Babysitting Bitches

After much research AND hesitation, I finally joined a gym. It's not my first choice. My first choice was the "elite" gym five minutes from my house, but the "elite" gym was very expensive. Twice the cost of the affordable one. So the affordable gym is the one I joined. In fact, we got such a good deal, my husband joined too. It's about a 25 minutes drive from my house, and I hate crossing the parking lot to the gym because it's in a busy strip mall, but inside it's actually quite nice. They just built it last year and it had the nicest kids' play area of all the gyms I saw. In fact the play area was twice the size of the "elite" gym, so I figured my kids would have more room to play while I worked out. I thought joining a gym would help me lose weight and relieve stress, but it's only been my second day, and already it's starting to become another source of stress.

The facility and equipment are great. I have no complaints about the quality of the gym. It's the bitches watching my kids that are causing me grief. The first day I went, I had planned to go before noon when it's not so busy, but shit happened and I didn't get to the gym until 5 pm. It was peak time, and when I got to the babysitting room, I was asked if I had a reservation. Yes, a reservation to babysit my three kids. I said I didn't know I needed one. So the fatty behind the desk said, "Sorry you can't work out today because we are at full capacity (which was 26 kids, but I only saw 14 in there) and we can't take anymore children". I was so mad, I went to the assistant manager and she reiterated there was a policy of reservations to prevent overcrowding. I was so angry, tearful, and confused at the same time, I didn't know what to say, so I left with the kids and complained to my husband how I will never be able to workout, never!

He called up the manager and gave him an earful about responsibility and customer service and threatened to cancel our membership. The manager gave us one month free of babysitting services if we stayed, so we did.

Today, I went to the gym again. This time I saw a huge sign on the front desk that said "Attention Kids Club members (this included me, it means I prepay babysitting with my membership to get a discount on 2 hours of childcare per gym visit): Please make sure you make reservations to secure space for your children." Wow, I thought. My husband made them do that.

I proceeded to the babysitting area. This time I had made reservations. I was so close to working out, I couldn't believe it. I checked the kids in, changed H's poopy diaper, and left the room, finally tasting freedom.

I didn't even get to check my bag into my locker before my name was announced on the intercom to report to the Kids Club. WTF? I went back and found Z crying hysterically "Mama, Mama" and the fatty woman saying "I didn't know what to do, she wouldn't calm down." There were only two women in the room watching four children, three of whom were mine. It wasn't a huge burden on them to maybe take Z for a stroll or show her what's outside the window. No. They just didn't want to deal with a crying baby. So I sat down for about 10 minutes trying to calm Z down. She was fine as long as I was in front of her, but the minute I turned around to leave she would start crying again. Classic separation anxiety. The other two, R and H were completely fine, only Z was having a problem. While I was sitting in the playroom playing legos with Z, I started overhearing the two bitchy babysitters. One was blond the other brunette, but both fatties. The blond one says to the brunette, "Oh gawd, I need a tylenol really bad, I don't know how I'll be able to last another hour here...." then she spied a woman carrying two kids into the gym and says, "oh no! she better not bring those kids in here, oh no. we already have four kids in here." What was this? Maximum capacity is 26 kids, and why is she bitching about members and their kids, in front of ME, another member of the club? Maybe she forgot I was sitting on the floor playing legos with my daughter. I got up and said, "Look, I didn't get a membership to this gym to play legos with my kids in the playroom, I want to work out. Can't you let her cry a little? She'll calm down after a while." This time the fatty brunette pipes up, "Sorry, you can't leave her here while she's crying, she might throw up and our cleaning lady doesn't come until 11 pm, and the vomit will pose a health hazard for the rest of the kids." The dumbest excuse I've ever heard! She doesn't want to clean vomit? What does she think childcare is, playing ring around the rosie with perfect angels? I wish I was a more confrontational person, but I'm not. I hate fights, I hate arguments, and I am one of those people who can never think of a good comeback on the spot. It always comes to me about 3 hours after the incident, with me thinking "damn I should have said that" but it's always too late. Very much like George Costanza and that Seinfeld episode about the Jerk Store. What I should have said was, "I think you need to add another sign on your front desk that says 'No Crying Children Allowed'" but it doesn't even matter now.

So I left Z crying and decided I was going to quit the gym. I left the playroom and ironically the manager was standing right outside. He asked me what was wrong, I looked so sad. I told him everything that happened, including how the girls were bitching about members and their kids, and asked him if they were going to bitch about me and my kids that way too? The manager said he was going to talk to them, but I asked him not to, that I was afraid that if he did that, the bitches would treat my kids bad and I don't want any tension, I just want to quit the gym and go home with my kids. The manager, who by the way was a very nice guy, said he would not tolerate treatment like that by his staff, told me to go workout and he went in to talk to the bitches. I ended up doing about five minutes of elliptical before I decided to go back and see what what was happening in the kids room. The manager saw me first and said he spoke with them and everything was alright. My kids were being taken care of and Z had stopped crying because he got the assistant manager in there to take care of Z personally. That was nice of them. He insisted I complete my workout and not worry about the kids, he won't let anyone treat kids badly in his gym. So I got to complete about 15 minutes of treadmill and did some stretches and ab work for 15 minutes before I decided I had enough fun for one day. My mind was racing thinking about the kids, I couldn't relax.

When I went to go pick up the kids, R was having fun with some kids his own age, and Z was quietly coloring with markers. This time it was H who was crying "Mommy, mommy" and the blond fatty was holding her and trying to calm her down. I tried to be nice and said "Actually, they're not used to daycare that's why they're crying so much today" but the bitch didn't even make eye contact and just handed H over to me. Gosh. I didn't want to tattle on them, but I had no choice. The manager wanted to know exactly why I was planning to quit, and I had to tell him.

So I'm still a member of the gym, but I don't know why I still don't feel comfortable with the babysitting. It sucks. I am now going to be one of those women that make them go "oh gawd no, she better not be coming in here with those kids". I told my husband that the "elite" gym would never employ people like that and would let Z cry it out before they paged me. But the management at the affordable gym is good to us, and from what it seems, is desperate to keep us on as members, so we're sticking it out with them a little longer. Tonight, my husband went to the gym, sans kids, after dinner. He's so lucky. He doesn't even need to deal with the babysitting bitches because the kids club closes at 9 pm and by then it's the kids bedtime anyway (we fixed the kids' sleeping schedule, all it took was one day of waking them up at 8 am and they all started going to bed by 9 pm. Genious.)
I swear, after having kids, it's me whose life has changed the most, not his. He can still get up and go anywhere, without ever having to ask me "Can you watch the kids while I (do whatever I want to do)?". Yet, if I want to do anything without the kids, like get a haircut, go to the store, or even workout, I have to ask, beg, someone to watch my kids. I really hope I haven't screwed it up with the babysitting bitches, as bitchy as they are, I really need them.