Mischa Capra captures her job as a "mother's helper" on her social media platforms
Credit: Mischa Capra
NEED TO KNOW
- Mischa Capra has gone viral for her videos where she takes followers through a day in the life at her job as a mother’s helper
- Speaking with PEOPLE, Capra emphasizes the mutual respect she has with her four client families, who rarely ask her to do tasks outside her job description
- She also shares whether there are any tasks she wouldn’t do
Mischa Capra tells PEOPLE that she's very "protective" when it comes to her clients — all of whom hired her for her expertise as a mother's helper.
Capra explains that a mother's helper is different from other home helpers, like a nanny or even a housekeeper. Nannies, she explains, are primarily focused on childcare, and housekeepers are solely devoted to maintaining a home's cleanliness.
Mother's helpers do exactly what the name says — they help out the mothers. All the little tasks, like switching over the laundry, tidying up toys in bedrooms and making beds that a mom might not want to deal with after a long day? Those are part of Capra's job description.
Credit: Mischa Capra
Over time with her clients, Capra has built up a rapport that enables them to ask her for help when it comes to the ordinary tasks of motherhood that might bring shame in asking for help.
"In the sense, she is leaning on me where she doesn't have someone like her mom to come over and help set up," Capra explains of one of her clients, who recently asked for help setting up a party. "Obviously, she has her husband, but she also has a six-month-old baby, and a four-year-old who need constant attention. You need help. You can't do it all."
Perhaps surprisingly, Capra finds that many people have a "big problem" with her title of a mother's helper, with many social media users wanting her to slightly adjust the name to better explain her duties (some have thrown out the idea of family helper or housekeeper). However, for Capra, the defense of her job title is quite simple.
"I'm helping the mom. That is who I coordinate with. That is who I'm supporting," she says. "And yes, obviously it supports the entire household, but I'm really there to help the mom and help create ease in her everyday life and relieve some of that stress."
Capra is the first line of defense for her clients online, whose homes she often shares as she takes followers through a day in her life. "I'm always kindness first. And these people let me expose their homes. And if you're going to judge because their three-year-old son didn't make the bed, I'm going to delete the comment. Because the moms I work for follow me, and I want respect for them and their friends."
The respect that Capra builds with her families is mutual, meaning that her clients — of which she currently has four — rarely ask her to do things that fall outside the realm of her job description. As such, when they do ask for something outside the scope of her job description, Mischa isn't really inclined to say no.
She also points to her own upbringing as the reason why.
"My whole life, my mom was kind of like, nothing's ever a big deal, in the sense that almost everything can be fixed," Capra explains.
"That's why I have such a calm demeanor about whatever they ask me to do, because it's kind of like, 'All right, if nothing's a big deal, just do it and move on with the day.'" She's gotten pen stains out of cream upholstered chairs, made goodie bags for moms — "Nothing surprises me, because I'm so go with the flow," she adds.
"It's kind of a hard question for me to answer, because I would never say no to anything," she says.
Touching on the element of respect she has been able to cultivate with her four client families, Capra says that she feels her clients wouldn't "ever" ask her for something outside the scope of her job.
Credit: Mischa Capra
"Some people," she says, referring to her commenters, "are like, 'Do you clean the toilets, do you do this…?' And I'm like, 'No, but let's say they were having a party or something and she had asked me, it was like a one-off.'"
"I love who I work for, and I respect them and I'm there to help," she says. "There's nothing I won't do." And, even though Capra is clear that she is not a nanny, she's always happy to watch a kid every once in a while if a mom needs to step out. "I only talk with the moms, ever," she adds. "Obviously, the dads, they all say hello. But I only talk with the moms. And the kids, most are in school." She loves kids and always says hello, but is clear that she isn't there for childcare.
Capra does not visit all four of her clients every single day. All of her clients have a set start and end time. Capra even goes as far as to take on some of the messier tasks of being a mom. The other day, she cleaned up some vomit from a car seat. "Some people would be like, 'Ew, no,' but it's just like, I put gloves on and I moved on with a day."
"I work for really great people," she says. "And they're very thankful and respectful. I think that it makes me want to be as helpful. If you're not getting respected and you're doing all this and you're not feel appreciated, is when I feel like a lot of people are just like, 'I don't want to do it because you don't appreciate the stuff I normally do.'"
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