A Winnipeg daycare has been shut down as part of a police investigation.
Chris and Julie Phippard brought their 13-month-old daughter to the unlicensed home daycare in St. Vital on Oct. 13.
What happened that morning still isn’t fully known to her parents.
“Got a call saying that she needed to be picked up and something happened with her hands,” said Chris Phippard.
Chantal’s hands and wrists were bright red, inflamed, with the skin in serious distress.
Doctors treated her injuries as chemical burns.
For more than two weeks, Winnipeg’s Children’s Hospital became home.
“When we first showed up at the hospital, we didn't know anything about burns and injuries, I didn't know if her fingers were going to be ok,” said Phippard.
The baby was put on pain medication, not sleeping or eating well, doctors hooked her up to an IV.
“She couldn't really walk, so we're sitting with her, playing a whole lot of peekaboo,” said Phippard.
Chantal had been going to the daycare for just two weeks when she was hurt.
It’s now closed while Winnipeg police and Manitoba Child and Family Services investigate.
The Phippards are waiting until police finish their investigations before they decide if they’ll take legal action against the daycare.
“Sometimes, I feel that I’m kind of numbed by the whole thing, like maybe I haven't had time to fully process it,” said Phippard.
For now, Chantal’s parents are off work while their daughter recovers.
Her right hand is out of bandages and healing better than the left. Doctors say she may still need skin grafts to help the healing.
“We still don’t have a concrete idea of when Chantal is going to be 100 per cent able to play and be left at another daycare or something.”
Family friends started a GoFundMe page to help cover expenses.
“It’s been really hard to adjust that this has become our new normal,” said Chris Phippard, who still isn’t sure when he and his wife will return to work.
