Week 3

This week during class our teacher possed the question "What is Family??" It really got me thinking how I define family. Some may define family as blood related. But some people may never connect with their blood relatives. Some may define their legal guardians as family. It may be hard for people that are adopted for them to define who their real parents are. To me family are the people that raised us, were a role model and showed true love to us. I feel immediate connection with my blood relative because we have a strong bond within my family. At times its hard to describe but a family has a sense of support, trust, and belonging. It's different with family because you would sacrifice and do anything for them than compared to friends. There are many different kinds of families but I support what the Proclamation to World states: the family is ordained of God and marriage between a man and a woman is essentail to his eternal plan. Marriage is the foundation to a family.

Week 2

This week we discussed how the family is a social system. In a family, each person plays a role and is interrelated and interdependent on each other. Within this system there are subsystems such as parental, spouse. Every family has their own rules and boundaries. There can be rigid boundaries to hardly any boundaries within a family. It is essential to create a homeostasis, in other words to seek a balance between stability and change in family relationships. The healthy family relationships are determinded by a family's system. Do the parents have a stronger relationship with their child than with their spouse? What is my role within my family and what kind of relationship do I have within the subsystems of my family (such as siblings, parents and spouse.) The most important subsystem is the marital subsystem because it is the foundation of a strong family system. By creating a family system it is easier to identify patterns and how can a family improve and create more cohesion.

While studying the family systems theory it reminded me of the circumplex model and how similar it is in how family might interact. I just thought I would share it.

Week 1

This week in class, we discussed the trends and statistics of marriage, divorce, birthrate, employed mothers, cohabitation, and house hold sizes. After we discussed the trends we cateorgized them into critical, significant or no big deal. It was interesting to see all of the trends correlate and have an impact on the family in some way.

We also discussed the "river anaolgy". A river is filled with debri that floats along with the current and eventually a log blocks the current by going sideways and doesn't move. This causes debris to build up behind it and everything stacks up. This causes a lot of strain for the log but down river the water becomes cleaner. This can be applied to familes when one family member decides change a family trend. They may have to deal with grief and pain from family members, but because of the change they are creating this person allows for there to be cleaner water for future generations.