Family Genogram Dynamics - Term Paper Example

My Family Genogram Affiliation: My Family Dynamics and How the Intergenerational Relationships Have Shaped Me and My Relationship With My Own Family Brief Introduction To My Family I did this genogram, and, as McGoldrick et al. (2008) states, I was able to use these figures, along with information gleaned from my family, to understand who I am, where I came from, and how I was shaped by my forebears. I am a Nigerian woman who was raised in the traditional nuclear family. In other words, my mother and my father raised me together. My mother and father are not overtly religious, although my mother was Catholic when I was growing up. My father did not subscribe to a certain religion, however. Therefore, religion was not a factor in how I was raised. My parents did raise me, however, to believe in the tenants of religion and the teachings that are important in any religious observance. These teachings include the admonition that I must treat everybody with kindness and respect; that I must not judge anybody, as I am not perfect myself; that I must love my neighbor as myself; and that I must not become too enamored of material things, because material things are not what brings true happiness. My parents are very traditionalists, aside from the fact that they are not religious overtly. Their parents were even more traditionalists, and they observed more traditional religion. They believed not only in the Supreme Being, but they also believed in lesser gods, ancestral spirits and magic and medicine. In a way, my grandparents shaped my religious identity more than my parents did. This is because I believe, at least somewhat, in the old ways of my grandparents. I understand that Christianity has some of the same beliefs as what my grandparents ascribed to, which includes the beliefs in guardian angels and the like. I also believe that my ancestors are watching over me, like a kind of guardian angel. My beliefs in magic and medicine are derived from my grandparents, and they are translated into my beliefs in the Tarot and astrology. In other words, I have more of a mystical basis for my overall belief system that does not necessarily comport with Christianity, but is more in line with my grandparents. And, from my parents, come the values that they have taught me, which I have listed above. As far as the sociopolitical foundations of my family, my parents showed the typical exchange theory of labor within the family dynamic, which means that my mother had the role as a homemaker, and she exchanged her labor for my father’s economic provisions. My grandparents have exhibited the same type of exchange. I am different, however, as I am raising my three teenagers on my own, with some help from their father, who is my ex-husband. However, although he pays child support, he is not as involved in their lives as I would like. Thus, the norms in the family structure, up until my nuclear family with my children, is that the parents are married, and that the woman stays home and takes care of the children, while the man is the breadwinner. This is traditional, and this is the norm that my family has exhibited. I have obviously gone against this familial norm, to bring a different norm to my family. The norm that I am exhibiting for my children is that a woman may be independent of the man, and that the woman may be the head of the family. Moreover, another norm that I am teaching my children is that both of the men and the women should have household responsibilities. One example of this is that I am teaching my sons that they are to do dishes, laundry and housekeeping duties. This is different from my parents and my grandparents, as the norm was, in both of these dyads, that the woman is in charge of the cooking, cleaning, laundry and other household duties and that the man does not do any of these duties. This is another way that I have broken the traditional norms which has been in my family during previous generations. Therefore, I can positively state that my family norms of tradition – the father the breadwinner, the mother the housekeeper, and the fact that the father did not do household chores – has shaped me, but only in that I knew that I needed to break out of the social roles that my parents and grandparents have exhibited. This is because I see that my father and grandfather did not help with household chores, and I always saw that as an injustice. I always thought that my father should help my mother more in the kitchen, and that my father should do his laundry once in awhile. It also would not hurt for my father to pick up a vacuum and clean the house. He never did this, so I feel that my reaction to this is to make sure that my children do not subscribe to the same rigid gender roles that my parents and my grandparents did. Multi-Generational Norms And How I Am Breaking Them This is what I understand about my role in my multi-generational family. That is that, as my chart would indicate, my family has been plagued with a variety of health and addiction issues. I did not understand this when I was growing up, now I understand that, perhaps the root of their issues is because they were unhappy with their marriage and the dynamic that it brought. One of the issues which has plagued my family has been obesity and alcoholism. I have understood that, at the root of overeating and alcoholism is an inability to cope. Also, depression has also run in my family. I see that, if I dig a little deeper of my traditionalist grandparents and parents that, perhaps, the dynamic that they show, which is that the man rules the roost and the woman is submissive, did not work for them. There was not enough of the egalitarianism that should be present in a healthy family. This is one reason why I have chosen to be non-traditional, compared to them, and why I have chosen to be independent. This is also why I am teaching my children to have a different marriage and a different family dynamic than what they have seen in the older generations in this family. One of the family lifecycle issues that has presented itself is the way that my parents’ marriage changed when they had children. I have heard the stories that they have told about the way that they were when they were first married, verses what happened when the children arrived. My parents, when they were younger, were much more carefree and, it seems that they were also much happier. However, having children put stress on their marriage and on them as individuals. I had to find a way for this pattern to not repeat itself with my family. I understood that having children is a sacrifice, and that I could no longer have the independent life that I had before having my children. However, I was also determined that I would not necessarily be slaves to my children, and that I have to carve out time for myself, in order to keep my sanity. In other words, my mother made her children the center of her world, and her marriage to my father suffered, in part, because of this. This is another family norm, which is unspoken, that I did not want to repeat. I therefore have cultivated friendships. I also have hobbies, which includes being active outdoors riding my bike and hiking. I understand that my children do not need me every minute of every day, so this has become freeing for me. I believe that this will help me, and my children, in the long run, because I will have less trauma when my children leave the nest to go to college and get married. This is in comparison to my mother, who had a hard time letting me become an adult, because she focused so much upon me and my siblings that, when the time came for us to move away, have families of our own, etc., she had a difficult time adjusting. Therefore, some of the intergenerational themes which have presented themselves are that my family, including my parents and grandparents, have been chronically unhappy because the family dynamics that they perpetuated were not exactly healthy. Because the women in the family were focused exclusively on child-rearing and housework, and keeping the men happy, they did not cultivate outside interests of their own. When one’s identity is focused upon the happiness of others, and how that person plays a part in these other people’s happiness, than this is a recipe for failure. Whether the other person whose happiness depended upon the women in the family were the children or the spouse, the fact was, the women in my family did not have their own happiness in mind when considering the dynamics of the families. Because of this, my parents and grandparents experienced health issues which typically plague unhappy families, including food, gambling and alcohol addictions. I have come to see the traditional roles which have been perpetuated through the generations as severely limiting, and are, in fact, a recipe for unhappiness. Perhaps it is selfish on my part, but I refuse to continue to perpetuate the family dynamics of my forebearers. I also see that the spiritual traditions and religious aspects of my grandparents have been limiting for them in some ways. They have traditional views regarding gay rights, for instance, which have come from their religious beliefs. I do not hold these same views. I feel that gays are not second-class citizens, and that they are entitled to equal rights under the law. I therefore have not let religious views make me bigoted, as were shown by my grandparents. I also believe that religion was at the core of how they saw themselves and their family roles, and why it was that the man was at the head of the household and the woman was submissive. This was at the core of my grandparents’ dynamic, and was equally at the core of my parents’ dynamic. This is because my grandparents, both sets, taught both of my parents about social roles between husbands and wives. My parents carried these norms, which were taught by their parents, because of their parents’ religion, into their own marriage. I was the first one to break the mold, and this is because I have seen what this dynamic can do to a person’s sole and sense of self-worth. That said, I understand that I need to work on myself some to become a better person. I understand that, even though I do not want to get involved in the trap of living for others, like my mother did, and my grandmothers did, there is a limit to how much independence is healthy for a family. I understand that I might tend to go the other way a little too much, and that I need to balance my need for independence with my family’s need to have me around for them. This is something that I must work on. I do not want to be a helicopter parent, always involving myself in my children’s lives. Yet, at the same time, I need to involve myself in some of the aspects of child-rearing. This is my challenge – how much independence do I give them, and how many battles must they fight on their own, in order to have a better sense of self than what I have had growing up? And when do I step in as a parent, and an ally for them? This is something that I struggle with and question myself about every day. I also feel a little guilty about not giving my children some sort of spiritual underpinning. My children are moral, because this is what I am teaching them, yet I have a nagging feeling that giving them more of a spiritual guidance would give my moral teachings more weight. So, I find myself wondering if I should get more involved with the traditional teachings of my grandparents’ religion, and pass this on to my children. In other words, I am not completely removed from my parents and grandparents, and the dynamics that they displayed in their interpersonal dealings with one another, and my grandparents’ religious beliefs. There are still vestiges of them within me, and a part of me wants to pass these vestiges on to my children, even as I want them to have a different life from myself or my forebearers. Conclusion I have learned much through this process of analysis of my intergenerational family. When going through the genogram process, I noticed that my family did have a history of health problems, and that I do not, myself, suffer from the very same health problems. My family has a history of depression, addiction, obesity and obesity-related diseases – including hypertension and diabetes. When writing about my family dynamic, it occurred to me why my family was unhappy, which was no doubt at the root of their addictions and depression. Furthermore, that was because my family was so traditional, to the point where there was no room for independence. This was especially true with the women in the family. However, the men were also pressured, because they had to be the sole breadwinners for their respective families. I now theorize that these rigid roles, and the consequences of these rigid roles, are at the root of my family’s unhappiness. Therefore, I am glad that I decided to buck family norms and bring my own family up differently, and I do not subscribe to these same roles. Therefore, the largest lesson that this project has taught me is that my way of bringing up my own family hopefully will result in more happiness for them, and for myself, than my forebears experienced. Source Used McGoldrick, M., Gerson, R. & Petry (2008). Genograms: Assessment and intervention. New York: W.W. Norton & Co. Read More