Dreamer

As another holiday went by, I can come clean in front of you and tell you I have survived, however, not without scratches.

Having a large family often implies a lot of uncomfortable holiday moments, lots of pressure, and tongue bites for everyone’s happiness.

Maybe it’s because everyone is tired, bored, or has different expectations, maybe it’s because some cannot regulate their emotions, or simply need all the attention and act like spoiled kids.

Some are actual kids, but we’re not talking about pre-schoolers tantrums.

We are here to talk about our relatives or, as my therapist loved to say: 1st, 2nd, and 3rd-degree relatives!

We as human beings are born as a result of a natural and normal activity of procreation between a woman and a man, and they are called our parents. They have parents too: our grandparents. We might be lucky (or not) to be born into a multi-kid family, so we have brothers or sisters or both. And, with time, we might decide to have children of our own. And if our brothers and sisters decide too, we will have nephews and our children will have cousins. These are our close relatives: parents/kids, brothers/sisters, aunts and uncles/cousins and grandparents. 

Let’s not forget the in-laws who are still a part of this close circle of so-called family. And they are another kind of mess.

However, all these people are actually our family? As stated in the Cambridge dictionary a family is a group of people related to each other as mother and father and children, so, the first-degree relatives.

In reality, things can be different. Many cases show that lots of abuse happens here, in the close circle of “family”. Think about rape, alcoholism, physical, mental abuse, all covered with a nice picture frame. Abuse also comes in other forms, not only with bruises, talking down a kid, pressuring it, forcing one of the spouses into illegal things and so much more. It’s not quite today’s topic so we stop here, only highlighting the fact that the defined family isn’t everything that it should be.

Because when we think about an idyllic family, that was served to us, we think about the white fence house, with the man and the woman, the two kids, with grandparents coming over to holidays, large gatherings, great achievements, and a cheerful happy life. 

I don’t blame marketing, religion, or politics for serving it to us. It’s something nice to aspire to. But the truth is far from the truth in most of the cases.

So, this “family” is really our family? Or the stranger that became our friend, who knows us better than anyone, who knows about our darkest thoughts, our ups or downs, is more our family than our brothers and sisters?

Or the elder co-worker, who saw us sad and gave us better advice than our parents at a breakup?

Or our college friends that drove us to calm down when they saw our tears in the corners of our eyes in class, and the second day acted like it never happened?

The ones we actually call when we are in trouble or the ones we should call?

Or, or, or? 

There are so many other or’ s for each of us, for different situations, when people who should have been on our side, without a single question, the family we’ve been born in, disappointed us, and strangers came closer and acted like a real family members.

So, who is our real family? Is it always our 1st, 2nd, and 3rd-degree relatives or could it be the people you could really count on?

Who are we putting on the emergency call?

#adreamerlife

Cristiana Apreutese