Children left behind on the Internet” has become the current situation faced by most employees of large factories.
The term “left-behind children” first appeared in a report in 2002: many young people born in rural towns had to migrate to big cities with more developed economies in order to work and earn money, but their children had to stay at Home with their grandparents, and they might not be able to see them once a year.
The popularity of the 996 and 007 work system in Internet companies in recent years has led to the fact that many highly educated employees still have to face long working hours and are unable to spend Time with their children growing up.
Many of them were left behind 20 years ago, but now they still have to miss their children’s growth due to their work.
There was a popular post on Douban last year, “So what about the 996 people who have children”, in which netizens described the current situation of children left behind on the Internet as follows: staying with nannies and elderly people for a long time, going to bed at night before their Parents get off work, and getting up in the morning when their parents are already on their way to work.
Some parents will go to the square near their home at 6 pm dinner time, let the elderly bring their children over to meet, a few pleasantries and then turn back to the workstation to continue to work overtime.
The rapid development of the Internet has also brought about the phenomenon of “old drifters”. According to data, nearly 18 million elderly people come to big cities with their children, accounting for 7.2% of the country’s 247 million floating population, of which the proportion of those who come specifically to take care of their offspring is as high as 43%.
This issue of Microscopic Stories is about a group of Internet dual 996 families, among whom.
Some were once left-behind children and worked hard to earn money after work in order not to let their children continue their childhood tragedies, however, high housing prices and his wife facing the obstacle of returning to the workplace after giving birth led him to choose again to let the elderly take their children back home.
Some families where both spouses work overtime for long periods of time and the children spend most of their time with the nanny, resulting in the children becoming dependent on the nanny for an intimate relationship
Other families ask the elderly to come home with their children, but encounter the situation that the elderly are not acclimatized in the big city, and have no choice but to let the elderly take their children home, not seeing them for years.
The following are true stories about them.
Career or Family is always a single-choice question: “I am a left-behind child, and my son has to be”
Renhao
Internet Product Manager
32 years old in Shenzhen
The end of January 2021 was the time when I cried the most.
At that time, the need for Epidemic prevention, the policy changed one day at a time, and when I learned that I might not be able to return home, I was a 30-year-old man, I could not help but cry – it was too much to miss the children in the old home.
Especially the night before, my 3-year-old daughter asked me in the video, “Dad, when will you come back for the New Year? “
Fortunately, later our side of the notice as long as hold nucleic acid test, to the old home after the home isolation, my mood and instantly restore joy, immediately bought more expensive than usual thousands of dollars of airline tickets to rush home for the New Year.
I feel guilty about my daughter.
I am a left-behind child myself, my parents went to work in the city when I was a child, and I was always bullied by the children in town when I was studying because my parents were not around, and at that time I vowed, “I will never let my children be left-behind children in the future “.
But when my daughter was born, I realized how naive I was.
My wife and I had worked in Guangzhou for five years and saved more than 600,000 yuan.
We had planned to go back to Changsha to work after having a child, and then buy a school house in the area and pick up my mother to help with the child, but we still let the child become a “different kind of left-behind child” under the weight of reality. “The first is the long working hours of the Internet.
First of all, the Internet work long hours, long-term 996, new projects on the line is to 007, which led to the child is still awake we went out, after working overtime home children also early to bed, working days basically difficult to have interaction with children.
Since we can’t accompany our children, although we live under the same roof, we can only witness the growth of our children from the words of the elderly and the short companionship on weekends.
In addition, my wife’s working hours were affected after she had a baby, and her career path was closed to her, so our family income growth rate dropped significantly.
So we had to postpone our plan to buy a house in Changsha – a house in Changsha requires a local household registration, which means we need to take a pay cut to go back to Changsha to work and pay local social security, but our current income situation does not allow us to do so.
35 years old is the magic spell hanging over the Internet people, considering the possibility of “unemployment” in the near future, as well as the large amount of money needed for the future Education of children, I decided to accept I decided to accept a management job offer from a Shenzhen startup company.
The company had longer working hours and more pressure, but the other party doubled the salary, and had a monthly rental allowance and transportation allowance.
So my wife and I started to live as a “weekend couple”. She stayed in Guangzhou, where the pressure was relatively low, and I spent more than 1,000 yuan in Shenzhen to rent an apartment in an urban village as a place to stay from Monday to Thursday, catching the intercity railroad back to Guangzhou after work on Friday and spending the weekend with my children.
Later, the child found that every weekend I would leave while she was asleep, and when I came home, I would not sleep, afraid that I would leave, just like when I was a child, I was afraid that my parents would leave.
At that time, I felt particularly bad, but I could only bite the bullet and leave early Monday morning when the children were not awake, wiping tears to catch the earliest intercity railroad, spending three hours to reach the company before 10:00 for the morning meeting.
It didn’t take long for us to face another problem – my mom was not used to staying in Guangzhou and wanted to take the kids back to the countryside.
Guangzhou is a strange existence for her, except with the children, language barrier, different climate, no friends ……
The Life of a strange city makes her grumpy, and sometimes a little thing will turn into a mother-in-law conflict.
The price of housing in Changsha is still rising in the past few years, I had to be ruthless to send the children back home.
The day I sent my child away I was very sad, I kept thinking about waiting for 2 more years to go back to Hunan, then I bought a good house, I will never worry about the family separation.
The child prefers to sleep with the nanny: “I also want to accompany her, but I do not have time”
Rachel
29 years old, Shanghai
Daughter 4.5 years old
Our family hired an aunt to cope with the situation of having no one to take care of our child.
I am in an internet company and my husband is in a traditional company in transition. Both sides are very busy and we basically don’t get home until 9 or 10 pm every day. My daughter goes to bed at 9:00 p.m., and she’s usually asleep by the time we get back.
The only time I can spend with her is in the morning. I get up at 6:30 a.m., get her up, have breakfast with her, and then leave at 7 a.m. to take her to kindergarten.
The 40-minute commute on the road is one of the few times I can spend with her. But my daughter is very understanding and usually doesn’t cry.
I hired a sister-in-law from the beginning of my month, and when I went to work after breastfeeding, I switched to a live-in aunt.
Although my daughter is not old enough to know that her father and I need to work, she is also used to her aunt’s company in her daily life.
With the pressure of working on the Internet, all I could do was to extend my work day, get things done ahead of time, and if I was lucky, I could get off work on time one day a week and go spend time with her.
I don’t even ask my friends out on weekends anymore, because I’m missing my daughter’s company on weekdays, so I want to spend time with her on weekends, watching cartoons, shopping, and buying things with her.
With the long lack of company, my daughter doesn’t cry but does feel closer to her aunt.
She won’t cry until she sees me and her dad. Her dad was away on business for 2 weeks before and she was totally fine.
But if her auntie takes off, she gets upset, she deflates and cries, “Mommy, I miss my auntie, I want her to sleep with me”, or she doesn’t say anything at all. Only a person silently shed tears.
The degree of missing is obvious, but it can’t be helped.
But I’m not worried that my aunt will take the place of my mom and dad.
The child will grow up, when she is a little older, she will know that the aunt is good to her is conditional, because the mother pays, so the aunt will take good care of her, but only stop at the daily care.
My own parenting philosophy is that I can give up my personal space for my child in moderation, but I won’t sacrifice for her, and prolonged sacrifice is not a healthy parent-child relationship.
I am not a person who loves to stay at home and dedicate my life to my family, so being a full-time housewife is a sacrifice for me. So at this time, I need an aunt to take on the role of taking care of the children.
She used to work as a civil servant in a third-tier city, but after she retired, she couldn’t stay idle and wanted to give her daughter a little allowance, so she went to Shanghai to work as a live-in aunt.
She has studied, her experience and character are trustworthy, and her former employers have given her high marks, but of course, the price is not cheap.
When we only signed up with her in early 2018, her salary was over 10,000 and has slowly increased since then.
When I initially hired this aunt, the budget would take up 70-80% of my pre-tax monthly salary, and now it’s 60-65% of my pre-tax monthly salary.
But I think: personal career development is a more important thing than the expense of hiring an aunt.
When I was little, my parents would also work, and I would often come home to do my homework alone and read books alone. When I was very young, I would feel a little bored, but when I was a little older, I knew that the work thing itself was meaningful, one, because it creates value, and two, because it brings a stable source of income.
But this lack is not irreparable. Quality companionship within the limits of our ability can also shape a healthy parent-child relationship.
My parents are not yet retired and they have their own work to do; my in-laws are more interested in their personal life and do not want their life to revolve around the children.
After a few years of living together, we do feel that this state is the most relaxed and enjoyable for us now.
However, because I often work overtime, I have saved up a little bit of annual leave on hand, so I’m thinking of taking my daughter out at the end of March and the beginning of April to have some fun.
Next September, my daughter will start elementary school and will need some after-school tutoring, so I’m afraid my aunt will no longer be able to take on this responsibility, so I plan to stop hiring her then.
But before that, my aunt did help me and my father to balance work and family to a great extent.
Children still do left-behind children after a million annual salary: “The elderly can not adapt to life in the big city, they can only be considered first”
Mr. Wang
34-year-old employee of a large Internet factory in Shanghai
After my wife and I graduated with a master’s degree, we both joined a large Internet factory in Shanghai.
After many years of struggle, I am now a middle-aged person and I have a firm footing in this company. My wife and I have a salary of more than one million, plus year-end project commission.
In recent years, the topic of 996 often occupies the hot search, and is criticized by modern young people. But in the years I just graduated, 996 for me “is a blessing.
My wife and I were both born in the countryside, and we attached special importance to the opportunity to change our fate by working in a big city.
At dawn, we dragged ourselves out of bed and flew around the office building like walking corpses for more than 10 hours, and then let the cab transport our dead bodies home, simply putting the word “social animal” into practice. The two words “social animal” are vividly interpreted.
The reason for working so hard is to one day be able to get a foothold in the Magic City, to be able to buy a house here and let the children grow up here.
In 2018, we finally bought a small one-bedroom apartment, and the next year the child was born.
The next year, the child was born. At that time, my department was facing business restructuring, as a leader I was particularly busy every day, often continuous dry several all-nighters. 996 for me is a very luxurious “relaxation. “.
My wife took maternity leave, according to company regulations, I also enjoy a few days of paternity leave, but I was too busy to use this leave. My wife also returned to work immediately after she finished the month.
We had to hire a sister-in-law to help with the baby, which cost more than 10,000 a month. The house we bought was very small, only one room, and we left the only room for the baby and the sister-in-law so that the baby could sleep well.
For a few months, we were very busy and often came back in the early hours of the morning when the baby and sister-in-law were already asleep. We did not dare to disturb the baby’s sleep, and left earlier in the morning, so during that time, we even forgot what the baby looked like.
I have also considered, let my wife find an easier job, a little less salary on a little less it, at least you can work 9 to 5, have time to take care of the child.
But my wife refused, she said we now need money for the mortgage and car loan, the future to raise children and elderly people for the school district, more need a large amount of money.
One time, I happened to see a nanny abuse of the elderly news at work, after reading the heart palpitations, and told my wife about it. My wife was distracted that day, so she took a day off work and rushed home to check if the baby had any injuries.
We both were so scared that we quit the babysitter and asked our parents back home to come to Shanghai to take care of the baby.
When they arrived, not only could they not fit in the house, but to top it all off, they were severely uncomfortable with the environment, they couldn’t use the toilet, they couldn’t use the gas stove or the shower, and they couldn’t sleep through the night because of the sound of cars driving by. In just a few days, the people aged several years at once.
We had no choice but to send all the old people and children back home. My wife and I were left-behind children when we were young, and we studied hard and suffered a lot to get out of farming, just so that the next generation could have a richer childhood and a better life.
I never thought that my children would return to the countryside and become left-behind children.
Postscript
996 is not only a waste of young people’s youth, but also a drain on the future of the country’s society. In this year’s two sessions, Li Guohua, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, suggested that the 996 work system be regulated. But in fact, back in early 1986, the National Science Committee had studied the possibility of shortening working hours: this practice, although adjusting the total social labor input, could increase people’s leisure time and thus stimulate consumption, while at the same time giving parents more time to participate in the growth of the next generation.
Ultimately, this study was not completed due to the realities it encountered.
While we discuss the impact of the family of origin on children, these “Internet left-behind children” do not even really perceive the companionship that comes with a family of origin.
Of course, the Internet industry is only one small segment of the urban left-behind children. In other industries with long working hours, such as healthcare and finance, there is also an invisible and untouchable gap between parents and children.
Perhaps, in another 10 or 20 years, these parents will look back on their children’s growth, and will not regret their less overtime a day, but it is certain that the absence of even one hour of the child’s company, the future can not be regained.
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