Family Relations

Congratulations! You're finally married! But now what? The day you get married, everyone feels like they know what the night is going to be like. Throughout my life, I have known quite a few people in high school who had sex with a couple people during their time there. They took pride in that and would even make fun of those who was still a virgin. I never really understood those people. I mean why is that something they should take pride over and brag about. We have been raised in a world where things like pornography and having sex with a lot of people has kind of become normalized.  For those of you who are single and even those who are married that haven't had sex yet, don't feel left out. It's a sacred experience and it's not something that shouldn't be rushed. Many people have in their heads a certain expectation of what it's supposed to be like because of what's portrayed in movies, stories, and more. But with this comes a to of challenges, but a...

You're either at the point where marriage is far from your mind, or marriage is the only thing on your mind. Marriage may seem fun and don't get me wrong you'll have those fun moments for the rest of your life! But there are also a lot of things that are not considered.  Two things that are most important to realize when it comes to marriage are cost and commitments.  The cost to get married can range depending on how, where, and when you get married. A typical wedding would cost about $15k and usually goes up from there. Something to recognize is that you don't need a big wedding. The big question to ask yourself is do you really need a $40k wedding? One thing to take into consideration is that it doesn't matter the cost or how big you have it. In fact, something that might just be nice is to have family there celebrating with you. I know most girls have had their dream wedding planned since they were 6 but it's more about who you want to spend the rest of your...

Does anyone really know when they will meet "the one"? I can tell you with so much reassurance that you don't. I've seen and met so many couples around me and the one thing they all say is "I wasn't expecting it". For all the single people, this advice is mostly for you but all of you in a relationship, maybe this will be good advice as well. I have nothing against dating for one, in fact, I have been on a few here in college as well. However, I know dating is one of the hardest thing people do. I was just talking with a friend about how hard it is to go out and date because everyone has so many different intentions.  One of the most difficult things our generation faces is first figuring out what a date is. I know that we have changed the phrase "Do you want to go out on a date?" to "Hey do you want to hang out this week?". This may be the most common phrase ever, but it also confuses people so much! Something our class talked about ...

From the beginning of life, we are expected to act a certain way. By this, I mean that once the announcement of "It's a Girl" or "It's a Boy" comes, parents start to buy either pink or blue clothes, toy cars or Barbies, Minnie Mouse or Paw Patrol diapers, etc. However many children tend to grow up differently. Not all girls wanted to play with Barbies and not all boys wanted to play in the dirt. Once we are born we have an expectation about what we want to play with, what our favorite color will be, or even who we will interact with more. During my time in elementary school, I saw so many different people, but based on your gender you were either considered "normal" or "weird".  When I was in elementary I had a friend who didn't like to play rough. He was a very kind boy and a lot of the girls actually liked to play with him because he preferred not to go play a running game or kickball. The problem for him was that even though the gi...

No matter how big or little, your parents have made sacrifices for you. I know that personally, mine has made a ton for me and my siblings. This week in class we had a discussion about immigration. Now, this topic hits close to home for me.  I wasn't the one necessarily going through the experience since I was born in California; however, my parents made this sacrifice when they were about my age.  First, let me tell you a bit about what I know about my parent's story. My dad came to the United States when he was around 17 to 18 years old. He came here with his brother and sister but the journey was rough. Luckily for them, they had some family already here but that didn't make the journey any easier. He had enough money to get them through and from then they had to figure out how to meet up with their family. This is just a sum of what they really went through and eventually they were going on to finish high school. Expect their school system was different causing my dad t...

It wasn't until recently that we have created the norm of a stay-at-home dad. Over the last couple of years, we have found that the mother isn't the one who must be the primary nurturer. " The U.S. Census reports that 32% of married fathers ( approximately 7 million dads ) are "a regular source of care for their children under age 15, up from 26% from 2002." The U.S. Census defines “regular care of children” as an arrangement that is consistent at least one day per week"(U.S. Census, 2011). From then it's only been growing!  Personally, I grew up with both parents alternating from being a stay-at-home parent. I honestly have never seen a problem with this, and I think it's quite common. The focus isn't who has to be the one working or who is the one staying home with their child, but it's about your child getting the care and love from both parents. This isn't a hand-off, it's a team effort.  One thing I know many parents struggle wit...

There are a lot of times where we take a look at our families and we're really grateful for them, other times we question why we had to have a brother or sister. I know that for me there are so many times where I realize that having siblings has helped me in my life. I have one brother and one sister, and we may not get along every day, but we know that we'll be there for each other. Now I know that sounds really cheesy but anyone who has siblings can admit that it's true.   Nowadays not many people have siblings, let alone children. Ok, before you think that I'm here to convince you to have kids, stick around because that's not what I'm trying to do. We live in a world where women have moved so much in life! It's literally one of the best things ever! However, because of that, so many women don't want to have children anymore or as many. Culture has always had an impact on how many children people have or don't. But we went from the world thinki...