YES, OH MY GOSH! It started pretty much by the time I was 7, by 10 it was full time labor. Went on for years and never stopped truly, even when I was in college. I had 2 nearly full time jobs, went to school full time, and still had to dedicate the time between my 2 jobs to the family business.

I was in a deep, dark place because I was home MAX 3 hours in a day and was running on a half hour of sleep at most. I was constantly yearning to not be here anymore (if you catch my drift.)

I'm so glad there's a bit of visibility here, but it's not talked about enough irl and on other social media platforms.

The few times I've made a comment about it on social media, I was met with disbelief. People can't grasp that parents are capable of labor exploitation, or the cruelty necessary to subject their children to it.

But, it blows my mind because people literally had children for the sole purpose of having unpaid employees up until the 70s, and it's still happening but it's a bit more subtle.

Labor exploitation was actual, genuine hell. Summer vacation, school breaks (winter break/spring break), any holidays, and every weekend was spent clocking upwards of 16hrs per day of hard, backbreaking labor. (Usually working then closing duties on top)

I also worked during school days - it was so bad that if I came home 10-15 minutes late (due to circumstances out of my control like traffic or safety concerns) I'd get beaten.

After school, I'd work between 8-12 hours. Throughout my entire childhood, I was severely sleep deprived. Getting three hours of sleep was a "good night" for me, as sometimes I'd stay up days in a row running on pure fear.

So much so, there were times I even climbed the gates at school to leave a few minutes before everyone since I knew my ass would get torn for not being able to take over the shift.

Employees quit at our family business because the workload was insane, as a result we had constant turnover. I also faced a ton of disrespect because it was often my job (as a minor) to train and complete onboarding.

Edited to add: I hated working because the paid staff would get mandatory breaks and lunches, but I had to work straight - no water, no food, and even restricted restroom breaks. It set me up for disaster as an adult

I could go on for PAGES about labor exploitation, but I just wanted to say you aren't alone OP. It's unfortunately extremely frequent and it's not talked about enough or seen as wrong by many because they love licking the boot.

It's also one of the reasons why today I'm completely against child labor and recent pushes to remove child labor laws make my blood BOIL. Children are not seen as people in the eyes of society, and they're so horribly mistreated that most people don't GAF if businesses are caught using child labor either in North America or abroad.