Mother and new baby are happy but the sibling is upset. Photo: CFP
Last month in Wuhan, a 13-year-old girl threatened to kill herself when she learned that her mother was pregnant with a second child. Eventually the mother had an abortion to prevent her daughter from harming herself, the Wuhan Evening News reported.
A 5-year-old Chinese girl rejected her mother and went to live with her grandmother, calling the older woman her "Mom" after her mother had a second child last year. She felt that her mother didn't love her anymore after her brother was born, the Shenyang Evening News reported.
And in January a couple from Anhui Province had to write a letter to their daughter promising they would love her forever when they discussed having a second child, the China Daily reported.
In Shanghai some children are also suffering these extreme reactions to siblings - a phenomenon that is only just becoming visible because of the changes in the one-child regulations. Wan Lizhu is a senior psychological therapist who specializes in children's psychology at the Resoul Psychological Counseling Center. She said that she was encountering this sort of behavior in many of the cases she was handling.
Temper tantrums
She told the Global Times about a 4-year-old girl whose mother had taken her to the center because of her behavior. She refused to follow the set practices at kindergarten and wouldn't have lunch or queue to wash her hands and seemed to prefer playing by herself. At home she had temper tantrums and screamed and threw things on the floor.
Wan talked to the girl and found out that this antisocial behavior had started after her mother had given birth to the little girl's brother. Wan said the little girl felt unwanted - before her brother had arrived everything at home focused on the girl and mom would sleep and play with her constantly. Her brother's arrival changed all of that but, as a 4-year-old she didn't know how to express this and so she began behaving badly.
"This kind of problem happens quite often. In my experience, more than 60 percent of the families with more than one child that consult me have this kind of problem."
A big reason is that many children are spoiled at home. Parents indulge the first child when they are born and this can make them self-centered. Then when there's discussion about a second child arriving the original child objects violently. When the second child actually arrives, the first child often feels neglected, Wan said.
Gu Ge is a psychoanalytic therapist and Chief Strategy Officer of XIN CHAO Psychology Consultation, and agrees with Wan that in recent years there have been an increasing number of cases of first-child jealousy.
In one case he dealt with firstborn twins developed such a hatred of their younger brother that they threatened to kill him and the parents sent the child to a relative's home to be safe.
Gu believes that there are three reasons why a first child will be unhappy at the prospect of a younger brother or sister.
Center of attention
"The first reason is that these children have been the center of attention in the family. When they hear their parents plan to have more children, they feel that their position in the family is threatened. So they try their best to stop this," Gu told the Global Times. "It's human nature to compete with others when there are limited resources. Society is filled with competition. When the first child learns that there will be a sibling, they feel the need to compete for love and resources from their parents."
The way parents speak to their children can also play a part in the jealous feelings first children can experience. Gu said he often hears parents threaten children, saying: "If you don't behave well, we'll have a second child, and we won't love you anymore." This can create an identity crisis for children and they could come to believe that a brother or sister was the parents' way of punishing or replacing them, Gu said.
"With the one-child policy being implemented in China for more than 30 years, the majority of Chinese children are now only children. They have two parents and four grandparents to take care of them. They tend to believe that they should own all the love." But at the end of 2013, China changed its family planning regulations, allowing families, where one of the parents was a single child, to have two children. Gu firmly believes that this policy change is why jealous first-child cases are emerging.
Teng Meiwen is a psychological therapist and member of the Chinese Association for Psychological Intervention, and discussed a recent case of first-child jealousy. An 8-year-old girl began bed-wetting after her mother had a second baby girl. Her mother scolded her for wetting the bed, and the little girl told her mother that she showed she no longer loved her because she had given birth to her sister.
"These cases are not one-off cases from individual families. Society has caused this. China has had the one-child policy for over 30 years, and many of the young parents now were single children born in the 1980s. Their parents loved them too much, and they didn't have to share that love. This has made them very self-centered and now these only children are having their own children. They tend to indulge their children as their parents did. With the grandparents' and the parents' spoiling the children, the new generation is even more self-centered. And this leads to the problems with siblings," Teng explained.
Low fertility rate
China introduced the one-child policy in 1979 and most provinces penalize families who have more than one child. China's total fertility rate in 2010 fell to 1.18, among the lowest in the world, according to the China Economic Herald.
At present in China, more than 11 million families are eligible to have two children but up to May 31, 2014, just 271,600 families had applied for permission to have a second child, according to the Oriental Morning Post.
According to eastday.com, about 370,000 families in Shanghai are eligible to have two children, and between 70,000 and 150,000 second children are expected to be born into Shanghai families in the future.
An online survey from qq.com showed that more than 81,179 people believed that parents should not consider their first child's opinion when planning to have a second child - 57 percent of the number surveyed. Only 43 percent of those surveyed believed these children should be consulted.
"Chinese parents don't pay a lot of attention to their children's thoughts, and they usually neither consult their children nor explain what it will mean when they plan to have a second child," said Chen Guopeng, a professor and psychologist at the School of Psychology and Cognitive Science of the East China Normal University. "It's a problem of our generation. Children are used to being the only one in a family, and they enjoy the benefits of being the only one. It's hard for them to accept a sibling."
While parents can take disturbed children for professional counseling in serious cases, experts say they should be working to prevent problems before they become serious.
Several parents have told Lin Jun, a psychological therapist with the Shanghai Soul Garden Psychological Counseling Center, that they actually loved their older children more after having a second child. But the firstborn children still had problems accepting their siblings.
Guidance needed
Lin said that no matter how much more parents give to the older children, they will still feel that part of their love has been taken by the new brother or sister. This can make the children feel that the parents owe them something.
"If parents plan to have a second child and the first child is aged over 3 they should guide the older child, and give them a sense of responsibility," Lin said. "For example, parents could consult them about family decisions like buying a new car or moving apartments. This will make them feel that they are on the same team as their parents. When the second child is born, then even if the older child feels a little uncomfortable, they will assume responsibility and take care of the brother or sister."
Gu said the best time to have a second child was when the firstborn was aged under 3 or over 6. Children under 3 don't have a sense of self-awareness and therefore don't know the difference between being an only child and having a sibling. Children aged over 6 are going to school and should be distracted from family issues.