Family Crisis

No matter what kind of preparation a family makes, each family will have a family crisis. But what is a crisis? A crisis is sometimes seen as just a problem, but it is much more than the problem. The problem is just the initial event. There is a lot to a crisis, which encompasses everything including the problem, reaction, and opportunity.

  A crisis is something that can come in and threaten family intimacy. It is an event that can literally make or break a family. After the initial stressor of the crisis, comes the opportunity that we are talking about. The ways that we choose to react and deal with the crisis gives us the opportunity to either strengthen or destroy our family. There are a variety of ways that we can choose to cope with a crisis. Some are effective, and others are not. Crisis’s come without a choice, but we do choose what to do next. A family with an alcoholic parent can use denial to refuse to accept the fact that someone has a drinking problem or that the drinking will soon just stop. The Family can also take the opportunity to come together and tackle the problem together as a unit. The alcoholic has the choice to continue to drink or to stop drinking, but the rest of the family will be closely bonded together and the act of drinking will not be accepted, so the drinker will have to choose between being a part of the family unit or not, and the alcoholic no longer threatens the family intimacy, only the intimacy between him/her and the family. A family that experiences the death of a loved one can choose to blame each other of shortcomings, but they are also given the opportunity to mourn together and lift each other up, strengthening the intimacy that binds a family together. 
                                                       

Relationship Attachment Model (RAM)

                                    

The Relationship Attachment Model (RAM) is something that we talked a little bit in out class one week that I found to be very vital to those in the dating world. In dating and courtship, it is so important for someone to understand the steps in making sure that they are in "love" and not just "infatuated."

Earlier I talked about the chemical side of love. It is important to understand what is going on in the brain in order to understand this model. The RAM show why people end up in such unhealthy relationships, and it also shows how to make sure you end up in a healthy relationship. In the RAM there are five ways that people bond, and there is also a close correlation to each of them.

The first is to KNOW. Knowledge of an individual will grow through quality time spent together. It is important to understand that there is a difference between quality time and just time. You don't get to know somebody by watching a movie together. You get to know them by going on walks, playing games, pretty much anything that causes you to communicate with each other. As you get to know somebody, you start to TRUST them. You cannot absolutely trust somebody unless you know them. As you trust them, you begin to RELY on them. If you cant trust them, you cant rely on them and the relationship fails. It is only when you start to rely on someone that you should start to COMMIT. Each relationship needs commitment, but each commitment needs trust and the ability to rely on each other. It is only after the commitment part that the TOUCH should go up. I cannot stress how important this one is.




Earlier when I was talking about chemical release in love, there was a lot of chemicals related to touch. Through romantic touch, such as a kiss, oxytocin, dopamine, and serotonin is released. Oxytocin is the cuddle drug that makes us feel more comfortable in the arms of a loved one. This can be mistaken for trust. Dopamine is the learning drug that conditions us. This can be mistaken for knowing someone and being committed to an individual. Seritonin is the happy drug that makes everything seem okay. So it is obvious that premature touch makes it seem like each of the levels are higher than they really are, giving us an illusion of a healthy relationship. This is why it is important to follow these in order and make sure that you are concentrating on the KNOW part. Through knowing someone, we ca truly see how healthy our relationship is and through holding off on the touch we can avoid the illusions and see the relationship as it is.

Family and Immigration

         Earlier in the semester we talked about the family structure and the effects of immigration. We read  a research paper that focused on immigration from Mexico to the United States. In the study conducted they mentioned that acculturation into the American culture caused a decrease in familism. This is greatly caused by the individualistic influence that the American culture holds. Roles were shifted by the separation of families. Some fathers left early to America to get a job and create a foundation for the family to move. Most of the time, families were separated for 3 or more years. Rules become stricter within the family due to the new dangers and fear of being exported. The children became the median between the Mexican and the American cultures because they would attend schools and we more able to adapt to the new culture. All of these changes come about with little expectation, but without the realization on how severe these changes would be. For example I believe that the families knew that they would have stricter rules, but did not anticipate the effects that it would have. They also knew that when the father would leave, that it would be for a while but did not realize how the roles would shift and how that would have such a lasting effect.

                                     

             It would be pretty difficult to offer a family that is experiencing this type of difficulty because I haven’t really experienced this type of situation. The closest thing that I have experienced is my mission in Russia. Our readings state that there are programs that help decrease the stresses of acculturation and address issues in family relationships caused by the immigration process. The main thing that people need to understand is that there is a great deal of stress brought on by assimilating into a new culture. Immigrants from Mexico also have to deal with the fact that they might not see their extended family that still live in Mexico. For a family with strong familism, that can be very difficult to deal with.

Fatherhood

              

                                         

              When writing a paper for my class, I came upon a great website that talked about efective fathering; https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/usermanuals/fatherhood/chapterfour.cfm the website gave several attrabutes that an effective father partrays. The first attrabute that that they gave was “Fostering  a positive relationship with the children’s mother.” The virtues that a father displays in his relationship with the children’s mother is setting an important example to the children. This reminds me of the youtube video where daughters are saying that loving her mother is the most important thing that their father could do. They bring up the point that by loving their mothers, their father is showing them not to settle in choosing their spouse. That loving their mother is showing them how to treat others, and how love heals wounds, and how to treat others. The article gives statistics in how fathers that treat their wife’s with love have children that suffered less from depression, anxiety, anger, and are all around healthier

                The second is spending time with their children. This to me is a given for effective fathering. This gives the father the opportunity to get to know his children, and the children the opportunity to get to know their father. The father can then get to know the problems and weaknesses of the child, and lift them up and help them. Time is not only the act of being around each other, but that they need to be actively engaged in productive activities. This is very different than spending time in passive activities such as watching television. Fathers should also spend time in fostering the child’s intellectual growth.

                                                   

                The third attribute that stood out to me was disciplining children appropriately. It is sometimes hard for a man to be in control of his emotions, body language, and his hands when disciplining. But fathers who scream, pound on things, or hit their children are both modeling bad behavior and they also lose their child’s respect when the father lets his emotions control him.

                The fourth attribute sounds like it came right out of the proclamation to the family. It is protecting and providing. A father needs to make the child feel safe and secure. Most fathers that are underemployed feel inadequate and sometimes lead them to anger or depression. But not only does a father need to provide financial security, they need to provide social security in their social environment. They need to keep track of their whereabouts and activities. It is one way of becoming involved in a child’s life, but also being protective of their surroundings and environments that they subject themselves to.

                                                           

                The last to me kind of sums it all up, which is being a role model. That one is very broad in that everything that a father does is going to mean something to their children. If the father is always gone, it could be interpreted as a lack of love. One of the points the author points out is that a father needs to admit to his children when he is wrong. Many men see apologizing to their children as a weakness and that the child may lose respect for their father, but in reality the opposite is true. What some men think is a sign of weakness to their children, is really a sign of strength. 

Genogram

One of the projects in our class that I didn't get to participate in was creating a family Genogram. A genogram is like a family tree but it shows family trends through generations. We had the opportunity to choose between this project and creating a family systems diagram that represented our family. I obviously chose the latter, but I do hope that I put one together for my wife's side of the family. It would be interesting to do my side of the family, but I don't think that I would find as many trends as my wife's family.
                                    
The purpose of this is to show trends that are either good or bad. Modern marriage and family therapists believe that it takes three to four generations for bad trends to dissolve out of the family. When we put together a genogram, we can see these trends and cut these trends out. It would have been very interesting to look at some of the other trends that I am not that aware of. My wife's family has an odd and unique trend  that for some reasons I will not go into. But, the main point is that the genogram is used to find trends and we can either keep them alive or we can try to stop the trend.

Womanism

A widely accepted idea that is being pushed today is equality between men and women. In the past 100 years, the rights for women have come a long way. Woman now have the right to vote, have equal wades, and are able obtain a college degree. Because of the sacrifices made by many great and strong women in our history, women basically have the same rights as men. In our modern society, some feminists are trying to take another step with feminism. They believe that there needs to be an absolute equality, not just political equality or equality in rights. They want to be looked at as the same. I personally have a different view.

                                           

Having a view that is not congruent with modern feminists, may be seen as sexist. Although I do see a difference in men and women, I do not see one gender as superior to the other. My wife is far more intelligent and capable of doing anything than I am. The only edge that I have on her is I can lift heavier things. With my wife being better at just about everything than I am, she is very different than I am. We think completely different, and we act completely different, and we are made so different. Not only do we have physical differences, but psychological and chemical differences.

          The genetic brain structure has been proven to be different between men and women. If we turn to neuroscience to take a look at these differences, we can see a concrete difference. Men have been proven to have 6.5 times more gray matter than women, and women have 10 times more white mater than men. What do these differences mean? Grey matter is more connected to processing and white matter is what connects information between more parts of the brain. This is why men can be more focused on one task, while women are thinking about multiple tasks. There are many theories connected to  this discovery to interpret what this means. But the bottom line is that men and women think different. It’s not that one is better than the other, it is just different.

          Modern Feminism fights for women’s rights, which is great, but they also fight gender related roles, which can be great and can be incongruent the divine nature of men and women. The idea of a woman staying home with children can be seen as sexist. The household chores are seen to be pulled into the idea of staying home with children. If a woman is to stay home with the kids, then she is also supposed to cook, clean, and do laundry. This is sexist. In my opinion, chores are different than responsibilities.

                                             

          A family is the biggest blessing and the most fulfilling thing that we can have in this life. Everything that we do should revolve around our current or future families. We should always be preparing and bettering ourselves for the sake of our children. The natural and divine instinct that a woman has is motherhood. There is a special attachment between a mother and her child. Woman are naturally more nurturing and caring toward their children. Men are naturally more concerned about the families wellbeing, financial and physical. While there are some exceptions, these are true to most couples. My brother is an example of the switch of these gender roles. His wife was making more money in her profession than he was, so when they had a baby, he stayed at home with the baby while she went off to work. While his wife was at work, she couldn’t concentrate on work because she was too preoccupied with thinking about the baby. He, on the other hand, didn’t feel like he was contributing to the families well-being. Resentment arose between the two because they both felt like the other was contributing more, even though they were doing what should be done.

          Each family has their own exceptions and due to the current economy, there  are new demands for the family. But a family is like a motor engine composed of many parts. Each part plays a different role in making the engine run. Each is different, but equally important. 

Love Over the Years

                                                      

One of the chapters that we have covered is on the basis of material intimacy. One of the questions that was brought up was, “does sexual relations become less fulfilling or exciting over time?” In my high school years I heard countless times arguments about sexual intimacy. Many of my peers believed that it was pointless to marry. Several of my friends believed that over time, sexual intimacy between a couple decreases. The intimacy becomes more like a close friendship.

                                                                                                                        

Sexual intimacy does change over time, and that change is a decline in frequency. As we age sex becomes less urgent and the desires change. But that doesn't change the sexual satisfaction. For a lot of couples, the sexual satisfaction improved over time. Frequency is independent from quality. Time changes almost everything, including intimacy. But we can see that if we grow strong as a couple within marriage, that intimacy changes for the better. Couples fall even more in love, and intimacy becomes more satisfying. Below is a video that shows the importance of the expression of love and how it helps couples grow closer together. You can see that there is a difference between the older and the younger couples, but the younger couples aren't any more in love than the older couples. It is more than just a friendship.