Allie didn’t nap that well yesterday. Jayne greeted us after work with, “Her charts look horrible, we get an ‘F’ for today.” It wasn’t THAT bad; she had 3 naps, they were just short. They were also earlier than I’d napped Allie (not sure if the off-timing had something to do with their short durations) but that was out of necessity because she’d be up too long once she wakes up too early from her naps if the next nap isn’t advanced. I’m not sure that Jayne is letting Allie cry as long as maybe I would when Allie wakes up naturally around the 30-minute mark after one sleep cycle. I’ve found that if I can grit my teeth and deal with my anxiety attack through up to 15 minutes of crying, she goes back down solid for up to 2 hours. Jayne said she did let Allie cry to see if she’ll go back to sleep, but that Allie would appear to her to be unlikely to go back down, so Jayne goes and picks her up. There’s likely some developmental stuff going on, too, since Allie is now moving around a lot more in her crib. I’m hoping she’ll just take longer naps on her own very soon without waking up to cry after just the first sleep cycle. I still have a very hard time thinking about it or seeing it at work, so I look on the cameras as little as possible.

So yesterday morning, I was dumbfounded to receive this long text from Laura on my phone:
“I hope you don’t take this the wrong way. Its meant for good. FYI – for the benefit of Ali, I would and can work for $10 an hr, 11 hrs a day, no over time $ change and cash only. That would work out to be $550 a week so Ali could be home. Don’t worry about insurance either. If you are interested, let’s talk soon. I would need [Mr. W] to be on board with this decision too.”
I was so shocked I didn’t know what to do. Was she not there in our last phone conversation when she made any trusting relationship with her impossible? Was she not there when she sent me the text the day after to guilt me about the other position she wanted having been filled? How could she think anything would be salvageable after the things she’d said to me, not to mention that for this job, I’d have to leave the most important things in my life completely vulnerable to her (my baby, my cat, my home)? Did she think I was too dumb to pick up that I was being taken advantage of and bullied and berated?
And the way she said that she would “need” my husband to be on board with this too, as if she were advising me, “I know you want to jump at this, but hold on, you should talk to him, too.” My judge is hoping she isn’t trying to set me up for some loss of earnings lawsuit (she can sue, but she has no claim).
So I went in circles trying to think how I should respond. I got a lot of suggestions from friends, from advising me not to respond, to suggested responses such as “After in depth discussions with my husband, we have determined that your services will not be required.” I considered sending “Thank you, but we do not believe any agreement between us is possible. Good luck with everything,” “We are not inclined to change our current arrangements, but thank you,” but I didn’t want to allude to any “current arrangements” because I don’t want her to inquire or give her any openings for any further conversation. She appears to assume Allie is in daycare (which was the plan and still may be, depending on how Jayne works out), and I don’t want her sniffing around the house and making assumptions and accusations. I need to protect Jayne, as well as Allie. I was afraid she was a step away from boiling our bunny. So finally, I took Rebecca’s advice, and texted back the shortest more definitive thing suggested: “No, thank you.”
Haven’t heard from her since.