18 Parents Share Shocking Stories Of Their Worst Babysitter Ever

Having to entrust the care of your child to another person can be scary, especially when you hear stories of babysitters not just slacking, but even putting the well-being of the child in jeopardy. This is something the following parents know all too well, as they share their own tales of nightmarish babysitters.

This Woman Should NOT Work With Kids.

“Well my experience is actually with a supposed ‘teacher’ at a daycare. My son was 6 months when the incident happened. I went to pick him up from daycare and he was very fussy and he is never like that. I thought maybe he needed a nap so I tried rocking him which normally helps but he continued to cry and cry until I decided to feed him. Never in my life had I ever seen him finish a bottle so fast! He drank two and a half bottles with 8 oz each. Turns out the new teacher at the daycare hadn’t fed him all day because ‘he didn’t seem hungry.’ I don’t think I’ve ever felt so angry in my life! Needless to say she was fired thank God” (Source).

No Overtime.

“I was out shopping for food and when I saw a friend I called my babysitter and said I would be a little late and would pay her extra. When I got home I looked for the babysitter and heard my 3 year old baby crying. I asked what was wrong and she said the baby sitter had left when she was done talking to me. I asked her why she was crying and she said she fell down the stairs and hurt her arm. Went to the hospital and she had a broken arm. Babysitter is still in juvy and when she turns 18 she is going to jail for child endangerment” (Source).

Peanut Butter And Glass Sandwich.

“As a child, I had one that couldn’t open a peanut butter jar (at that time they were glass). She hit it against the counter and broke the top off. Then smeared it on bread and we were eating sandwiches filled with glass pieces. We had cut mouths when my parents got home” (Source).

That Was WAY More Than A Close Call.

“When my son was 4 I left my son overnight with my mom so me and my fiancé could have a night to ourselves. The next day we were getting dressed to come and get him and we got a phone call from my niece that something is wrong and to get over to my mom’s house. I was praying the whole way for Joshua to be ok. When we got there, there was ambulances and police cars EVERYWHERE. Got in the house to find out that she wasn’t keeping a good eye on him like she should have and him and my nephew had got into their pool and Joshua had drowned and actually died. Lucky she use to be a licensed nurse practitioner and knew what to do and brought him back to life. He spent almost 5 days in the hospital and made a 100% recovery but we still have to worry about him leaving us” (Source).

That’s Not Chocolate.

“My son was two. My father, his wife (not my mother) and my half sister (who was 1 at the time) had come to visit for a month. My dad had offered to watch my son while I was at work to save me paying for daycare, which I took advantage of because I had decided to change daycares and was looking for a new one. My father had also offered to take me to and from work while he was there to save me taking the bus. One afternoon, he came to pick me up from work and left my son and my sister with his wife at my house. I walk in the door and my son is naked from the waist down, and his hands and face are covered in what I first assumed was dried chocolate until the smell hit my nostrils. Turns out he had taken off his diaper which he had pooped in, and played with the poop. I was so enraged but knew I had to keep my head long enough to get my son clean, but once my son was bathed I went into his room to get clothes and saw the poop smeared over the walls and many of his toys, over the bed, windows, dresser! I took him to my room, laid him down in nothing but a diaper and got him to sleep, but the moment he was out I told my father that what he chose to do with my sister was on his own conscience if he wanted to let this woman be alone with my sister – this woman, who had already had three children taken from her before she married my father and who was technically not supposed to even be living with my sister because the state had stepped in at birth – but that under no circumstances was he EVER to leave my son alone with her EVER again. And that if he was to pick me up from work my son had best be with him! My father died when my sister was 3. Her mother did not get to keep her, had her parental rights terminated, and has not seen her in over 10 years” (Source).

Making Baby Wine.

“I came home from work one day to find my mother-in-law feeding my then 5 month old a bottle of juice. She reasoned that it was made by Gerber, and therefor was fine to feed an infant once a day, that it would help him poop, and even went as far as to say, ‘How would you like it if all you had to drink all day was formula or breast milk?’ To top it all off, I found the bottle of juice on the counter, and it was fermented because she hadn’t put it in the fridge after opening it and had been hiding it in the cupboard for days because she knew if I found out she was feeding him juice every day I’d be ticked (Spoiler alert: I WAS ticked). Sometimes I wonder how she managed to keep three kids alive into adulthood” (Source).

Can’t Even Trust The Church Family.

“When my daughter was 12 weeks we started taking her to a church family’s house for full time care. There were 6 kids in their family and they seemed to really like having her there. It was such a relief until about 10 months later when my husband picked her up to find second degree burns on her arm. I understand that accidents happen, but after a bit of digging I found out it had happened at 10 a.m. and no one called me. I found out when my husband picked me up later. I waited a couple of hours and then called to find out what happened (I was pretty upset and my husband hadn’t asked any questions). About 5 seconds after hanging up the phone her husband called and yelled at me. He fired us before I hung up on him. They said she pulled a curling iron onto her arm. The pediatrician told me it looked like a curling iron burn, but probably not in the way she described…” (Source).

Babysitting Actually Requires Work?

“One of my friends’ first babysitters would put the one year old in a high chair in front of the TV all day, and if he started fussing cause he wanted to get down, they’d put him in a pack and play in the bedroom so they couldn’t hear him fuss/cry. Another friend’s son was a biter, and instead of going with what the parents were doing as discipline, the babysitter would bite back hard. It’s so hard finding babysitters you can trust!” (Source).

False Sense Of Calm.

“My mom told me a story of when she had to go back to work after having my older sister (back in the days before maternity leave) and left my sister with a friend of hers, who she knew for a while and was out of work. They thought she was great because my sister was always so calm when they went to pick her up. One day my mom picks her up and can’t wake her up to feed her so they went to the emergency room. Turns out this ‘friend’ of hers was giving my barely 2 month old sister medicine (cold medicine, Benadryl, etc.) whenever she cried” (Source).

Don’t Be Afraid To Speak Up.

“I am a healthy happy grown woman now, but from the ages of three to four my parents, young working people, left me with a woman named Joyce for a few hours each afternoon. Joyce was married and had an 11 year old son and 8 year old girl. To this day, I still remember her son and daughter hitting me repeatedly in front of her, and shooting at me with a bb gun packed with sand. Additionally, her husband used the bathroom with the door open. One day, Joyce got mad and filled the sink with water, then held my head underneath. Repeatedly. THAT was the day I told my mother what was going on when she picked me up. Needless to say the police were called. It took a year for me to speak up…always, always encourage your littles to tell you what’s going on. This was 30 years ago, but I remember every moment” (Source).

Smoke Out.

“I went out and left my son (who was 2 at the time) with my sister. I made a big point to make sure she knew not to let her bf smoke around him, no offence to smokers just don’t want it around my kids. Well I went to pick him up and he was coughing to the point he puked and I could smell the smoke. I got mad and asked her what happened and she says that he was in the doorway aa it was too cold to go all the way outside! Also that we grew up around smoke and we were ok. Ummm… my kid has asthma! We ended up having to take him to the ER to get him better. Yup she didn’t watch him again” (Source).

Babies Aren’t Dolls.

“I was a single parent when I had my first daughter and very young so my mom and my grandma were always wanting to help me out during the daytime. One day just me and my grandma were home and I was in the other room doing something and I heard a loud boom on the kitchen tile floor and then crying so I ran in there to find my 6 month old face down on the floor. Turns out my grandma set her up by herself on top of the counter while she went to finish doing the laundry. I could not believe she didn’t at least say something to me instead of assuming I was busy. Been scared to leave her unattended with her ever since” (Source).

Whine About It.

“When our daughter was 7 months old, my husband and I went out for dinner in the town that my in-laws lived in, they offered to keep her since the restaurant wasn’t a baby friendly place. After dinner we went to pick our daughter up and found her outside in the dark sitting in the driveway with her 10-year-old sister playing-all the adults were inside drinking wine. We also found out that the ten year old bathed her with no supervision and basically the ten year old was responsible for her the whole night. Pissed doesn’t describe how we felt, needless to say his parents never watched her again” (Source).

That’s All The Baby Needs…

“My mother-in-law fed my then 5 month old son 3 strawberries, then later because he was screaming, gave him an 8 ounce bottle of sugar water to calm him down. When I came home to a sobbing infant, she yelled at me for not having anything to feed a baby, then swore at me and slammed my door (formula and rice cereal in the cupboard, she didn’t look, nor did she call me). 6 hours, my baby had nothing but sugar water and strawberries” (Source).

Almost A Horror Story.

“It was my first night home with my first baby. She was barely 3 days old. It was late one night and I had just finished breastfeeding, and my mother-in-law offered to rock my days old baby, so I could sleep. I asked her if she was ok to stay up with her and she said yes, she had napped earlier so she would be helpful during the night. I woke up to my baby girl underneath her arm. She is obese and of course everyone knows those horror stories; there is not a day that goes by that I don’t thank God for watching over my little girl that night. I have never been so terrified in my life. 4 years later I still make her have a co-babysitter” (Source).

Float Like A Feather, Get Stung By A Bee.

“The first time I left my oldest with anyone she was 18 months old. We left her with my in-laws for the day so we could go out by ourselves for the first time since she was born. They fed her what I left, changed her regularly and put her down at her normal nap time. They also let her get stung by a bee – apparently she was chasing it and trying to catch it and rather than dissuade her they took pictures. They also warned us that she might have gotten into some poison ivy, but that she would probably be fine because they saw her crawling through a patch and brought her right into the house and rinsed her off with bleach water to get rid of the oils. And she had a splinter in her foot from waking on their old deck barefoot, and a cut on her eyebrow from falling into their brick hearth. Grrrr…It was a while before we let anyone watch her again” (Source).

Kids Are So Straightforward.

“I woke up the next morning after going out to find berry applesauce all over my living room! EVERYWHERE! When I asked my 4 year old what it was he said, ‘oh that’s my apple sauce mama, I was throwing it up in the air trying to hit the fan.’ So I asked where the sitter was and he said, ‘oh she was downstairs on daddy’s computer'” (Source).

If You Can’t See It…

“My in-laws had just gotten new white carpet put in. Babysitter decided it was a nice place to paint her toes green. Of course it spilt and she moved the couch over it. They didn’t find it till the next day when my mother-in-law noticed the couch was probably a half foot from the wall” (Source).