Our class discussion today really got me thinking about my own family interactions as well as the interactions I will have with my future family. In my family, we rarely show affection with kisses and hugs. I hug my parents when I come home and right before I leave. My fiance's family is interacts in pretty much the same way. His parents make the sign of the cross on each of their children's forehead and say "God bless you" every night before they go to bed, but other than that, it's a hug when they get home and a hug when they leave. This is purely my observations; I'm going to ask my fiance if what I see is really how it is.
I think this is important to professional development as a parent. Just like other areas, couples should talk about how their families showed affection and how they plan on showing affection to their children. This is something I want to talk about with my fiance. I want to know how he perceives the ways my family shows affection. I want to know how he sees his family showing affection. And I want to talk about how we plan on showing affection to our own children - will we do the same as our parents or choose to do something different?
3 comments:
I think it is very important that each person in a relationship understands one another's beliefs and practices about affection. It is great that you have observed and taken note of his family's methods of showing affection to one another. I don't think two people can successfully connect with one another and plan on creating a family of their own, without creating a cohesive understanding of how they do and expect one another to show affection. I believe that the family practices associated with one person have a substantial impact on how that person is going to associate with others. Your family life is your first encounter with human beings and this is where you learn all your firsts. Granted, these learned beliefs, ideals, behaviors, etc., can be changed throughout a lifetime, I feel that they are most likely to remain your core central beliefs, ideals, behaviors, etc. for much of your life.
One of the characteristics to having a "strong family" we learned in class today was positive communication. My family is close-knit and we all keep in touch with each other pretty well for living in different states. Sarcasm and humor are sometimes used, but my siblings and I are old enough now to understand what is really meant by the sarcastic comments. However, it seems like a family that is close to mine uses sarcasm and humor in place of affection and emotions. Is that a learned or developed behavior? I'm just curious as to why some families are not as affectionate as others, and completely rely on humor and sarcasm as a way to express how they feel.
In our discussion about communication and its role in building a positive family made me think of its importance in my own family. All of my siblings are now out of my parent’s house and we all have to rely on our communication skills in order to stay connected and close to one another.
The difficulty of staying connected can be straining especially with all of our hectic schedules, but in order to make things work we have to make the time to talk to each other on a regular basis. I feel that positive communication is one of the main ways that families learn and grow with each other.
I think this is important in a professional setting for the family are the support system that teaches you importance of communication and shows you ways to properly communicate with those around you. While working with families I would help them instill within their own family structure a positive communication system, where people’s voices can be heard and respected. I feel that in order to grow as an individual one must learn how to communicate and cooperate with others; this I believe starts right away in the home.
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