The children remain in Venezuela while their parents flee the country to find work

Unable to bring food home, Yusneiker's mother and Anthonella escaped from the economic collapse of Venezuela in the Dominican Republic in 2016. Two years later, the brothers' father also packed up in Peru.

Yusneiker, 12, and Anthonella, 8, are now entrusted to their maternal grandmother and, thanks to the remittances, they manage to feed themselves and escape the hyperinflation of over a million percent that the oil nation has had to face the year. last. However, children suffer from their parents' absence.

When they get sick, they want to have their parents by their side. Anthonella's vows fall to school. Even the girl, with her curly hair and dark eyes, has lost her way of speaking and responds to her grandmother, Aura Orozco, who merely asserts or shakes her head. "Even today he lies down and asks" what's wrong with it? "And he says," I miss my mom, "said Orozco, 48, in his living room in the Cota neighborhood of 905 in Caracas.

Venezuelan migration has increased to 3 million people in the last three years, and parents are forced to make the difficult decision to leave their children in the country, putting many of them to the test.

There is no official data on the phenomenon, since the government of Nicolás Maduro denies the existence of a diaspora and constantly insists that international humanitarian agencies swell the figures to obscure the management of their administration. However, experts consulted by Reuters have indicated that there is a growth in migration and the effects it produces on the remaining children, from low school performance to malnourishment in newborns, when their mothers stop breastfeeding.

"The decisions that parents are reflecting (…) are losing and losing decisions, do I lose more when I can not meet basic needs in the country, or lose more when I sacrifice aspects of my relationship with my son?" Said Abel Saraiba, psychologist Cecodap, a non-governmental organization that defends children's rights.

In the early years of Venezuelan migration, it was a phenomenon of the middle class, who fled by air. But for more than a year, the working class made long journeys by bus or on foot, through dangerous routes to bring their children. Many of the migrants leave without money in their pockets and work for long hours to send money home.

In 2018, the remaining children became the third reason for consultations on Cecodap therapies. In 2017 it was the fifth, according to psychologist Saraiba.

The Catholic organization Fe y Alegría, which brings together schools in the poor communities of the country, said that until January of this year 6,044 of its 110,000 students have seen their parents migrate. The situation is compounded by other hardships by Venezuelans, who face malnutrition, deteriorated schools, lack of medicines and food, before the collapse of their economy.

Thanks to remittances sent by parents, children have access to food and medicine. Even for occasional gifts. Recently, Yusneiker's grandmother was able to buy her a pair of shoes. This is a form of consolation that parents have before their absences. "It's hard to separate from your family, even though my children are big, they keep hitting me, I miss a world," said Omaira Martínez, who left her 17 and 21-year-old son with her grandmother when she emigrated to Chile six months, where he works cleaning pocete. "The first few months I cried a lot and I was susceptible," said Martinez.

The Venezuelan Ministry of Information has not responded to a request for comment. Maduro warned migrants of xenophobia and exploitation in the countries of the region, so four months ago launched the "Return to the Fatherland" plan, which was repatriated, according to figures from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 12,000 immigrants.

Many parents leave with the promise of an early return, but sometimes this does not happen and they prolong their stay in the host country. Angymar Jiménez, 27, went to Ecuador to work as a manicure for several months, but two years later still has his children, Andrew, 5 years, and Ailin, 10, entrusted to the care of his mother, Iris Olivo, of 69 , in a district of Caracas. "At the beginning the girl said her mother came looking for her and greeted her colleagues, until she realized she was not," Olivo said.

In the most extreme cases, mothers' migration can trigger malnutrition in their newborns. On the peninsula of Paraguaná, in the northwestern state of Falcón, a one-year-old girl Leanny Santander suffers from malnutrition, with diarrhea and vomiting, since her mother left for Colombia seven months ago, said her grandmother, Nélida Santander. Doctors have indicated that medical problems, which also include bronchitis, are caused by the lack of breastfeeding in the girl, Grandma added. "I am with my niece because I prefer her to bring her mother to work there worse," said Santander, 50. "She's sick here, but I'm waiting and I do everything I can to take care of her."

The migration is sometimes done quickly, so many parents leave their children without the required legal protection, while the children are left in a legal limbo that can have consequences when enrolled in school or in some medical operation, among the others.

In a survey of migrations conducted by Cecodap and the Datanalisis study, half of the 54 families interviewed did not carry out legal procedures for childcare.

These situations put pressure on children, who in their young age are forced to grow up quickly to comfort their bereaved parents. "Every day I talk to her," Yusneiker told his mother in the Dominican Republic. "I tell her that I miss her, that she does not worry, that I know she has not abandoned me."