Family collage project

By: Katy Robinson

Due to the lack of photos of the entire family

together, and the discomfort exhibited by my

parents when taking photos, there will be

limited photos of the whole family, but many

photos with different parts of the family

together. This is my family, this is our crazy.

“Connected. Family members experience

emotional independence as well as some

sense of involvement and belonging”

(Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004).

Our family is involved with one another

(we all live next to each other) but we

also enjoy some emotional

independence. We can rely on each other

in times of crisis, but we don’t always

have to be near each other.

Regardless, we all feel a sense of

belonging within the family-of-origin

structure.

In my family, our relationships are always up and down. My sister karissa

and I certainly move through phases of strong cohesion, and phases

where we can’t stand to be around one another for any length of time.

Overall, we are both learning how to have a “normal” adult relationship

and leave adolescence and the childhood years behind.

“Sibling ties represent the longest lifetime relationships for most people…” (Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004). I think that my sister and I learned a lot from our parents about what it means to be a sibling. Our dad has an awkward relationship with his brother that is still living, our mom has a good relationship with one aunt, wont speak to or speak of another aunt, and has an awkward relationship with her mentally handicapped sister. In seeing this relationships play-out over the course of our lives, we have determined that we don’t want to grow that far apart where a normal relationship is impossible and the most we can muster is an awkward encounter. As a result, we have a yearly ritual where we go to Salem, MA together the weekend before Halloween.

“…female sibling use relational maintenance behaviors at a higher rate than males…” (Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004).I completely agree with this finding! I see my sister and I using a lot of the strategies, especially humor and confirmation and validation. We learned from our dad that sometimes, humor can lighten any situation, and other times, it’s just fun to laugh. Together, if in the mood, we can both be found laughing at something someone else might find strange. We also confirm/validate the other, especially if we need to vent about work and school (both of our lives are pretty identical as far as work and school environments go). The one venting will be validated by the other with reassurances that it will get better, and that her problem is certainly nothing to be scoffed at.

“As parent and child relationships move from being highly veritcle to much more horizontal, responsibility for relational maintenance becomes shared” (Brommel, Bylund, Galvin 2004).As I got older, my parents always supported me, with whatever I chose to pursue. They have always counted my sister and I as huge sources of pride, and as a result, we have always strived to be the people they see us as. It is awkward to have some conversations with either parent, but I have seen that my sister and I can rely on them (their relational currency in many ways is and likely will always be, caring for their children (including much more adult children)). They support us, and we both work to keep an open communicative relationship.

“Roles are inextricably bound to the

communication process”

(Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004).

“Family roles and communication are

strongly interrelated because each

contributes to the maintenance or change of

the other”

For much of my life, the role of my mom has been constantly changing! She was a stay at home mom until my sister and I were old enough to take care of ourselves. Now she works and uses the money she earns for things she would like to do. She cares for the family as a traditional housewife, making dinner, cleaning the house, and doing the laundry, but she also has her own job and her own independence., she does not depend solely on my dad financially. My mom is also the one that provides the MOST nurturing and emotional support.

My sister and I both look to our dad for

emotional support, but less than our

mom. Our dad does provide the basic

resources, as the “bread-winner” in the

family. He is also the one that has the

most authority over large purchasing

decisions. Both parents will discuss the

purchase, but ultimately, what my dad

wants is what he gets.

“Other times people misunderstand the privacy agreement or forget that the information should be kept private” (Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004).

This is something that my mom (center) has trouble negotiating. In adolescance both my sister and I wanted to disclose information about our lives to her, just to have her telling our dad. Her rule was, he is your dad and deserves to know everything, and my husband, I will not lie to him. This made my sister and I (and still does a lot of the time) uncomfortable openly sharing more private information with her simply because we would rather our dad not know about it.

“One important maintenance function involves maintaining kinship ties with the extended family network” (Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004).My older sister Bev (back right) and her three youngest daughters (front left) are rarely at our house. Bev’s husband likes to keep him and his family to himself, so my dad and mom both strive to keep up kinship maintenance with Bev so that she and her youngest children will know us. My sister and I both work to maintain a relationship with the girls, so they might remember us from visit to visit and not feel so shy at first. So far, this plan has worked well. They are terrified of dogs, especially big ones, but here they are pictured with my 74lb boxer, Levi, because they trusted us that nothing would happen.

Another important reason for my sister

and I to maintain kinship ties with one of

our nieces who has been subject to

cyber-bullying and an unfortunately

unpleasant high school experience.

“Cyberbullying victims were almost twice

as likely to have attempted or considered

suicide compared to youth who had not

experienced cyberbullying”

(Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004). We

hope that due to our relatively close

ages, we can be there for her, and she

will be able to recognize that she is far

from alone, despite how it she might feel

at times.

“They need to be able to engage in

difficult consations on current concerns”

(Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004).

In this case, my family has had to have

the difficult conversations about my

aunt’s health. She was recently

diagnosed with cancer. Fortunately it is

the survivable type, but regardless, as a

family we have had to discuss how we

can help her get to her appointments and

possible outcomes of her treatment.

“In any crisis stage, members go through a process of managing the loss, grief, or chaos” (Brommel, Bylund, and Galvin 2004).In our lives, my sister and I grew up with one grandparent. We lost her when we were both young. Then, as adolescence began to hit me, and my sister not being far behind, we lost our aunt and uncle within months of each other. We were devastated. Our Mom and Dad had to help navigate us through the stages of grief, while dealing with the loss themselves. Today, we remember our lost family members with stories of the past, a celebration of the memories we were able to make. My sister and I both like to believe that our Gram would be proud of us if she were here today.