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Off topic discussions / CRA T778 Child Care Expenses Deduction for 2021

« Last post by sedohrm on March 01, 2022, 02:53:45 PM »

I just did my 2021 Taxes and cannot believe the maximum amount that can be claimed is $8000.00 for child care. In my area there is a lack of child care programs and I have had to hire a private nanny. That cost me almost $30,000.00 for full time child care due to pandemic and schools being closed. Now I find out I can only claim $8000 of that. So I am being kept in a higher tax bracket and have to pay more taxes. The nanny is being taxed on the income that I pay, the majority I am paying income tax on as well. This is double taxation on families that have a lower disposable income because of the child care and now we are being double taxed on top of that.

I already wrote to my MP and I encourage all families to do the same. This needs to be changed especially because of the pandemic and the higher child care costs.

Babysitter / nanny wanted / Brantford Ontario - Child care needed

« Last post by sedohrm on March 01, 2022, 02:45:20 PM »

I am looking for after school care for a wonderfully sweet 5-year-old boy.
After School: Mon to Fri, 3:30pm to 5:30pm - pickup after school required, from the school to the home is 1.5km

Summer Full Time Hours: July 1 to September 1 :
9:00am to 5:30pm, Mon to Friday

Our family follows all pandemic guidelines and we have not even had so much as a common cold since the start of the pandemic.

Duties:
Some minimal food prep and cleaning for the child.
Keeping the home the way you found it is the only cleaning duties.
Helping a little with the child's personal hygiene
Fun, games, reviewing school lessons, with some arts and crafts time.

Vulnerable Sector check or Police Clearance is not required but an asset.
CPR training is not required but is an asset.

Maximum $17.00/hr

Making a good fit:
We are a very clean, no smoking home.

For more information please contact me and I look forward to working with you.

Finances / Canada Child Benefit

« Last post by LeeBenjamin02654 on January 24, 2022, 11:59:55 PM »

Hi everyone! I want to start saving/planning for my child's future as early as now and I've been looking at different options. I saw this article from Insurance for Children that shared some good points about CCB. Has anyone had personal experiences with this that they can share? Is it true that it is better than RESP? Or are there better alternatives? Thanks in advance!

Health / Kids jewelers

« Last post by tijojaison on October 31, 2021, 05:42:10 PM »

There is no simple way to tell if jewelry contains cadmium or not just by looking at it. Buying jewelry that is made locally or its metal content verified by the retailer can reduce the risk of cadmium exposure.

Preschoolers / Montossori in Vancouver/Burnaby

« Last post by Sam on May 27, 2021, 09:19:19 PM »

Hello Friends

I am looking for some recommendations on a decent Montessori school for my three year .

Thanks , Sam

Safety / Sadly, Every Day of the Year Needs to be Child Abuse Prevention Month

« Last post by Frank Sterle Jr. on April 06, 2021, 07:13:35 PM »

Trauma from unchecked child abuse/neglect typically results in the helpless child’s brain improperly developing. If allowed to continue for a prolonged period, it acts as his/her starting point into an adolescence and (in particular) an adulthood in which its brain uncontrollably releases potentially damaging levels of inflammation-promoting stress hormones and chemicals, even in non-stressful daily routines. In short, it can make every day an emotional/psychological ordeal, unless the mental turmoil is doused with some form of self-medicating.

Meanwhile, general society perceives thus treats human procreative rights as though we’ll somehow, in blind anticipation, be innately inclined to sufficiently understand and appropriately nurture our children’s naturally developing minds and needs. I find that mentality — however widely practiced — wrong and needing re-evaluation, however unlikely that will ever happen.

Proactive measures may be needed to avoid later having to reactively treat (often with tranquilizing medication) potentially serious and life-long symptoms caused by a dysfunctional environment, neglect and/or abuse. And if we’re to avoid the dreadedly invasive conventional reactive means of intervention — that of governmental forced removal of children from dysfunctional/abusive home environments — maybe we then should be willing to try an unconventional proactive means of preventing some future dysfunctional/abusive family situations. Child development science curriculum might be one way.

Also, mental health-care needs to generate as much societal concern — and government funding — as does physical health, even though psychological illness/dysfunction typically is not immediately visually observable.

I wonder how many instances there have been wherein immense long-term suffering by children of dysfunctional rearing might have been prevented had the parent(s) received, as high school students, some crucial parenting or child development education by way of mandatory curriculum? After all, dysfunctional and/or abusive parents, for example, may not have had the chance to be anything else due to their lack of such education and their own dysfunctional/abusive rearing as children.

For decades, I’ve strongly felt that a psychologically and emotionally sound (as well as a physically healthy) future should be all children’s foremost right — especially considering the very troubled world into which they never asked to enter — and therefore child development science should be learned long before the average person has their first child.

Off topic discussions / Re: ASD & High ACE Score Increases Likelihood of Substance (Ab)Use

« Last post by Frank Sterle Jr. on March 27, 2021, 02:54:16 PM »

While a high score on the adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) questionnaire is bad, there can be a counteracting effect if one also scores high on the Resilience questionnaire. [The two questionnaires can be accessed at: www.irenegreene.com/wp-content/uploads/ACEScoreResilienceQ2.pdf]

Resilience is a formal measure of one’s emotional/psychological strengths. For example, one may have had an uncle or grandmother who was a stable, strong and loving presence always available when one’s parent(s) was/were dysfunctional or abusive.

Society tends to perceive thus treat human procreation like we will somehow be innately inclined to sufficiently understand and appropriately nurture our children’s naturally developing minds and needs. I find that mentality — however widely practiced — wrong and needing re-evaluation, however unlikely that will ever happen.

What it essentially comes down to is, proactive measures in order to avoid having to later reactively treat (often with tranquilizing medication) potentially serious and life-long symptoms caused by a dysfunctional environment, neglect and/or abuse. And if we’re to avoid the dreadedly invasive conventional reactive means of intervention—that of governmental forced removal of children from dysfunctional/abusive home environments—maybe we then should be willing to try an unconventional proactive means of preventing some future dysfunctional/abusive family situations. Secondary high school child development science curriculum might be one way.

Also, mental health-care needs to generate as much societal concern as does physical health, even though psychological illness/dysfunction typically is not immediately visually observable.

____

“It has been said that if child abuse and neglect were to disappear today, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual would shrink to the size of a pamphlet in two generations, and the prisons would empty. Or, as Bernie Siegel, MD, puts it, quite simply, after half a century of practicing medicine, ‘I have become convinced that our number-one public health problem is our childhood’.” (Childhood Disrupted, pg.228).

Off topic discussions / ASD & High ACE Score Increases Likelihood of Substance (Ab)Use

« Last post by Frank Sterle Jr. on February 25, 2021, 07:51:41 PM »

Notable adverse childhood experience (ACE) trauma — especially when its effect is amplified by an accompanying autism spectrum disorder (ASD) — suffered by adolescents can readily lead to a substance use disorder. This, of course, can also lead to an adulthood of debilitating self-medicating.

The greater the drug-induced euphoria or escape one attains from its use, the more one wants to repeat the experience; and the more intolerable one finds their sober reality, the more pleasurable that escape should be perceived. By extension, the greater one’s mental pain or trauma while sober, the greater the need for escape from reality, thus the more addictive the euphoric escape-form will likely be.

If the adolescent is also highly sensitive, both the drug-induced euphoria and, conversely, the come-down effect or return to their burdensome reality will be heightened thus making the substance-use more addicting.

As a highly sensitive child, teenager and adult with ASD—an official condition with which I greatly struggled yet of which I was not even aware until I was a half-century old—compounded by a high ACE score, I largely learned this for myself from my own substance (ab)use experience. The self-medicating method I utilized during most of my pre-teen years, however, was eating.

Meanwhile, in many straight and NT minds such addicts have somehow committed a moral crime. But serious life trauma, notably adverse childhood experiences, is typically behind a substance abuser’s debilitating lead-ball-and-chain self-medicating lifestyle.

Generally, there’s a formidable reason why a person repeatedly consumes and gets heavily hooked on an unregulated often deadly chemical that eventually destroys their life and even that of a loved-one. It all really doesn’t happen out of boredom.

Perhaps not surprisingly, I now strongly feel that not only should all school teachers have received ASD training, but that there should further be an inclusion in standard high school curriculum of a child development course which in part would also teach students about the often debilitating condition.

It would explain to students how, among other aspects of the condition, people with ASD (including those with higher functioning autism) are often deemed willfully ‘difficult’ and socially incongruent, when in fact such behavior is really not a choice.

While some other school curriculum is controversial (e.g. SOGI, especially in rural residential settings), it nonetheless was implemented. The same attitude and policy should be applied to teaching high school students about ASD, the developing mind and, especially, how to enable a child’s mind to develop properly.

Health and Safety / Re: root canal for my son

« Last post by patriciaucker on February 21, 2021, 04:41:50 PM »

I would recommend you go through with it by visiting your dentist and take the option of the root canal. There are possibilities if late to take care of your teeth, there are chances for the damage to be worse. As your son is young, getting immediate dental care would be helpful to maintain his oral health. Please do consider the factors for a root canal before going ahead with the procedure.

Family Outings and Excursions / Disposal bins for party

« Last post by christy bently on January 27, 2021, 01:31:29 AM »

Hey all, My son and I have been thinking about having a small gathering for our nana's birthday party. As it is the time of COVID-19, there are certain restrictions on the gathering and social interactions with social distancing. This has resulted in the decision to invite only close family and friends to the party. All the needed arrangements are to be made, the main thing that bothers us is the need for waste management after the party as there would be many arising. I was thinking about renting disposal bins for garbage disposal and would really appreciate it if someone could help and advise me on this if it is a good idea.