When the child becomes the parent

In our society, elder siblings have always taken care of their younger brothers and sisters, occasionally watching over them or preparing their meals.

Such responsibilities, to some extent, are seen as a sign of maturity, a natural progression from childhood to adulthood, a development that is encouraged.

But what of when one is prompted by circumstances to fully step into his parents’ shoes and forced to shelve his or her dreams to take care of younger siblings?

Carazon Amukhale, 30

Communications Director at Digital Scroll Media

“I am the first born and an only girl in a family of four children. My brothers and I were brought up by our mother, who was the sole breadwinner. As a primary school teacher, she really worked hard to provide for us, such that we didn’t lack basic needs such as food and decent clothes, however, it was a struggle to see us through school, and I had to wait two years to join college because she couldn’t afford the fees. Even after this long wait, she still was forced to request for support from our church.

In 2007, I eventually joined Multimedia University to study a diploma in mass communication. I promised myself that I would not allow her to struggle to educate my younger siblings and provide for me too. The first step I took was to look for means to raise my upkeep money. I did this by selling cakes to schoolmates.

When I graduated in 2009, I got a job with an insurance agency that paid me Sh10, 000 a month. Around this time, one of my brothers completed high school, only for my mother to be dismissed from the private school she was teaching in, with no benefits to her name. It was a harrowing period for us. Thankfully, my workplace was close to home, so I did not spend money on bus fare and other expenses that might have arisen had I been working a distance away. I had therefore been saving in earnest, my goal to eventually start a business. After my mother lost her job however, I had to withdraw all my savings to pay for my brother’s admission fees to college, which came to Sh54, 000. My other brother was in secondary school while the last born was in upper primary school.

Besides putting on hold my dream of starting a business, I denied myself new clothes and stopped eating out. I also started selling handbags and shoes on the side to raise enough money to pay my brothers’ school fees. My mother would prepare and sell samosas to complement my income. It was a struggle, but the real battle came about when my youngest brother joined secondary school.

Two days to the admission date, we still hadn’t managed to raise the full school fees of Sh35, 000, yet the school had made it clear that no student would be enrolled without the full amount. We had made so many calls for help yet no one had come through for us. By good fortune, just when I was about to give in to despair, one of my friends offered to pay the balance.

That was when I decided that I would do all it took to see my brother through secondary school. He finally completed his high school education last year, and what a relief it was! As you read this, two of my brothers can now comfortably support themselves because they have jobs. What remains is to see my youngest brother through college having got a better paying job.

I can now focus on myself and even enroll at the university to study for a degree, something I have wanted to do for a long time. I believe that the experience I went through during that challenging phase was life-changing – I appreciate the value of hard work and persistence and I am more empathetic.

Nelson Kwaje, 26

Team leader, WEB 4 ALL

Nelson, who comes from Juba, South Sudan, has lived in Kenya for the past five years. He describes his place of birth as a communal society that believes that no man is self-made.

“I am the second born in a family of 10 children. I started supporting my siblings in 2016 when I graduated from Technical University of Kenya where I was studying for a diploma in Information Technology.”

When his sister and cousin joined him in Kenya that same year, he did not need to be told that they were his responsibility.

While his parents and his cousin’s parents pay their school fees, he meets their basic needs and other expenses such as rent and bus fare. He also pays for the living expenses of his elder sister who is in medical school, and once in a while, sends money back home for the upkeep of his other younger siblings.

For a young person seeking to grow his start-up, WEB4ALL, an ICT company that provides innovative ICT solutions with an aim of bridging the literacy gap in Africa, such responsibilities can be overwhelming, and he often has to deny himself many needs to assist his family.

“I decided to venture into business right after I graduated, so I wasn’t financially stable when my relatives came to live with me,” he explains.

He had a choice to say no, after all, he was struggling to make ends meet, but he decided to share whatever little he was making with them, reminding himself that it was only for a time.

He points out that the support he gives to his siblings comes with conditions. One of them is that they draw a budget, which they are expected to operate within.

“I have learnts that those you assist might not understand that you don’t have much to give, so you have to be careful about striking a good balance to provide for them and still meet your own expenses.”

He adds that it is important to make those that you help understand that money is a resource that people work for, that is why once in a while, he hires his sister to work for his firm, so that she can experience, first-hand, the work that goes into running a business.

He says,

“With them relying on me, I cannot invest back into the business or travel as much as I would wish to, but the fact that I provide them a comfortable life makes me more fulfilled.”

Edwin Mwangi 30

IT consultant, Tarakilishi Enterprise

Mwangi was 19 when he became, as he puts it, “deputy parent.” He had just got his first job with Equity Bank through its scholarship programme after he was named Laikipia County’s best Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) student in 2005.

“I was offered a job as a cashier, and even before I got my first salary, I knew that my responsibilities back home would increase,” he explains.

Although his parents did not openly ask him to take care of his sister and brother who were in primary school then, it was suggested through questions and comments such as, “Your siblings need new shoes,” or “What do you think we should do?” each time they erred.

Mwangi, who comes from a humble background, was not resentful of these requests to help. He understood where his parents were coming from.

“We were squatters in a rural slum called Marmanet in Laikipia County. It greatly disturbed me that my parents had to work on other peoples’ farms to put a meal on the table. With this in mind, I worked hard in school, my goal to one day make our lives better. I therefore welcomed the job opportunity with both hands and gladly helped out at home,” he explains.

He points out that with the salary he was earning, he could have managed to buy himself trendy outfits and a smartphone he had long desired, but he denied himself these with a bigger picture in mind – to rescue his family from poverty.

“I started saving every shilling I could spare, and within six months, I had saved enough to buy a parcel of land and build a semi-permanent house for my family in Nyahururu town, in Laikipia County,” He says.

When he joined the University of Nairobi in 2007, where he had been admitted to study Bachelor of Business Information Systems, he continued to support his parents using his savings. He would cater for his siblings needs, such as buying them school books and paying for their school trips. During the long holidays, he would go back to his bank job since the programme allowed dedicated team players to continue working during the holidays.

While in his second year, Mwangi decided to transfer his brother and sister to a private school when his parents complained that their performance was not impressive.

“I supported my siblings through primary, secondary school and college, though my parents would sometimes help to pay their school fees. Both completed college last year. My sister has a certificate in education while my brother studied computer technology,” says Mwangi, who now supports a relative who is 13 years old, and is in a special school.

Though it sounds easy in writing, it was anything but – paying his siblings’ college fees demanded dedicated sacrifice. Both courses took two years each, and every semester, he parted with not less than Sh40, 000, yet he still had his needs to meet.

He graduated from university in 2011, and was offered a scholarship by his alma mater to study for a master’s degree in Management Information Systems. By then, he had been promoted at work, from cashier to supervisor, a position he held until last year when he resigned to venture into entrepreneurship.

“I am a focused person, but as a young person, I was not immune to peer pressure - some of my friends could not understand why, yet I was employed, could not even afford to buy myself a laptop, which was quite necessary for MIS students – it was a battle to stay level-headed. What motivated me to stay focused on my goal was the knowledge that if I didn’t support my brother and sister, they might be dependent on me or my parents for, the rest of their lives” he explains.

He points out that when offering this kind of support, it is important to be careful about how you do it because the help you give might be viewed as entitlement.

“When I got married in 2014, I had to scale down the support I was extending because I had a family of my own to raise, a family that came with many responsibilities especially after the birth of our child in 2015. My decision wasn’t received well, so I had to make them understand why things had to change. For instance, my sister wanted to enroll for a diploma course after the certificate, but I could no longer afford to pay for her education, so I passed the responsibility back to my parents.”

Although his siblings are yet to find jobs, he is happy that his parents are doing better financially – he helped them establish income-generating projects, so they no longer have to do menial jobs to support themselves.

“I discovered early on that there would come a time when I might not be able to meet my family’s expectations, so I decided to invest in long-term projects that they could rely on. In 2014 for instance, I bought three dairy cows for my dad and gave my mother the capital she required to start a vegetable-selling business.”

Once in a while, his grateful parents send him milk and vegetables. Mwangi concludes his story by saying that sacrificing comfort to take care of his family has not impeded his success in any way, if anything, it made him work even harder and aspire for more. Currently, he is studying for a PhD in Management Information Systems at the University of Nairobi. His business, Tarakilishi Entreprise, an IT consulting firm, is now on firm footing.