WHAT MOMS SAY

Lindelwa Mngomezulu

“My nanny stays with us. She went home to Swaziland when the lockdown started during the initial 21 days. When she came back, I asked her to stay in her cottage for the first day because she had used public transport. It’s been difficult because I now work from home, and have two kids. Our greatest challenge is that it’s been three months since our nanny hasn’t been home because the borders are closed. Every Sunday, my sister takes her to the mall for essentials. It’s the only way I can protect everyone. In addition to masks and sanitising, we’re all taking the same supplements for precautionary and preventative measures.”

Athandile Maswili

“Fortunately, my husband and I are working from home. We have a nine-month-old baby and live-in nanny. Prior to the lockdown, she would go home every weekend. When it started, we negotiated that we give her two weekends in and two out. When she comes back, she doesn’t have any interaction with the baby until the next day because she uses public transport. She sanitises when she enters the house. But, with the spiking rate of infection, we are talking about taking her home and fetching her. Hubby and I take multivitamins, and she prefers the honey, lemon, ginger and garlic concoction. We also sanitise door handles, light switches, lamps and baby toys. When we took our baby for her immunisation, we were told that babies needed a little bit of germs/bacteria to build up their immunity. So, we can’t make environment too sterile. It’s a tricky balance to maintain.”

Noxolo Mthethwa

“We decided to rather keep the kids at home – a 10-year-old in grade 4, six-year-old in grade R and three-year-old in preschool. I have two helpers. We sanitise and wash our hands religiously. The helpers can’t come in without a mask. They have to work wearing them, especially when they’re interacting with the kids. They also use shields if they have to remove the masks. They have a taxi that brings them in the morning, then I drop them off after work.”