Nursery advice

My little one is 13 and a half months and has been attending nursery two days a week (Thursday and Friday) since September. He is still very unsettled at drop off and throughout the day he will cry unless he's being held. He has had a lot of time off (probably every other week) because he keeps getting very sick each time he goes - temps, stomach bugs, you name it. I really don't know whether I need to pull him out and try a child minder instead. Nursery is such a chaotic environment and it's genuinely crushing my soul to hear that he's so unhappy throughout the day. I don't even know what I want from posting this. I guess some reassurance or advice or someone in a similar boat?
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Hello, I had a similar situation with my eldest daughter who is 3. I started her at a private nursery. The nursery was very chaotic. She hated going to nursery, my usual confident happy little girl was becoming really clingy and started pushing her little sister and regressing with her communication. I pulled her out and she’s now at a school nursery and is thriving. She loves going in and her confidence has returned ten fold. The preschool she’s at now is much calmer and has structure. I think it’s worth finding a childminder and trying a different setting. I am so glad I switched up my daughter’s childcare.

If baby has had so much time off you may find they need longer to settle. It can take a while for some children and with only going two days a week it’ll naturally take longer than a baby who goes say 4/5 days. That being said, if you think baby would benefit from a calmer environment 100% explore a childminder. We have a bit of a hybrid setup with 3 childminders and 9 children in a purpose built outhouse. It’s the perfect balance between other children but more personalised care, it’s calm, structured and baby and I have an excellent relationship ship with his key worker. They also do all the same arts and crafts, activities, outdoor play etc a nursery would. I don’t feel we’d get the same in a busy nursery setting. He settled almost immediately there and really bonded to his ‘second mum’ as I call her! x

When I was looking at nursery/preschool for my firstborn, I wanted to send him two days and I visited 3 nurserys/preschools at the time and none of them reccomend doing 2 days back to back as it’s quite a long time when they come back and they forget. Why not try spread the days to a day earlier in the week? It that’s a possibility x

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