Demanding Parents Expect Nanny to Pay $1000 for Vacation Flights – Their Harsh Reality Check

ane’s employers plan a luxurious holiday away, tagging her along to look after their children. While they promised that they would take care of all the expenses, it is only when they return home that they demand that Jane play her part and pay for her plane tickets. But Jane won’t give up that easily.

“Jane, can you come into the living room?” Mrs. Smith called out, her teaspoon clinking as she stirred sugar into the cup of tea Melanie, the helper, had just given her.

I was tidying up the playroom.

“Now, please,” she added.

Her tone was sweet, but something felt off. I walked into the living room, trying to keep my nerves at bay.

“Sure, Mrs. Smith. What’s up?” I replied, wiping the disinfectant onto my jeans.

She was sitting on the couch, perfectly poised as always. Not even a strand of hair out of place. Mr. Smith was seated beside her, his phone in his hand. He gave me a tight smile.

“Jane, we need to talk about the vacation.”

I nodded, curious.

We had been home for two days now. Back from our trip to the seaside, staying in a luxurious resort. It was almost the break I needed, minus the fact that I had the Smiths’ three children, and their friends, the Johnsons’ two sons to care for as well.

I was just doing my job in a fancier location.

“Of course,” I said. “It was a lovely trip. Thank you again for inviting me.”

“Yes, well,” Mrs. Smith started. “We need to discuss the plane tickets. When will you be able to return the $1000?”

I blinked. I was sure that I had misheard her.

“Sorry, $1000? For the tickets? What?”

“Yes, for the tickets, Jane,” she spoke slowly as if I was stupid. “We spent a lot on them, and we thought you’d be grateful enough to pay us back.”

My heart raced. I didn’t have that kind of money to spare. I was their full-time nanny, with a mother to care for at home.

“But you told me that everything was sorted. You said, ‘Don’t worry about it, Jane. We’ve got it all covered.’”

Mrs. Smith’s expression hardened. Mr. Smith gazed at me.

“That was before the Johnsons refused to sign a business deal with Craig. That was the entire purpose of the holiday. Mr. Smith and I needed to woo them. So, there’s no need to seem generous now, Jane. You have exactly one week to return the money, or it will be taken from your pay.”

I was stunned. The room felt like it was spinning.

“But… I can’t afford that, Mrs. Smith,” I admitted. “Most of my salary goes to the rent at home and my mother’s medication. I can’t take that away from her. And you didn’t mention anything about paying you back!”

“That’s not our problem, Jane. One week,” Mr. Smith reiterated, reaching for a croissant from the tea tray left for Mrs. Smith. With a wave of his hand, he signaled the end of the discussion.

That night, I sat in my tiny room a few feet away from the Smiths’ house. I was seething. How could they do this? I needed a plan, and I needed it fast.

Then it hit me: the Smiths cared deeply about their social standing and their reputation.

“Of course, that’s all they care about,” I muttered to myself as I brushed my teeth before bed. “But I can use that to my advantage.”

The next day, after I dropped the kids off at school, I created a fake email account. I drafted a polite but detailed message about my experience, making sure to be clear without naming any names.

But there were enough telltale signs pointing to the Smiths, from their cars to the kids, to the gold facial appointments that Mrs. Smith bragged about.

Thereafter, I sent it to the key people in their social circle, including the other influential families that the Smiths wanted to be in league with.

“I just don’t understand what they want from us,” I overheard Mrs. Smith say into the phone later that day. “Eva asked me if everything is true, but I don’t know what she’s talking about.”

A few days later, the gossip started spreading. The Smiths’ dirty little secret on how they treated “their staff” was out, and naturally, their reputation took a hit.

Mrs. Smith called in a masseuse to soothe her muscles.

“Just let them into the spa when they arrive, Jane,” she said. “I need all the help I can get.”

Later that day, when I went to pick the kids up from school, the other nannies were hanging about, waiting for the bell to ring.

“Did you read the email about the Smiths?” one of the nannies said. “Jane, are they really like that?”

I nodded.

“They’re good parents, but they’re horrible people,” I admitted, not wanting to give away that I was the person who sent out the email.

“How long will you work for them?” another asked me. “I couldn’t live or work under those circumstances. Rich people need to learn that respect for them is earned, too.”

I smiled.

The nannies went back and forth as we waited. And through their chatter, I discovered something interesting about Mrs. Smith.

Turns out that my employer had a habit of “borrowing” items from her friends and never returning them.

“An entire Gucci handbag, Jane,” Mina said. “Mrs. Smith asked my ma’am if she could borrow it for a fundraising gala two months ago.”

“That’s ridiculous!” I said, shocked. “I didn’t know that she was capable of that sort of thing. But she doesn’t like me getting too close to her things anyway.”

A few days later, Mrs. Smith held one of her ladies’ luncheons. It was a monthly event that she loved hosting, but this time it was only two weeks into the month.

“I need this to go well, Jane,” she said as I cut fruit up for the kids. “So, you need to attend it. The kids will be at school. Everything will be catered for. Just walk around and talk to the women. Make us seem human.”

I knew that she was puzzling. She must have heard more than enough through the grapevine.

During the event, I walked around as requested of me. But I wasn’t going to let this opportunity slip. And I had nothing to lose. The Smiths were probably going to fire me at the end of the week when I couldn’t make the $1000.

“We’ll deal with it, darling,” my mother coughed into the phone when I told her the truth of the matter.

At the luncheon, I walked around, casually mentioning to the ladies how much I admired Mrs. Smith’s collection, making sure that I spoke to Eva, Mina’s employer.

“Mrs. Smith has a stunning handbag similar to yours,” I said. “Gucci. Did she lend you this one? She’s always telling me that she lends her things out because she has so much.”

Eva looked at me over the top of her champagne glass.

“Is that so, Jane?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.

Whispers started circulating. By the end of the luncheon, Mrs. Smith’s reputation for borrowing without returning was the hot topic.

The next morning, her friends began asking for their things back.

Mrs. Smith was mortified.

During dinner the next night, Mr. Smith called me to the table, asking me to join them.

“Thank you, but I usually wait for Ivy and Melanie to eat,” I said politely, mentioning the chef and her helper.

“No, sit with us,” he insisted.

I obliged.

Despite his tone, I hoped that maybe he was going to tell me that the money could be forgotten. And that everything would return as normal.

“It has come to my attention that an anonymous email has gone out,” he said, cutting into his steak.

“A disgusting email,” Mrs. Smith added, taking a long sip of her wine.

“Did you have anything to do with it?” he asked me, his eyes trying to coax a confession out of me.

I shook my head, looking down at my plate.

“Then that settles it,” he said, knowingly. “You’re dismissed. You can pack up and get out tomorrow.”

I did exactly as I was told and moved back home. A week later, Mrs. Johnson called me.

“Jane, can you come over for tea?” she asked warmly.

“Of course, Mrs. Johnson,” I replied, curious about the nature of the invitation.

As we sat in her luxurious living room, she looked at me with genuine concern.

“I heard about what the Smiths did to you. It’s disgraceful.”

I nodded, trying to keep my composure.

“Well,” she continued. “We’ve decided to cut ties with the Smiths entirely. And we’d like to offer you a job. Better pay, better working conditions. We could use someone like you for our kids.”

I was stunned.

“Of course!” I exclaimed. I needed the job desperately.

“You’ve earned it,” she smiled. “The boys loved having you watch them during the holiday. And somehow, you got Jonathan to eat his peas!”

I don’t know how the Smiths reacted to me working for the Johnsons, but I hoped that they felt betrayed.

What would you have done?

11 Characters That Were Pregnant in Real Life, and What Their Babies Look Like Today

Participating in the filming of a series or movie is hard work since celebrities have to get into the skin of their characters to achieve an authentic interpretation. But that doesn’t mean that actors don’t have real lives behind the scenes. Sometimes, actresses decide to become mothers and already have contracts with production companies. This presents a challenge for them, because of their pregnancy, and for the filmmakers who have to decide whether to incorporate the belly into the plot or simply let the actress cover her belly.

Bright Side made a list of 11 celebrities who played during pregnancy (some of them had to hide their belly) and is revealing what these kids that made things complicated for their mothers and producers look like today.

1. Julia Louis-Dreyfus in Seinfeld

During the shooting of the third season of the popular sitcom, Seinfeld, Julia Louis-Dreyfus became pregnant with her first child, Henry Hall. Baby Henry was born in July of 1992. However, the actress’s pregnancy was never really a problem for the producers of the series. The simple solution writers came up with was to put her character, Elaine, in baggy clothes and any large garments to hide her belly. Henry is currently 29 years old.

2. Claire Danes in Homeland

You probably know actress Claire Danes because of the amazing performance she delivered as the CIA agent, Carrie Mathison, in the television series, Homeland. However, what’s not often talked about is the fact that she was 8 months pregnant when she completed the filming of the second season. Her pregnancy could not be introduced in the plot due to her character, so they decided to use digital retouching to hide her belly. Her son, Cyrus, was born in December 2012, and he’s now 9 years old.

3. Ellen Pompeo in Grey’s Anatomy

During the filming of the sixth season of one of the most popular drama series ever created, Grey’s Anatomy, producers decided to hide Ellen Pompeo’s pregnancy from the cameras. This was done because, for the writers, this was not the right time for her character, Dr. Meredith, to have a baby, and they wanted to keep that for a later moment. In September 2009, Stella Luna, now 12 years old, was born.

4. Zooey Deschanel in New Girl

Zooey Deschanel was 7 months pregnant when season 5 of the hit series, New Girl,was shot. As you probably remember, the actress had to be momentarily replaced by Megan Fox since producers were only able to hide her belly for no more than a few episodes. Deschanel also had to stay off the series until she returned from postpartum rest. Zooey gave birth to her daughter, Elsie, in August 2015, and today the little girl is 5 years old.

5. Holly Marie Combs in Charmed

Holly Marie Combs, who plays Piper, one of the main characters of the series, Charmed, announced during the shooting of the sixth season that she was pregnant. The producers thought it was better to hide her pregnancy at first. However, after a while, they decided that it was better for her character to actually have a child in the story as well. Apparently, Piper’s pregnancy was planned before the actress knew she was expecting a baby, so that came in handy. Combs gave birth to her first child, Finley Arthur, in 2004, and he’s now 17 years old.

6. Amaia Salamanca in Velvet

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Amaia Salamanca’s pregnancy was well-planned when she rejoined the set of Velvet, a show about the compelling Spanish story of a fashion house in Madrid in the late ’50s. Because of this, production had no choice but to make Barbara, her character, pregnant as well. At the age of 28, she gave birth to her first child, a girl named Olivia Varo, in April 2014.

7. Kerry Washington in Scandal

Kerry Washington’s pregnancy happened right in the middle of the shooting of the series, Scandal, in which she played the main character. This unforeseen event forced producers to reduce the number of episodes to hide the actress’s pregnancy that couldn’t fit the schedule of the series. Currently, her daughter, Isabelle, is 7 years old.

8. Kristen Bell in House of Lies

The star of the House of Lies TV series, Kristen Bell, was about 6 months pregnant with her first daughter when the second season of the show was about to be shot. In order to actually film some episodes, the producers had to hire a body double for the scenes in which Bell would have had to show her belly. Her first daughter, Lincoln Bell, is now 8 years old.

9. Cobie Smulders in How I Met Your Mother

https://embed.gettyimages.com/embed/165393821?et=bak9FYxCS1h09phHhjaOIg&tld=no&sig=Dn2XqspeN4ZcyicTRn-p4kc5RF_6Op1Vray794hTe00=&caption=true&ver=1

Actress Cobie Smulders brought her character, Robin, to millions of small screens thanks to the sitcom, How I Met Your Mother. After fellow actress Alyson Hannigan told the show-runners that she was pregnant, Cobie Smulders discovered that she was also pregnant and told the producers who had to camouflage both of their pregnancies. To disguise Smulders’ belly, producers asked the costume designers to use garments and objects that could hide her abdomen, and they had the character remain seated for most of the scenes that she appeared in. In May 2009, the actress gave birth to her daughter, Shaelyn.

10. Madonna in Evita

Madonna, also known as the Queen of Pop, made the controversial 1996 film in which she played the wife of Argentinian dictator Juan Domingo Perón, Eva Perón. However, Madonna was pregnant with her daughter, Lourdes Leon, back then. It was because of this that the crew of Evita cleverly used costumes and camera shots so that it was not noticeable that Madonna was pregnant with her eldest daughter who is now 24 years old.

11. Lisa Kudrow in Friends

When Lisa Kudrow played Phoebe Buffay on one of the most famous sitcoms, Friends, she became pregnant. This was right about when they started filming the fourth season. The producers decided to include her pregnancy in the story by having Phoebe lend her womb to her brother to conceive triplets because he and his wife couldn’t have kids on their own. Today, her only son, Julian, is 23 years old.

What is your favorite family series? What do you think of women who work while pregnant?

Preview photo credit Friends / Bright/Kauffman/Crane Productions, and, co-producerlisakudrow / Instagram

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