Dec 11 2008
What is family
Today’s word is family. In today’s society that word takes on many more forms than I myself ever anticipated. Growing up in Oklahoma I always thought myself as of being from what I called a “normal” family. My parents are still married and I don’t ever remember hearing the word divorce until I was a teenager. I believe I was married before I ever heard the word step-mom or step-dad. I married at the young and tender age of 16 and of course I knew everything so I knew my marriage would last throughout the years like my parents and like his parents. My marriage as it turns out only lasted 22 years and half of them were just what I called the hanging in there years. I never dreamed of giving my kids a step-dad but as it turns out when my youngest child was 15 years old I met someone. So my family grew.
With my having 3 boys and 1 girl and the man I met having 3 girls and 1 boy I was so excited about all the family bonding we would get to do. Somehow in my mind I had pictured this large happy family that had joined together with laughter all the time and tons of grandbabies. It did not take long for the word “family” to burn a different impression into my gullible mind. With him and his family being from Columbus Ohio and myself and my family being from a small town in Oklahoma I think the words culture shock are two words I learned the meaning of very quickly. To me, after a few years of trying to merge all these people into one form like I seen in my mind, I learned that just because you are related to someone, it don’t make them family. Or it doesn’t make them what one of my step-children called “real” family.
So over the past 10 years I have been trying to make a family work that will never really be a family. To be in ones family you have to accept them into your heart. Sure family’s come in many different shapes and forms these days. Two moms or two dads there’s half family’s and step family’s and different culture family’s. My not being accepted into the heart of a step child to me means that they don’t consider me family like I did them. Family’s have their ups and their downs, and falling outs, but to never have accepted someone into your heart that was so excited to be your family, well that takes on a whole new meaning to me.
