Confinement Nanny vs Domestic Helper/Chores

After a series of feeding, bath, and sufficient naps during the day, your baby is now ready to be gently patted to sleep for the night. Good news — your baby is very well taken care of! But the question is, what about you? When can YOU take a calm, relaxing bath and frequent naps amidst all of these? 

Moms, there is no shame in admitting that you need as much assistance as one could receive – especially during your postpartum confinement period. Taking care of your baby while healing from your childbirth wounds is not easy to do alone. It is perfectly fine and very much advisable to reach out for help. The question is, what kind of help?

A lot of mothers consider getting help with the house chores (laundry, cleaning up, and cooking for the family) and others require more help with the baby especially if they are first-time parents along with the spouses. Usually, these forms of help can be obtained from domestic helpers and confinement nannies in Singapore respectively. Find out which one you would need more in your house through this article! 

Duties

Confinement Nanny:

Once a baby is born, a confinement nanny will keep their main focus and attention to your newly-born baby and you. They have received training prior to starting their work specifically to learn how to tend to a postpartum mother and their baby. 

Remember; looking after you is beyond just checking up on how you are doing. It means preparing confinement meals with healing properties and setting up your herbal bath, washing your newborn’s and your clothes, doing a few chores around the house – basically allowing for a stress-free phase so you are able to heal from your recovery from childbirth. A confinement nanny’s duties may or may not include taking care of the condition of the house, and even if they do, housekeeping should still not be one of their main duties.

Domestic Helper/Chores:

A domestic helper’s duties practically encompass almost everything in and outside the house, but not to a deeper extent in each aspect. They would take care of the people living in it as well as the condition of the house. They are expected to provide regular housekeeping services to everyone and prepare meals on a daily basis.

Among their everyday tasks include keeping the house clean (sweeping, mopping, tidying up, doing laundry, and cleaning dishes), running errands (buying groceries and picking up kids from school), providing care to the people in the house (babysitting and feeding a bedridden elderly). 

Responsibilities

Confinement nanny:

Although their job scope may look restricted on paper, a mom confinement nanny is accountable for bigger things as their main purpose is ensuring that the baby and the new mother’s needs are catered to. This is why most moms want to get to know and be comfortable with a confinement nanny first before hiring them as they are going to be the next closest person to her newborn after her. 

In turn, a confinement nanny will have the time to get to know the baby better in terms of their behaviour, feeding and nap time, digestive process, and development – thus knowing how to handle the baby at all times. Whether you are first-time or experienced parents, a confinement nanny will always have something new to share. They will be the closest person who will guide you step-by-step in taking care of your newborn.

You May Also Read this : Things to Prepare Before the Nanny Arrives at Your House

Domestic Helper/Chores:

A domestic helper may have a bigger job scope as they work for everyone in the household, but they might not be knowledgeable or trained enough to perform all of the confinement nanny’s duties. As far as confinement duties are concerned, they can apply their housekeeping skills in handwashing the baby’s clothes and probably changing the diapers. They are responsible to prepare meals for everyone and keep the house mess-free. If you need to run any errands outside, they are usually fit to do it too.

Availability & Flexibility

You might have noticed it when you are doing your research, but the services of a confinement nanny and domestic helper are pretty similar in this aspect. Their availability varies vastly depending on whether they live in your house or outside and whether they are working full-time, part-time, or freelance.

Confinement Nanny

A confinement nanny will normally stay with you throughout the whole month after birth, whether she lives inside or outside of your place. If you prefer to have the confinement nanny during the day only, certain agencies provide daytime confinement nanny services as well. When calculating all costs, try to reduce your workload by ensuring that the application of work permit for confinement nanny is fully handled by the agency.

Domestic Helper

With a domestic helper, it is also pretty much the same. You can find full-time, part-time, and even freelance services. However, they are not restricted to any particular week or month in your life (unless it is stated as so in the agreement according to your request).

Knowledge

Confinement Nanny:

From their training and experience, a confinement nanny is trained to deal with the issues you might be dealing with with your newborn. They normally have basic knowledge of Chinese herbs and traditional medicine that is in line with Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) theories. Thus, they can provide appropriate suggestions and recommendations to moms in their recovery. A certified confinement nanny that comes from an agency would have gone through training that helps them understand the needs of a newborn and postnatal mom better.

Domestic Helper:

Their knowledge is normally pretty restricted and encompasses household chores only. You can certainly depend on them to prepare any meals or clean all corners of your place as their expertise would include those.

Attention to Baby

Confinement Nanny:

Your CL will be able to pay extra one-to-one attention to your baby. While it is quite a subjective matter, you can judge how close a person is to a baby by what they do for/with the baby and how the baby reacts to them. A lot of confinement nanny feels like they have formed a special bond with the baby and treats the baby as their own grandchild/child. This is completely up to your preference – whether you would mind your baby connecting with their caregiver (who is not you) or not.

Domestic Helper:

Likewise, from a domestic helper’s point of view, they could not possibly focus solely on your baby as they are handling the housekeeping and comfort of everyone in the house. As a result, they may not be able to report much to you regarding your baby’s development. As mentioned before, this is mainly due to the much bigger job scope that they have compared to that of a confinement nanny so you could not really place the blame on them.

Conclusion: Confinement Nanny or Domestic Helper?

For your confinement period, a confinement nanny would be a lot more helpful than a domestic helper. A domestic helper will lessen your burden regarding your household chores, but you might have other forms of postnatal needs during your recovery period. This is where a confinement nanny will make a better option. Talk to other mothers and ask around to get a good confinement nanny training services in Singapore and learn how they went through their confinement period with the help of a confinement nanny.

Author

  • PEM Confinement Nanny Agency

    We are a group of frontliners and support team members who are passionate about sharing our knowledge and experience in confinement care. Representing the largest confinement nanny agency in Singapore which has served over 250,000 mothers in over 30 years, we are all about sharing useful and insightful information based on our experience to help new parents navigate this exciting chapter of their life better.