was permanently attached to Mrs Sad Old Dad. And though she slowly got better at performing household tasks with one hand, there seemed to be so many things to do – cooking, cleaning, endlessly tidying up toys, the various entertainment demands of Thing One – that even on the days when my own two hands were available, we were struggling to cope .
I had put forth the prospect of getting an au pair previously. Of course I had. But what was becoming increasingly clear was that an extra pair of hands was desperately needed if we were to ever stay awake past 9pm again. I realise in putting this out there, of course, that we are by no means the only couple who have faced this sort of situation. Similarly, I am fully aware that writing about desperately needing an au pair might just be the most middle class thing I have ever done. Do I care? Not a jot, because one simple website search later yielded a Skype chat with a Spanish girl who seemed to fit our exacting criteria (don’t be weird) and who seemed to like us as much as we liked her.
We now have a babysitter should we ever wish to go out for a few hours to have a good argument
A few weeks later, we went to pick her up at the airport. It was pouring with rain and in the why-didn’t-we-bring-an-umbrella chaos that ensued we left the sign with her name on in the car. Luckily, Mrs SOD recognised her and the next thing you know we had a total stranger living in our spare room.
Thing One took to her immediately but mistakenly assumed she was there to be his playmate and then went frosty when he realised she was another member of Team Be a Good Boy. Let’s just say their relationship is a work in progress. Thing Two, as I might have mentioned, does not really take kindly to anyone who isn’t his mum, so any steps to bond him with our new arrival will have to be taken tentatively.
From our point of view, though, we are talking Gamechanger Bigtime. It’s the little things: the toy room that clears itself up; the mess on the floor after lunch that mysteriously disappears, the kids’ clothes that get magically cleaned and put back in drawers. Hell, we even now have an on-site babysitter should we ever wish to go out for a few hours to have a good argument. But first, we’ll have to try to stay awake past 10pm. One hour at a time, eh? She’s an au pair, not a miracle worker.
