Leila

My Requirements

We are looking for a full time live-in or live-out nanny to look after our two daughters, aged 20 months and 4 years. The eldest child is autistic, with a demand avoidant (PDA) profile, so we are looking for someone who has experience with special needs - knowledge of PDA is a plus but not a necessity. Our autistic child is highly intelligent and very advanced at communicating but demands make her anxious, so she needs a low-demand approach whereby rules are minimised and she is made to feel as though she is in control.

The right candidate would be someone who is:
- calm and patient
- willing to learn about PDA and adapt their childcare style
- flexible - strict rules and discipline will not work with this condition
- collaborative and able to communicate with the child as though she is on the same level, letting her take charge where necessary
- fun and creative - novelty, role play and games make transitions easier
- emotionally intelligent and able to help the child label and cope with her emotions
- prepared to look beyond the outward behaviours and try to understand the root cause of what is making the child anxious, including unmet sensory needs or overstimulation, communication or processing difficulties, anxiety, etc.

Additional training will be provided on PDA to support the nanny in her role.

The children currently attend nursery and will continue to attend on a part-time basis so the nanny would be responsible for:
- Getting the children ready for nursery and dropping them off
- Organising activities, playdates etc. when the children are not in nursery
- Supporting the children’s learning and development

It should be noted that the eldest who is autistic is sometimes anxious about attending nursery. When this is the case, the nanny would be responsible for looking after her at home while the youngest goes to nursery. We are looking for someone who is flexible and available to focus primarily on our eldest daughter who has additional needs.

This is a full time role, with one evening of babysitting a week.

The role would involve some light housekeeping duties (we have a cleaner 1-2 a week), including:
- Planning and preparing meals for the family during the week while the children are in nursery
- Dealing with the children’s clothes / washing
- Tidying up after children / meals

Both parents will be working from home 2-3 days a week and going into the office 2 days a week.

We would prefer if the nanny was willing to go on holiday with the family once or twice a year (for 1 to 2 weeks).