Child care is expensive. It's really expensive. And it's one of those things in life that you DON'T always get what you pay for.

So it's incredibly frustrating when, after carefully selecting child care for your baby and going through the painful grieving process of leaving her with someone for the first time, you realize that the child care setting you've chosen is rapidly deteriorating. Rapidly. Deteriorating.

I hesitated in leaving my daughter at day care this morning. I walked in to the day care center (I still have a mild feeling of dread whenever I walk in the doors, knowing that I'm about to leave my daughter in the hands of someone who doesn't think she's the most precious thing in the world to them) today, navigated my way back to the infant room (which is about the size of most people's living rooms and dining rooms put together) and almost threw up. There they were - row upon row upon ROW of cribs. Fifteen cribs in all. That means FIFTEEN babies.

Let me clarify - when we started Sophie at this day care there were six babies and three adults watching them (one full time and two part time).

Now, with no notice, there are FIFTEEN babies and six adults watching them (1 full time, 5 part time).

What if there were a fire? There is NO WAY you could get fifteen babies out of that room, around all of those cribs, in a safe way in a short amount of time. No way.

There is also NO WAY you can tend to that many babies' feeding, changing and sleeping schedules. Period.

And, perhaps most importantly, is the sleep problem. Babies need sleep. It's a physiological fact. In order to grow, in order to develop, and in order to be their pleasant baby selves, they need several hours of sleep during the day. Now tell me, with fifteen babies, how you are going to be able to keep it quiet enough in there for babies to sleep!??!

It's a horrible situation.

And we don't have a back up. We don't know anyone that can take Sophie in the meantime. We don't have family that can step up to the plate for a couple of weeks while we find someone else.

I typically don't panic over small stuff - but this doesn't feel small. And I'm panicking. Brian and I both are. I'm leaving work early today to "drop in" and see how things are REALLY going. And I'm picking Sophie up early. And I'm not sure I'm bringing her back there again. Ever.