Manny the Manny

My name is Manny and I am, coincidentally, a “manny.” That is, I am a man who works as a nanny, and since I am an adult, apparently being called a babysitter is no longer appropriate. Personally, I prefer Tina Fey’s term, “director of toddlery,” but that doesn’t make for much of a name.

I live, work, write and play* in New York. I manny for a 4- and 10-year-old somewhere in the five boroughs, whom I refer to in posts as Salvador and Yoshi in order to protect the innocent. Before turning to a life of relative leisure (i.e., butt wiping) in the lucrative world of mannying, I spent over a decade as a professional child caregiver in various capacities. I have done everything from mentoring gifted and talented children in public schools to being a summer camp counselor to running a shelter for at-risk children. A brief rundown of my experience and training in child-minding:

• Spent 2 years in college mentoring gifted and talented elementary students, providing additional educational enrichment beyond the classroom.
• Was an advocate in the Michigan State University/Ingham County Adolescent Diversion Project for two semesters, working one-on-one with an at-risk teen as part of multi-disciplinary alternative to detention.
• Wrote a senior honors thesis on parenting practices and parent-child relationships as they relate to problem behaviors in children. My presentation won 1st prize at the Michigan State University Undergraduate Research and Arts Forum in 2006.
• I hold a Bachelor’s degree in psychology from MSU.
• Worked as direct care staff for a year in a short-term emergency shelter for abused and neglected children, aged 0 to 17. (This was where I first picked up my butt-wiping skills.)
• Spent four summers as a camp counselor in the Adirondacks, working primarily with 12-14 year old boys.
• Three years managing a short-term intervention and assessment shelter for at-risk teens in New York City. This is where I picked up the bulk of my training in behavior modification, crisis management, and applied child development.
• Six months of training in behavioral models as applied to long-term residential and in-home settings.
• Certified parent trainer in Common Sense Parenting.

In my journey along this path, I picked up more training in caring for children than any one person should humanely be subjected to in a lifetime. It is now my privilege to pass this knowledge on to you via this website, along with some humor, advice, reviews, fun stuff and anything else that I think might be of value to today’s parents.

By way of disclaimer, let me make it clear what I am versus what I am not. I am a well-trained professional who cares about kids and understand the challenges they present. I am a certified parent trainer who is well versed in tackling problem behaviors and building skills. I am a blogger who shares a mixture of information and opinion to anyone who wishes to read it, in order to further the general discussion of child care and parenting — and maybe we’ll all learn a few things along the way.

While I hold a degree in psychology, I am not a therapist nor clinician. I am not a parent and by no means am I arrogant enough to think that the strategies and style I describe are the only right way to care for children. There is no single right way to nurture a human being – although there are several decidedly wrong ones – I just share what has worked for me and what has been empirically shown to work for many others. If you stumbled upon this blog looking for a kiddie instruction manual, I must apologize, because I don’t have it.

Read on anyway, though. I bet you’ll find something helpful. Or at least something interesting. Maybe just something to take your mind off the non-stop butt wiping. Heaven knows we all need that from time to time.

*I mean actually playing. Like in a sandbox.