Mom and Dad are out? Time to hire a babysitter. Parents always want to find the best babysitter for their kids but sometimes, the babysitters just aren't so great. These kids, now grown up, share some of the worst babysitters they've ever had. All stories have been edited for clarity.
I’m Allergic
“When I was seven, I had a babysitter who insisted I have a glass of milk with my dinner because it’s healthy for me. I always said no and begged her to not make me drink it but she always forced me to, so I did. I’m lactose intolerant, so every time she made me drink that glass of milk I would instantly puke and be sick for the rest of the night.
She told me that this feeling was normal and that I’m getting healthy and that everyone goes through this when they first start drinking milk. Then she would sit on the couch and watch TV for the rest of the night as I remained in bed in utter pain.
My mother told her that I was lactose intolerant when she first hired her and told her repeatedly that the milk in the fridge could be for my sister but not me or else I would get really sick.
This carried on for probably 4-5 Saturdays in a row until I told my mom what happened. Needless to say, she was fired and my mom put out the word all over our municipality about how she forced a lactose intolerant kid to drink milk, I hope she never got a babysitting job in our area again.”
Not My Bed!
“My brother and I were being watch by a 17-year-old girl who lived up the street. After my mother left, she had three of her male friends come over. One was her boyfriend. I was sick and laying on the couch in the living room. My brother was sitting there watching TV. The girl went upstairs to find nail polish remover. A few minutes later, her boyfriend went up stairs to ‘see what was taking her so long.’ That left my brother and I alone with two strangers. Super safe right? My brother (being older and at the time smarter than me) decided to go up stairs and see what the girl and her boyfriend were doing. He walked in on them getting it on in his bed, he was 12 at the time. My brother didn’t tell my mom until after she left that evening. Not sure what happened after that, but I know she never watched us again.”
Let’s Play A Game
“Being the youngest of four sucks because often my babysitters were my siblings. The worst that any of them had ever done is one time my sister, who is six years older than me, decided she wanted to play ‘Kidnapped’ and since I was only like 6-7 at the time, I agreed. She proceeded to tie my hands and feet together into a hog-tie (Hands and feet behind my back, all tied together in one knot) and then duct taped my mouth and stashed me in the closet. I thought it was fun for the first 30 seconds or so, and then I realized that I wasn’t getting out.
I lost it. Screaming and crying and losing my mind. I was crying, so my nose instantly filled with snot, which made it near impossible to breathe. I freaked out harder. I don’t remember much after that, I’m pretty sure I passed out. It’s an odd angle to be at for so long. I do know that I kept screaming, though, making muffled screams and crying like a baby.
I remember once, my brother, who was also in on it, opened the door and said something along the lines of ‘Had enough yet?’ and threw some water in my face, then closed the door again.
I was in there, stuck in the dark, scared, crying, breathless, for almost 6 hours. SIX WHOLE HOURS! They pulled me out when my mom called and said she was leaving work. I had rope burns on my wrists and ankles and a duct tape burn on my mouth. They made me tell my mom that we were just playing and I agreed to it and that I thought it was fun. She still doesn’t know how long I was tied up for.”
The Worst Babysitter Ever
“Our normal babysitter was busy one weekend and my parents hired an elderly couple to watch after my younger brother and I. We were 12 and 10.
It turned into the worst experience of our lives. What we got was typical physical abuse. After I started crying because they hid my comic books and prevented me from watching Power Rangers (that my parents always let us watch), they got upset with us. What set them off is when I snuck in an episode behind their back. They caught me during the last scene. They squeezed my upper arms really tight and shook me, yelling in my face. The old woman slapped my brother and shoved him onto the bed. He tried crawling away and she grabbed his shorts. The shorts came off and he scrambled for the pillows to hide himself. The old man let me go and started to take his belt off, and so I charged the woman and let into her. She was trying to grab my squirming brother (whom I was and still am very protective of) so I started punching her.
The old man pulled me back and whipped me with his belt until my butt bled. He held me down while she poured hydrogen peroxide on my rear, then they yelled at me and pulled me by my hair to bed, tucked me in, and told me not to make a sound.
My brother hid, so they went looking for him. I snuck over to a phone and tried to reach my parents but couldn’t. They caught me crying and repeatedly dialing my parents. They hid the phone and told me my parents didn’t care.
The next day, they slept in very late, so I sat in my room sobbing and playing with Legos. I didn’t leave my room and they didn’t bother me. That night, I refused to eat the food they made so they sent me to bed hungry. I snuck downstairs later and had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and ice cream, but they caught me, and then made me drink salt water so I’d throw up the food and go to bed hungry.
They left before my parents came home the next day and left a note saying that we were despicable kids and they weren’t interested in the payment or any further contact.
Never found out what my parents did to them but they were furious when my brother and I told them what’d happened.”
Now I Hate Corndogs
“When I was around three and my brother was four or so, we went to this daycare run out of this one woman’s house. Everyday, I would cry at the doorstep and tell my mom that I didn’t want to go in, but she assumed that it was because I would have missed her so much. What really happened was that as soon as mom left, this woman would bare-bottom spank us, hard, and warn us that we deserved it and that my mom wouldn’t believe us if we told. My brother and I were so afraid of this lady and her punishments that during lunch, we would sometimes throw up our food. If we did throw up, we would have to eat the thrown up food and vomit because this woman didn’t want us to ‘waste her good food.’ To this day, I really hate corn dogs because that was one food I threw up and had to eat. Also, because I was so scared of this woman, I would wet myself regularly and every time I did, she would bare-bottom spank me again and tell me I was a bad kid for doing it, and would accuse me of doing it on purpose.
I remember one day, though, that Mom came to the house early and picked my brother and me up to take us to lunch. As soon as we got in the car, she told us that our babysitter was a bad lady and that we never had to go back there again. I didn’t know it at the time, but they finally realized something was amiss when the babysitter ripped my brother’s shirt from yanking him around and gave him some bruises. I do not blame my parents whatsoever because our babysitter was a master manipulator and was excellent at hiding everything up until then. I know my parents still feel torn up about it all these years later, but I have since let them know that it really wasn’t their fault.”
Betrayed By Family
“My teacher was married and had a 3 year old little girl. She and her husband were both working and struggling to pay the bills and couldn’t afford proper daycare, so they let the husband’s sister watch her.
One day, my teacher got a call saying her daughter was in the hospital having emergency surgery. She rushed there and it was explained to her that her daughter suffered horrible brain damage and might not make it. She also had spiral fractures in both her legs and bruising on her arms. The babysitter obviously claimed she had no idea what happened.
Well, my teacher didn’t buy it and there was a police investigation which eventually led to the sister-in-law/babysitter confessing to shaking her daughter. This resulted in shaken baby syndrome. They’re still not sure exactly how it happened but what my teacher thinks is that her daughter broke both her legs falling or something (remember, they were spiral fractures which is the most painful) and was screaming and crying so much that the babysitter couldn’t take it and shook her.
Her daughter is 15 now but is completely paralyzed, mentally handicapped and has the mental abilities of a 3 year old. She can’t speak or eat by herself. She and her husband have since divorced.
The babysitter went to jail but only for 2 years.”
“I Was Just Hungry”
“When I was about 2 and my brother about 9, we had a babysitter (I think she was mid-20’s) while in Japan (dad was in the navy, mom worked extra jobs wherever we moved to). According to my brother, this babysitter had a terrible habit of starving us and just punishing us for everything we did that would upset her.
Apparently, my 2 year old self was throwing a tantrum of some sort and would not stop crying. I’m told that I was an ideal child growing up. Slept through the night, usually played quietly, obeyed orders, etc. So me screaming and crying consistently set off red-alarms for my brother. The babysitter, in her rage, lifted me by my right arm and shook me a bit to try to get my wailing to stop. Turns out, I was just hungry.
Hours later, my mom gets home and my brother rats out the babysitter. My mom’s Filipino rage kicks in and she beats the poop out of the babysitter and throws her out of the house. To this day, my right arm is an inch longer than my left.”
Take Us To The Hospital!
“My younger brother broke his wrist and hit is head falling off the monkey bars. I was about 12, he was 10. The sitter refused to call an ambulance or take him to the hospital. She took away the phone when I tried to call my dad. I locked myself in my parents room and managed to get my dad. He was able to come home and take him to the hospital. My brother had to wait close to an hour before he got any help. We never saw her again.”
Not The Best Solution For Bee Stings
“Both of my stories were courtesy of the same kid, a boy who lived up the street from me. As it was about 30 years ago, I can’t remember which one happened first, nor his name.
He was my babysitter one day while my mom was away one day. I was playing with friends in an adjacent yard when I must have jarred a bee hive. Next thing I know, I’m getting stung all over. I sprint back home, crying and hollering. My babysitter assesses the situation and decides what I need is the juice from his Skoal chew on the stings. Since a few of the bees had made their way up my shorts, I had to strip down as well. Other than the stings, all I remember is lying face down sobbing on my living room floor, (mostly) naked, while he’s laughing at me. I have no idea how well the chewing dip salve worked.
The other one was a night time job. We were watching TV–he was on the coach and I was on the floor. For some reason, he started spitting at me. I ended up wrapping myself in the rug to avoid his spittle. I didn’t realize he was just using me to entertain himself until later.”
That’s Not How You Play With A Rocking Horse
“When I was in pre-school, my neighbor had a daycare. My mom would take us there and this one woman would watch us everyday along with my 2 other siblings. There was a jungle gym in the backyard and a lot of the times, she would have her ten year old supervise while she went inside to do whatever (already kind of suspicious, I know). Anyways, her ten year old daughter, lets call her Lucy, got a hold of a lighter and started to light the plastic rocking horse on fire. Since I was so young, I just watched and didn’t say anything. But Lucy was afraid I would tell her mom or my mom about what she did, even though I was silent the whole time, so she immediately stuck my hand to the melting rocking horse. My babysitter refused to let me call my mother because it was her daughter and she didn’t want to get in trouble. Meanwhile, I’m crying from the pain of what ended up being 3rd degree burns. In the end, my sister had to lie and say she left her book at home, (right across the street) and ran and called my mother. My mom was livid and we never saw that babysitter or her daughter again.”
“Turtle Time Out”
“I went to a daycare place after school with about 25 other kids ages 5 through 10. I lived out of the school district, so I got picked up in a full size van with other kids from my school and another nearby school. The driver of the van chain-smoked in the van and kept all the windows up. I threw up a few times in or right outside of that van from all the smoke.
They didn’t bother with food for us except during the summer, when we’d be there for 9-10 hours a day. They wanted you to eat every last bit of food. Don’t like peas? Too bad, eat it. You couldn’t even think of shoving it off on the plate of the one kid who likes peas, because they watched us eat to make sure we didn’t do it. Beans and hot dogs made me throw up every single time I ate it, but it was like they developed amnesia every time. I’d insist that I’d throw up if I ate it, pointing out that every single other time they’ve given to me, I’ve either thrown up on the plate of food or within 5 minutes of eating it. They’d tell me I could keep it down if I tried, and I’m not going anywhere until I eat it. Then I throw up, they hand me paper towels, and I clean it up and feel bad.
Most of the people watching over us were college students, I remember them always having stacks of books and homework, but they were too old for high school. They were often more interested in doing their homework than they were in watching a bunch of kids. They had strict rules on what we could or couldn’t do. No running. No yelling. No playing outside of specific play-times (the length of which was random). I think we were supposed to read books and be quiet, except they didn’t have books for us to read and this was before the gameboy existed.
Breaking any of these rules was met with time-out for every kid, not just the ones doing something ‘wrong.’ They had various methods of time-out. The most common was ‘turtle time-out,’ where every kid has to get in a bomb-drill position. On your knees, bent over, head touching knees, hands on top of head. Hold this position for 30 minutes and don’t talk. If you talked, you got to see the scary (and rather mean) owner of the daycare.
They experimented with other methods of time-outs. They all consisted of getting in an awkward position and holding it for a long period of time with no talking. My mom didn’t believe any of my stories from that place until she walked in on us in time-out. We all had to sit crosslegged next to the wall, facing the wall. Our hands above our heads, but you couldn’t touch your head or lower your arms. My mom walked in right as a kid complained about his hands going numb and they were yelling at the kid for talking. And then I was in there for another 2 years because, apparently, finding a new daycare place is so hard.
If your kid starts talking about how horribly they’re being treated in daycare by the staff, maybe check in on it. But at least we weren’t beaten or otherwise abused, so I guess I had that going for me.”
We Just Can’t Find A Good Babysitter
“One babysitter stole jewelry from my parents. This included a pair of earrings my godmother gave me. My parents gave her a chance to return the stolen items or they’d go to the police, but she didn’t return everything she stole.
Another bad sitter used a cultural slur against my mom. We have an apartment above our garage and when my siblings and I were younger, part of the responsibilities of that tenant was babysitting whenever my parents had to travel. We were in high school and junior high, so it was glorified traffic control. The sitter decided to make pot roast from a box in the crock pot for dinner, but she made it extremely salty whereas my parents avoid salt when possible. Of course, my siblings and I refused to eat the pot roast, because it was too salty. So the sitter then said, ‘Oh well, your mom will eat it. She’s a good Mick.’
My siblings and I all gasped (a slur against Irish people). We’d already started to hate the sitter and promptly reported the incident to my parents. That tenant was already on thin ice with my parents and was booted from the apartment for that incident.”
More Juice Please
“When I was about 5 or 6, I remember I had this person babysit me. I only really remember one time specifically what had happened that was not a very comforting experience.
Basically, the babysitter, who was about mid-40s and blonde, had been babysitting me and my brother at the time on and off due to my parents being busy. The memory that I remember the most was one day when the babysitter had to go to her apartment for some reason. Since she was babysitting us, she had to take us to her car and drive us to her apartment as well. Here’s where the fun begins. When we get there, the babysitter had to leave and go into the apartment.
She told me and my brother that she’d only be a few minutes. She gave me and my brother a box of juice and headed off into the apartment, leaving us in the car. It was fine at first, until about 20 minutes pass and the car started getting hotter and hotter. The juice wasn’t sufficing too well and I was starting to panic because it was getting too hot and I was dying of thirst. I think it was a whole 45 minutes or an hour before the babysitter came back and drove us back home. The whole time I was sitting in that car, I was just hoping to get some water and cool off. I didn’t find out how bad that was until years later when my mom left my little brother in the car (roughly 6 or 7 years later, I had another brother come into the family) and so he got hot. Someone saw him in the car and called 911. Minutes later an ambulance came and let my mom know that she can’t do that and gave her a big fine.”
Gremlins Of The Sugar Variety
“I was 6 at the time and my sister was 8. My parents were leaving for the weekend for some trip or something. Usually my folks would leave us with a relative, but this time they hired some poor babysitter. Now my parents never really let us have sugar except around Halloween, and even then, we were limited to one piece of candy a night. So my parents told the babysitter: ‘DO NOT GIVE THEM SUGAR,’ almost like we were gremlins and to not feed us after midnight.
Well, the first day, after my folks leave, she takes us to Toys R Us in an attempt to be the fun and cool babysitter. She lets us each pick out a cheap toy and then asks us if there’s anything else we wanted. We OF COURSE went straight for the candy. And to our surprise, she bought it for us! BIG MISTAKE. We were so thrilled, we inhaled the candy in the car on the way back to the house. We were so hyped up on sugar that we went NUTS! We were tearing around the house, literally tipping furniture over and jumping on it, screaming and throwing trash around, and just terrorizing this poor woman. Imagine if you will, a bunch of baby monkeys freaking out and throwing their feces. This is how I imagine we looked in the babysitter’s eyes (sans fecal matter). I think we may have even chanted at her something like, ‘You shouldn’t have bought us candy! Neener-neener booboo!’ She pretty much just locked herself in my parents’ bedroom and called my parents in tears, sobbing. I don’t remember what the rest of that weekend was like. We probably just had the biggest sugar-high-crash ever and slept it off… But that poor poor babysitter! My mom still brings it up to this day, ‘Remember when you made your babysitter cry?’
‘Yeah, but you warned her not to give us candy.'”