Trying Out The New Caregiver

So…..we decided to try a new weekend caregiver to cover our main caregiver Cristina on her days off. It was pretty interesting how many responses I got after I posted an ad in craigslist. I’ve got at least 30 people I can call back if he doesn’t work out. 

Why?

We had our other sister cover the weekends while Josie and I concentrated on being at our parents’ house during the week. As you may or may not know, we have other projects we run under our business and it was really hard trying to work on those projects, have other responsibilities and at the same time, be at Mom and Dad’s house. Our other sister started having some personal and financial issues, so understandably we had to  find someone else. 

The Personal Route

We decided to go through craigslist because let’s just face it, money is hard to come by these days! If you’re living in the same situation as we are, you would know the amount of costs involved. While it probably would’ve been easier to just call an agency, it would’ve been hard to find someone specific to our needs so I posted an ad and voila!—we hired (probationary) a young college nursing student to help us on the weekends. 

About the New Kid on the Block

After looking at a few email and resumes, we decided to interview this young nursing student who just moved the U.S. from the Philippines. He was originally born here but grew up there. We needed somebody who was familiar with the language of our parents and the customs of being in a Filipino family. He seems very smart and sweet. He’s studying for his RN degree and possibly going on to become an MD. We maintain a neutral stance of course, because we just met him. 

1st Weekend

I felt bad for him because my sisters, my toddler and I were at the house this whole weekend. Poor thing probably felt confused. I would be too if the house was chaotic. But, we didn’t want to throw him to the lions. We wanted to show him the ropes and observe him to see if this is something he could do. So far he seems to be picking up on things quickly. He listens well and writes notes. We encourage him to be open and honest with us because we are. The only thing I think is that he might get too confused with all of us being there so I told Josie that I think we should be there with him on a 1-1 basis until he gets comfortable. She agreed. He’ll be “chaperoned” if you will, probably for the next weekend or two until he is comfortable being left on his own.

But we’ll see……..I’m really tired right now so I can’t write a long drawn out post as I always do…:) . It’s around 1:21 AM on Sunday as  I write this and I have to get up  for church. I had to nurse my little one all weekend myself. She has some kind of sinus infection that I will have to call her doctor about on Monday. Last night she couldn’t sleep much because of the coughing. Tonight she seems better. 

Anyway, re: our new guy. I’ll be updating some more once I observe him over these next few weeks. I  kind of watch him on Facebook too! he’s probably reading this. hee hee. My only concern is that he might get too bored. My parents are really easy to take care of once you run through the checklist. After that, it’s alot of downtime. But as with anything new, there’s always a test period. I really hope it works out. He reminds me alot of my nephew who’s in his 1st year of college.