I will preface this with the fact that my day care didn't open until my own children were 11 and 8 - ish.

From the beginning, I assured my sons that their toys would not be day care toys and that their bedrooms would be out of bounds - and I stuck to that. I felt my own boys needed to feel this was their home and they needed some private space which wasn't occupied by client's children. They also needed to keep their own possessions. It's very different when a child invites a friend over to their home to play with their toys than it is when several children are in their house who might not necessarily be who they would choose for their friends, and they feel they have to share their precious belongings with children they might not particularly like.

When I first opened, I did take some before and after school children and I found for my boys that was too tricky to handle. It wasn't so much that other children were in the house although of course that was strange at first, but it was more so that these weren't necessarily the personalities they would choose to have as friends. They felt that after having to be with a mixed group in school all day, they shouldn't need to have to be nice, thoughtful, sharing etc to a new mixture of children when they got home at the end of the day too. I guess it's like adults in the workplace - although you get on with those you work with, some you get on with better than others and you wouldn't necessarily want all your work colleagues in your home at the end of the day. You wouldn't necessarily socialize with them all. You just want to come in, relax, hang out with the people who matter to you and not have to bother with those who don't.

They had been through some very big changes - losing a parent, moving house, and we hadn't long been in Canada so hadn't really made the sort of life-long friends which are great support in difficult times. Because it really was the boys and I on this continent, I think they struggled with the older day care children. Although they understood that I needed to work and that by opening a day care I was using my past careers to ensure I could still be home for them at the end of the school day, they really struggled when I was caring for children of a similar age to themselves.

I then made the switch to the little ones, and my boys adapted much better with that.

Now at very nearly 18 and 15, they are incredibly kind and patient with the little ones although have limited interaction other than school vacations. If a day care child is upset and the boys are home, you can count on one of them appearing to see if they can help to either sit with the upset one or entertain the others whilst I calm the upset child. They will keep an eye on the day care children if I'm toilet training someone who needs an extra bit of help in the bathroom.

In terms of your daughter, try not to take it to heart.

One of my sons is an outside person - always has been, always will be. He would go out with friends to their houses, to the park, at any given opportunity. He's always respected the age appropriate boundaries in terms of time outside or distance from the house and checking in with me but he's always needed that extended social circle. Home is the soft place he lands at the end of the day. My other son, is a home body. He spends a lot of time in his room, even now. He's chatting on Skype to his friends, he's reading, he pops up and down the stairs for a chat. That's just who he is. Even this summer at 15, he rarely went out and as much as I tried to get him to, he truly prefers just to be home, doing his own thing and entertaining himself. He's a happy young man, has great friends, a straight A student but is just more selective and keeps a closer social circle than his brother. He just needs less social interaction.

So part of your daughters decision, might be that she just doesn't want to hang out with little kids and prefers her own space. That's okay. It takes all sorts to make a World. Part of it might be that the day care children just don't happen to be the type of children she would choose to play with. Part of it might be that she just doesn't want to have to be sharing, and kind, and polite to a group of children that are already taking up most of the space in her home.

As long as she feels that she can participate if she chooses (which she seems to), as long as she knows that day care is just your business but she and your family are your whole World, as long as she knows that at home, she has some freedom of movement and it's okay to choose to escape, then it will all work out.

I think as parents, particularly as mothers, we sometimes worry about things which don't need to be worried over. Most of the things we stress about, never happen anyway! We spend hours, days, nights agonizing over imagined situations which never come to be.

One of the biggest lessons I've learned in the last 8 years or so, is not to worry about something until it's happened.