The Traditional Family: The Roles Of My Family

Usually we consider a traditional family to have a male, female and children they care for, when the female is the homemaker and the male to be the breadwinner. The idea of the male breadwinner and the nurturing mother as the traditional family appeared only in the 19th century, when “the white middle-class families became less patriarchal and more child-centered” (Coontz, 1). When I was growing up, roles in my family have been changing to some degree. Before my parents got married, my mom was a tailor, and my dad worked as a welder. However, after they got married and I was born, my mom quit her job. From that time my mom stayed home and became the homemaker, while my dad was the breadwinner. My dad was the main source of the family’s income, …show more content…
From the time I could remember myself, I remember that my mom always had a great respect and love for my dad, and the last word in our family always was after my dad. My dad greatly loved (and still does) my mom, an even though he technically did have more authority in our house than my mom, he never used it against any of us. He is a really wise man, and he always includes everyone’s opinions in his decisions. When there was a time when we did not have enough money to pay for everything, and my mom had to return back to being a tailor, which she did before my parents got married. One time that I remember which really made me grow up is when I was 7. Both of my parents were working, and because I am a girl and the oldest child I was expected to take my siblings to school, clean the house and cook. My siblings were also trying to help me with everything. We were in school from 8 am to 5pm. After coming back from school, I tried to do my house chores, and at 7pm my mom came back from work, cooked something else and make sure that we finish our homework. When I turned 10, we moved to the USA, and my dad found a good job as a welder and my mom takes care of her parents …show more content…
My family is the reason why I am who I am, and I would never want to lose a connection with a single member of my family. They are part of me. Like I said before, my dad is the head of our family, and I will be more than willingly have my husband to take charge of my future family because I see that it worked for my parents. My family also influenced the things that I like to do, such as painting, drawing, singing, teaching, spots, exploring, and my goals in the future, such as being involved in church, getting a good education and a good job. As in anything else, there are benefits and drawbacks in the way I was raised. For example, one of the drawbacks of having separate chores between boys and girls led to be being closer connected with my sister than my brothers. Coontz actually addresses this problem in her article, explaining “Rigid insistence on separate spheres for men and women made male-female relations extremely stilted, so that women commonly turned to other women, not their husbands, for their most intimate relations” (Coontz,