Children raised by grandparents: the cost of a parent's migration

In 2023, according to Moldova's National Bureau of Statistics, almost 100,000 children under 18 were living with at least one parent working abroad. Around 60,000 were living with both parents away — raised by grandparents, aunts, other relatives.

If you are one of those children — now an adult, or still young — your story is predictable. You aren't defective. You aren't alone. And the effects can be addressed: the earlier, the better.

What parental migration does to a child

Systematic research (UNICEF Moldova, 2018 and 2021; Vanore et al., 2015) identifies five recurring effects.

1. Attachment difficulties

Secure attachment is built through consistent, predictable presence in the first five years of life. When a parent leaves abruptly — even for a good reason, like money sent home — the child cannot process it cognitively. They process it emotionally: the people I love disappear.

In adulthood that translates into:

• Avoidant attachment — fear of intimacy, difficulty depending on anyone.
• Anxious attachment — an obsessive need for reassurance in relationships.
• Disorganised attachment — alternating between the two, with contradictory behaviour.

According to Cervinka et al. (2018), 57% of children in Moldovan migrant families show insecure attachment patterns, compared with 30-35% in non-migrant families.

2. Depression and anxiety

Longitudinal studies show these children carry:

• 2.3× the risk of developing depression by age 25.
• 1.8× the risk of generalised or social anxiety.
• Self-esteem below the average for their age group.

These numbers are not destiny — they are statistical risk. With the right intervention, the trajectory changes.

3. Fragmented identity

The child oscillates between two identities:

• The one from the grandparents — often conservative, rural, close to tradition.
• The one of the parents in photos and calls — modern, urban, comparatively well-off.

In adolescence this produces confusion: who am I? Who do I identify with?

4. School problems

Academic performance is mixed. Some children over-perform, compensating, trying to be their parents' pride. Others drop out, boys especially. The key factor is the absence of an adult who monitors daily — checking homework, asking what happened at school.

5. Adolescent behaviour

Raised risk of:

• Early alcohol or tobacco use, compensating for loneliness.
• Early or risky sexual activity.
• Involvement in delinquent behaviour, particularly for boys without present male role models.

The UNICEF 2018 study found that 34% of adolescents in migrant families reported regular alcohol use, against 19% in non-migrant families.

What isn't visible from outside — and hurts most

The child's guilt. Nobody discusses it explicitly, but they carry it from the age of four or five:

• "Did they leave because of me?"
• "If I were better, would they come back?"
• "Am I allowed to be sad? Mum sends money — I should be grateful."
• "Grandma does everything she can. I have no right to suffer."

These thoughts are the most destructive in the long run. They build a dysfunctional relationship with your own emotions — teaching you that your feelings are a problem.

The adult who was that child often says: "I can't complain — our generation got past this, others had it worse." That is a mechanism of self-anaesthesia, and it perpetuates the injury.

What works

If you are the adult with this history

1. Attachment-focused therapy. Approaches with solid evidence:

• EMDR — for repeated loss in childhood.
• Psychodynamic therapy — explores the relationship with the absent parent at depth.
• Schema therapy (Jeffrey Young) — identifies patterns formed in childhood that repeat in adult life.

Typical duration: one to three years.

2. A conversation with the parent, where it's possible. For those who have re-established contact: a direct conversation, adult to adult, about what it was like for you. Not to blame them — to share the real history. Often the parent carried their own silent guilt all those years, and mutual release is possible.

3. Work on identity. Understanding that you don't have to choose between the identity from your grandparents and the one from your parents. You can integrate both, plus your own. The migration literature calls this bicultural integration.

If the child is young now

1. Emotional continuity with the absent parent.

• Short DAILY calls beat long weekly ones. The ritual is what counts.
• Watching together: films or cartoons "together" over video — something UNICEF Moldova actively recommends.
• Planned returns — the child needs certainty about when they'll see their parent again. Specific dates help.

2. Physical stability.

• Grandparents taking over should not change the child's school.
• Continuity with friends.
• The child's room kept with the things that carry the parent relationship — photos, toys from mum.

3. Allow the emotion.

• Grandparents who avoid discussing the absent parent, so as not to "bring on sadness", cause indirect harm.
• What actually helps: "Mum is away today, it's okay to miss her. Shall we write her a message?"

If you are the parent who left

Advice from the UNICEF Moldova guide, which is publicly available:

1. Daily communication, not weekly.
2. Involvement in decisions — even trivial ones. "What are you eating? How are you doing that homework?" The child feels the parent remains a caregiving authority rather than only a payer.
3. Short, frequent visits beat long holidays. Two weeks every six months is better than a month every eighteen.
4. Support for the grandparents, financial and emotional. Exhausted grandparents cannot parent well.
5. Honesty about the plan — when are you coming back? Definitely, or probably? Children sense the lie.

Worth taking to a therapist: if you are an adult who grew up with parents abroad and you recognise attachment patterns in your current relationships, therapy helps concretely. Book a free call with a therapist specialising in attachment or trauma.

A common myth: "the money makes up for the absence"

Money solves financial problems. It does not solve emotional ones.

Vanore et al. (2015), in "Best of both worlds?", compared children from migrant families, with higher household income, to children from non-migrant families with lower income. The conclusion: financial advantages do not offset relational deficits. Children in migrant families showed poorer psychological wellbeing even with more material resources.

Money helps. Money and daily presence helps far more. Money without daily communication is not sufficient for mental health.

For grandparents reading this

You are on the front line. And it is hard — you are often 60 or 70, with your own fragile health, parenting for a second time.

Three things that help:

1. Accept help — the school psychologist, a social worker, neighbours. You are not alone in this.
2. Talk to the child about their parents often, without avoiding the subject.
3. Respect the absent parent's authority, even during arguments. Don't speak badly of them. The child needs two intact parents in their mind.

The key message

Parental migration is a reality that has shaped two Moldovan generations. The harm is real — but it isn't destiny. With the right intervention, the child affected can have a healthy emotional life.

If you are one of those children — adult or young — and you are reading this: recognising your own experience is the first step. You don't have to carry it alone.

Next step: see therapists specialising in attachment and trauma or book a free call.