We could have avoided the pains we have subjected our children to over the years if we had been more sensitive to these house help issues.
I got a call from a friend a month ago who told me of how her house-helps tested positive to HIV while another one shared a story of how she discovered that the mechanics in front of their building have been sleeping with her house-help in her house.
I was privileged to interview a house-help for a client about a year ago and I asked her a simple question ‘How do you handle a child that has been crying for 30minutes and is inconsolable’ I wasn’t shocked at her response because I know quite well that many of them see your child as a distraction to what they want to do. She responded innocently ‘I will go chemist and buy sleeping tablet and go give am take after which the pikin go sleep’ .
I often wonder why we don’t send our children to a village school or allow illiterates to teach them? If we can take a good decision on the school they should go and the country they should go for summer how come we can’t decide on who should groom our children?
I am not sure you know of the numerous cases of child sexual abuse involving house-helps and children. Do I tell you about a child that was discovered to being sexually aroused each time they play Makosa beat only to discover the house help had been using his penis to excite her vagina and had always told the boy that was the way to dance to Makosa beat? Or do I tell you of the 4 year old that was sodomized by a house-boy for so many years without the parent’s knowledge?
I understand perfectly that we are much more busy than our parents but I also believe we have to be willing to personally raise these children that we bring into the world. I once took my son to play with another friend’s child, on getting there no one instructed me to take my son away because of the lewd songs I met their house-help singing and she was the one that was meant to watch over them.
You don’t want to know how many house-helps have masterminded the death of their masters or how many are currently sharing the same bed with their madams?
Two major questions you may need to ask as a mother are:
– Who spends more time with your husband between you and your house-help?
– Who spends more time with your children between you and your house-help?
Whosoever spends more time with them is the person they bond with and the future of your children may actually be largely influenced by the person they spend most of their time with.
I honestly feel it is safer to have house-keepers than keep house-helps. A house-keeper doesn’t live in your house and may not actually have access to your children. They only come in clean the house and leave.
My advice is if you are not willing to adopt a house-help as your child and raise them up the same way you would have raised your children then it is not wise keeping one because the effect of their stay may go beyond what you bargained for. But even at that it has to be a child in his or her formative years that you can easily train.
But if you still want to insist on getting a house-help then do the following:
– Be sure of the source of your house-help
– Interview them before bringing them in
– Conduct an HIV screening
– Take them through an induction process on how your home runs
– Care for them and let them not feel alienated from the family
– Share the chores between them and your children so that your children can be useful to themselves in the future.
– Pray and be very sensitive to what goes on in your home
Above all ask yourself a simple question ‘Do I actually need a house-help, a house-keeper or what I need is actually to re-organize my life’ .
You will succeed.