Why would this be stressful?

The daycare woes continue. I am so torn about what to do.

The center we are currently using is fine. Aside from a couple issues the first two days, things are going well there. My biggest problem is that I have not heard one person say good things about this particular center. In fact as time goes on, I only hear bad things. Nothing that makes me fear for Alex's safety or anything crazy, just not good stuff. This conflicts with the fact that Alex seems to be doing well there. He has been content every time I have picked him up. He is safe, clean and being fed. What more could you ask for? So why can I not get other people's opinions out of my head? Well, what fun would that be? The things people have said to us make me feel like I am not seeing something horribly wrong with this place, and some time down the road catastrophe is going to strike and I will shrivel up and die inside with guilt for not moving him to different care.

So then we move to the option of picking a new day care. Do we stick with a center or give in-home a try? My only knowledge of in-home day care is my ex-boyfriend's mother's in-home day care. And since I am certain she is a direct descendant of the Wicked Witch of the West, it was not the most favorable impression. My two big problems with in-home are:
1. I don't believe they are in any way, shape, or form, as regulated at centers. There is just no way the state is checking in with every single person that watches kids on a regular basis. And there aren't other people there to tattle on you if you are doing bad things. That's how I like to pick who is going to care for my kid...the best tattler.
2. The person watching the kids has no out. If they get frustrated, too bad. They cannot leave the room and cool off. They have to stay in the situation. That just feels like I am asking to get my baby shaken.
I guess there just seems to be the need for a lot more initial blind trust with in-home than a center.

But then we get to the cons of centers. Centers are crazy expensive. The care your kid gets usually isn't very unique since there are a lot more kids running around to keep track of. The flip side of the in-home problem of only having one person there is that in centers there are multiple adults that can get to chatting among themselves and not being so attentive.

The pros of each situation are the flip sides of the cons of other situation. So any sane person would just weigh each issue and find out what means more. But we all know parents are not sane people. It's the kids' fault. I am sure of that now.