The joys and tribulations of the two-children generation

Whatever the downsides to having a second child, the government is encouraging couples to have one.[Photo provided to China Daily]

If Huang Jingyi, 38, and Song Jiangtao, 47, of Guangzhou, are feeling such pressures they are not showing it. In fact the couple seem to have taken to the two-child lifestyle with gusto.

"With our two adorable daughters, we can enjoy family happiness together," says Huang, who works for an international company. "It is worrying though when they kick up a tantrum or are sick."

Like many other people, Huang believes two siblings - one of her daughters is 4 and the other is almost 2 - can provide each other companionship, and they are less likely to be self-centered.

Her parents live with her husband and the children, and they look after the younger daughter during the day and take the elder one to kindergarten in the morning and collect her in the afternoon. When she and Song, an architect, come home from work, they take over looking after the children and doing other household chores.

With an eye to when the children are bigger, Song plans to redesign their 105-square-meter home so that there are four bedrooms. His car is a seven-seater, sufficient for the family's everyday use.

"The two children are more attached to their mother, and I'm like a driver. But when we go to the zoo, our eldest daughter likes to be close to me because she wants to ride on my shoulders.

"At our kind of age we're at the point where life is stable, our careers may have peaked and we're not quite as ambitious as we used to be. Raising a child is a great thing to do. Nothing makes me feel happier than being out with the kids at the weekend, lapping up the sunshine in a park."

When it was announced last year that the family planning policy was being relaxed, many of Song's friends born in the 1970s said they wanted to have a second child, but a few failed, he says.

Huang says motherhood means taking more responsibility, and being a mother has underlined for her the importance of family ties.

She used to feel irritated if she heard a child crying or making a noise in public, she says, but she can now be empathetic and is even willing to give help if it is needed. In the same considered vein, she reckons any couple contemplating having a second child needs to weigh up the proposal carefully.

"You have to be well-prepared and consider many things such as how to balance your work and family life and how to give the child a good environment."

That will mean making compromises and sacrifices, and she says that for the moment she has withdrawn from business trips.

Anyone who has decided to have a second child might well consider doing so only after the existing child has started kindergarten, she says, which means the maximum energy and other resources are available so the second child can be well taken care of.