As soon as I was old enough to understand that my mother and father did not love each other anymore I knew I had to be stronger than most children my age. I spent most of my childhood in an unhappy home with constant tension and bickering between my mother and father. Additionally, it seemed as if my life was controlled by the outcomes of my parents’ struggles. As time went on, tensions built year by year until the last straw broke the camel’s back. I was ten years old when my parents were divorced. Even though these circumstances improved, my parents still had one person left to argue about and that was me. During high school, both of my parents wanted complete control over my thoughts and constant arguing ensued through me as I became a messenger for my father and mother. For example, incidents like child support, bills, and time I spent with each were fought over. It was an endless cycle. As a teen, I was not sure who to believe, and I did not have the ability to envision a clear picture of what my …show more content…
Last year, even with scholarships and grants, I still owed about five thousand dollars per semester. Once again, my parents fought about who helped me pay and they both had a difficult would time saying yes because they do not trust each other. Also, being a student at a school with a tuition of approximately forty two-thousand dollars a year, I began stressing about how I was going to pay for college. I constantly applied for scholarships, taking time away from my homework and study time. Additionally, I found it indispensable to apply for a job on campus. Soon, I was hired as the Website Editor for St. Edward’s University in Fall 2016 and had numerous responsibilities including updating the teachers and students’ website, information on events, and new teaching positions. I estimate that I spent two hours each week completing these
One of the biggest issues that many students and parents have concerning college education is the cost. Due to the state of the economy, affording college has become very difficult. Fortunately, the government is able to provide financial assistance in addition to the University’s own financial aid. Case is a private institution which means that it costs more compared to a public college. The tuition for Case was approximately, $38,000 in 2007 not including living or book expenses. Even though there was a tuition rate increase for every following year. The only way I was able to afford the tuition at Case was because of the scholarship I earned. In addition, I received federal grants and a substantial amount of aid from the University. I did not have a free ride but I received a great deal of financial help to pay for my college education.
For example, when I was younger my father told me that I would never be smart enough to attend college and that I might as well not even try to apply. For most of my life, this has caused me to think I would never be smart enough to graduate from high school or attend college. Eventually, I overcame this fear when I graduated high school and was accepted into college. I also had to learn not to take things personally from my father because the things that he said about me were not true. If I kept listening to him, I would always find myself hurt by the things he says. I began to realize that I had a problem with taking things personally, and I realized this even more after conducting some personal interviews about the Four
Deep down inside, I have always known my parents are loving parents that will do anything they can to support me to prosper and succeed in life. The only problem is that my parents came from very traditional household that used the authoritarian parenting style, so that is the style they used on me. While growing up with parents using the authoritarian parenting style, I was not exposed to their warmth or nurturing side. Instead, I was taught to respect authority and traditional structure in a demanding, controlling and punitive way. This affected me in a negative way as I was expected to follow strict rules unconditionally with absolute obedience, and my parents rarely gave me choices or options as they had very high expectations of what I should be doing. For example, when I was in junior high, my parents selected all of my courses and I had no control over my school schedule. They told me that they were doing this because they knew what was good for me and what career path I should be going into in the future. However, what they did not understand at that time is that their actions lowered my self-esteem and prevented me to act independently; as a result, I never really learned how to set my own limits and personal standards until I entered my sophomore year in high school.
According to Erikson, individuals are presented with crises that they must overcome in order to advance to the next stage of lifespan development. The psychological maltreatment that I experienced during my preschool years and continuing through to late adolescence, would have lessened my ability to succeed at the crisis presented and in the creation of a positive self-concept. During the time my pivotal experience took place, I would have been nearing the completion of Erikson’s Initiative vs Guilt stage (Feldman & Landry, 2012). The crisis presented during this stage is for the child to develop independence from their caregivers while learning to adequately contend with the guilt stemming from failure (Feldman & Landry, 2012). During this stage, I would have experienced an increased awareness of myself as an individual capable of making decisions and operating within a capacity separate form my caregivers. Returning to the example provided in this paper, one can see that the following occurred: 1. I assessed a situation to be harmful to my well-being; 2. I made a decision to tell my mother about the situation; 3. I received punishment for acting independently. My mother’s reaction to my attempt at independence not only made me question whether my concern had been fabricated or if it was as I recall her screaming at me “lies, lies, lies your
Unfortunately, my family and I fall into an area of the middle class that prohibits us from receiving need-based aid. Although I have graciously been awarded the Elizabeth Ann Seton Scholarship, without some additional form of aid, a Seton Hill education may be prohibitively expensive. My fourth year’s tuition alone would cost $37,520 with my current scholarship, and I would still have to pay for living expenses. Once my undergraduate and fifth years’ expenses are included, I will be over $150,000 in debt when I graduate. As a student who has worked exceedingly hard in the classroom and as a leader for four years, this amount of financial burden feels like a punishment. If I do not receive the Seton Scholar Award, I am not confident that I can attend Seton Hill and make the impacts I have described in this
Now that I am in the counseling program I have become aware of the dysfunctional family that I have grew up in. Growing up I remember my father was never around. There is a memory I will never forget it seems blurry but I remember my parents arguing and becoming angry. I went into a room and when I came out I saw my father’s hand bleeding. My mother was holding a kitchen knife and she had cut his hand. Since my father was hardly around we never had family trips or family time together. He would spend his weekends drinking or going out with his friends. I have another memory that stands out. I remember I was in the back seat of the car and my mom was dropping of my dad somewhere. They were arguing the whole way over there, once we got to the destination my dad got off and walked out. I can imagine this affected my mother as a woman because her needs were not being
When I was only nine years old I sat on my mother’s lap and heard the news that would impact my life indefinitely. When I learned that my parents were getting divorced, I never expected there to be any positive effects. However, in dealing with this drastic change in my life, I became a stronger person in numerous ways. Carrying my new maturity, new self-sufficiency, and new resilience on the weight of my shoulders these past 9 years have proven to me that I will succeed in life. Undergoing my parents’ divorce has heightened my level of maturity. I’ve learned life skills that allowed me to improve my self-sufficiency. Furthermore, going through this tough period of time has made me far more resilient in the face of hardships.
Due to domestic violence’s widespread effects, most individuals either retain, or know an individual who retains, personal experience with domestic violence. In both my personal experience and my mother’s, I preserve three distinct experiences of domestic violence. My first exposure to domestic violence occurred when I was four years old, as my parents reached the breaking point in their marriage. I witnessed physical and emotional abuse in my parent’s marriage as they fought over their three children and their marriage. The physical abuse represents the first, and only, memory I retain of my parents being married. Because I never witnessed my parent’s happily married, it affected my childhood through making me feel as if I must pick a side. I felt that my childhood did not represent a family, but rather a continuous battle over who retained more power over us children and the resources. I deemed relationships as degrading and selfish due to the
Looking back at my past, I recall my mother and father’s relationship as if it were yesterday. I am only four years old, small and curious; I tended to walk around my home aimlessly. I would climb book shelves like a mountain explorer venturing through the Himalayans, draw on walls to open windows to my own imagination, or run laps around the living room rug because to me I was an Olympic track star competing for her gold medal; however my parents did not enjoy my rambunctious imagination. My parents never punished me for it but would blame each other for horrible parenting skills; at the time I did not understand their fights, but instead was curious about why they would fight.
Compared to some of the horrible stories of child abuse I've heard, my childhood was a Walt Disney fairytale, but in my own eyes I was an unhappy kid. I was born in 1972, which is the Chinese Year of the Rat (the rat's Chinese characteristic is to scavenge for survival, which is also a part of my personality). From old pictures, my fragmented memories, and tales told by my grandma Mildred, I was close to my parents during my first six or seven years, especially my dad. My dad, Richard, was employed straight out of college as an Aerospace engineer with the Logicon Corporation (where he still works to day). He married my mom, Loretta, (who also became an Aerospace engineer for Logicon) seven years before I was born. My parents fought almost every night as far back as I can remember, and I can still recall covering my ears with a pillow to escape their bickering. I've always sort of believed that it was my mom's fault, possibly because her voice was always the loudest screech I could hear. I know the blame should rest equally between them, but my mother was always so demanding and emotional while my dad was a quiet man who was able to control his anger unless really pushed. I think she was used to a lot of emotions in her past and would intentionall...
It had come to the attention of my family that I had some sort of psychological problem and something had to be done. I was always labeled as a shy and quiet kid, and like my family I had thought nothing more of my behavior. However, now it had become something more obvious. I had told my parents the kinds of problems I was having. Basically I didn't want to talk to anyone or to be anywhere near anyone I didn't know. I didn't really want to leave my house for any reason for fear that I might have to talk to someone. I was so critical and scrutinizing in relation to myself that I couldn't even enter into a conversation. Everyone seems to have a part of themselves that lends itself to thoughts of pessimism and failure, but mine was something that was in the forefront of my mind at all times. Something telling me that everything I did was a failure, and that anything I ever did would not succeed. Through discussion with my family it was decided that I should move out of my parents house to a place where I could find treatment and get a job. I was to reside with my sister Lisa, her partner Brynn, and their Saint Bernard in Greensboro.
There have been on many occasions that I am confronted with interpersonal conflicts, some more serious than others. One of the most serious conflicts I have encountered involved my parents, yet it was also one that had the biggest positive impacts in my life. The conflict took its roots when I started high school. Due to our economic situation, my parents worked strenuous jobs with inflexible, long hours. As a result, they depended on my older sister and I to watch over our three younger siblings. Unlike my sister, I was involved in afterschool athletics, which then divided my time between home and school even further. This created an imbalance; my older sister took most of the responsibility of taking over my siblings. Due to this, my parents were not supportive of my involvement of extracurricular. This escalated when my parents left their jobs to open up a small family restaurant; as the business starting to pick up, not only did they need my sister and I to help at home, but also help at the restaurant. Since athletics were time consuming, I could not divide my time to cater my parents'
I have experienced numerous changes in my life within the last several years. During my earlier teen years, my daily life was one filled with sadness. Believing much of my unhappiness was attributed to being the oldest of three children in a single parent home and having an expectation that I should readily embrace responsibility of care for my siblings made me quite despondent. Unhappy with my circumstances made me become somewhat rebellious towards those people directly linked to my personal and home life. I inherited this responsibility by way of my father’s absence from the family home.
One beautiful day that summer, I was playing outside with my friends when my mom called for me to come home. I did not want to abandon my guard post at the neighbor's tree house so I decided to disregard her order. I figured that my parents would understand my delima and wouldn't mind if I stayed out for another two or three hours. Unfortunately, they had neglected to inform me that my grandparents had driven in from North Carolina, and we were supposed to go out for a nice dinner. When I finally returned, my father was furious. I had kept them from going to dinner, and he was simply not happy with me. "Go up to your room and don't even think about coming downstairs until I talk to you."
As a young adult lady, I grew up always being told how perfect I truly was, I grew up with the unconditional support of both my parents and a strong center in family orientation. I was blessed with these luxuries and I am forever thankful. Although I control the outcome of my life and I control my thought processes and social behaviors, my family has a big impact on how I carry myself and the aspirations I set for myself. Having a supportive family makes my life easier to endure during rough patches in my life and easier to reach my goals. I’ve endured the heartaches and the painful memories, but I am never alone in my pain. I think my family is the direct cause of my naturally elevated confidence during this vulnerable phase in my life, Although I do not want to give the perception of perfection but this mindset has helped me get through the toughest patches and come out on top, it has helped me dispatch from friends when needed and form positive inferences on how healthy relationships are suppose to look like. All families have some type of unique dysfunction, the dysfunction helps with the development of “ lessons learned”. Every family has different dynamics, some are smaller, some are big, some are closer than others. The only similarity that remains is that they all make an impact on a child 's mental, physical and