“The traditional family consists of a father, mother and children. This is the family shown on television as the standard family. However, the 21st century showcases a variety of family units, some very different from the standard of the 1950s. Today, children are also often raised in single parent homes, by grandparents or by homosexual parents. Some families opt to have no children, or cannot have children due to some medical or emotional barrier. The idea that parents and children make a family is a basic definition; however, in order to accurately acknowledge other family structures, a broader definition is necessary. In addition to a more universal family definition, there are also plenty of people who consider a group of friends to be family, and adults who consider pets as defining members of the family unit.” (Blessing) Blessing opened my eyes in this quote because she mentions how it’s not just parents and children. It can be no children or it can be pets and I didn’t look at it like that until I read this article. I didn’t put the idea of family with no children in my head simply because my own family consists of 4 …show more content…
I found that asking my family all of these questions overall made me open my eyes to a lot. Although my family members fights and argue over things very often, we still love and appreciate us a lot more than we all think. Asking them the question brought us to all know what we truly thought about one another and that was really fun to sit and talk about, especially with my parents. I don’t think that this research had a life changing effect on my family and I. I just think that it, for a week long, made us realize how much we need each other. The part of my research I found most effective to myself was talking about the meaning of family to my mother. Hers stood out in one way because she started having a family so young, like I mentioned earlier, and her story just made her and I both really emotional and was in a way, her teaching me a life lesson. I would describe my experience over all for this experiment/research as truly eye opening. If I didn’t have the family that I have, I would not be who I am today. I know from time to time I can be a handful to my parents, and I realized they do so much more for me than I have ever noticed, so this had given me a much deeper appreciation for them that I should have had all along. I think just knowing the amount of love that i receive from them, even when they are yelling at me for a good reason and I just don’t want to see it, is a blessing that not everyone gets to