Free Creative Writing About Family Analysis

Traditional Family

For this project, the traditional family that I have chosen to report on is an Indian (Asian) family living two lanes down from our apartment. The family hails originally from India, but they have migrated to the USA for over five years. In order to maintain their anonymity, I have changed their names. The husband is called Ashok and the wife is called Purnima. They have two children, one boy aged only 10 months and one girl aged 3 years. The couple is young within the age range of 28-35 years. Their ethnicity is Asian. They belong to a middle-income household, with both the husband and wife working in corporate earning moderately decent. Though they practice Hinduism as a religion, but here in the USA, they are not a part of any religious affiliation. They visit a Hindu temple nearby on a weekly basis to offer their prayers. Both the husband and wife showed their aversion towards politics, and expressed their lack of desire to join any political affiliation now or in the near future.
The family structure of the family is nuclear, with both the husband and wife providing care and support to their offspring. Two subsystems exist within the family. One is the couple itself, and the other is their children. The couple consists the primary subsystem of the family on which the subsystem consisted by children depend upon both physically and emotionally. The task of making decisions is undertaken by both Ashok and Purnima. While Purnima primarily takes decisions related to child rearing and recreation, Ashok takes decisions of financial matters, including monthly and yearly household expenditure, savings, and investments. Both Ashok and Purnima come from a well-knit family, and therefore, they give a lot of importance to family values and bonding. The child rearing philosophy they follow is to create an environment favorable for the children’s upbringing, and both of them emphasized on the need of giving the right education to their children. They would like to see their children highly qualified when grown up, and would like to provide for whatever it takes to give them the good education.
With the oldest daughter being 3 years old, the family falls into the stage of families with preschool children. Both Ashok and Purnima appeared to be responsible parents for their children and try their best to fulfill their needs. Ashok has already started saving money for the older child's college education and has expressed his desire to open a savings account for his son with the same purpose.
The thing that makes their family stable is the bond between the two primary members of the family, the couple. Ashok and Purnima have known each other since their college days. Due to being of different castes, they faced a lot of opposition to their marriage from their individual family’s side, but they stayed with each other through thick and thin, overcoming a great many hurdles. Especially, the initial two years while Ashok was struggling in his career with Purnima having become pregnant was a crucial period of their life. It was a time when the world was staggering under recession, with several people losing their jobs, and Ashok was worried sick for losing his job too. With a pregnant wife at home, the fear of losing the source of income in a foreign country kept them under constant stress. However, they overcame the situation by giving support to each other. Their strong bond strengthened by their love and support keeps them sail through any critical juncture, be that their families’ forceful opposition to their marriage or the critical phase in a foreign country.
There is no particular challenge big enough to rock the cohesiveness of the family as both Ashok and Purnima appeared happy with each other and very much in love. However, both of their demanding job schedules keep them away from home for a long time throughout the day. Especially, Purnima returns home quite late as she travels nearly three hours every day, and these long busy hours may put a crack in the family unit, especially as they children will grow up and will crave more for their parents’ company
My overall impression about the family is positive. Ashok and Purnima seem to be the ideal members of a traditional family setup with both of them acting responsibly for their children and trying to cater to their every need. However, one setback about the entire family is that in the pursuit of American dream, they are too engrossed in their career, giving less time to each other.

Non-traditional Family

For the nontraditional family, I have interviewed a same sex couple Dave Corn and Ryan Stuart. Aged 30 and 31 years respectively, Dave and Ryan share an apartment together and have been staying as a committed couple for the last one year. They are both Caucasian males belonging to a middleclass socioeconomic status. Dave is Jewish by origin whereas Ryan is a Catholic Christian. Though Ryan used to be a member of a Catholic Church, he was excommunicated due to his sexual preference, because the orthodox Catholic Church views homosexuality as sinful. Both Dave and Ryan favor Democrats as Democrats are liberal about legalizing gay marriage.
Since they have started living with each other just for a year with no responsibility of any child, their family consists of only them, with no subsystem. According to Ryan, Dave is good in financial matters, and hence, Dave takes most of the decisions related to the expenditure required for them to live together. However, they have kept their individual finances separate and would like to give each other a few years before they decide to open a joint account or make an investment together. They both take decisions on important matters of their day to day living, including recreation, and give value to each other’s opinion a lot.
Dave and Ryan as a couple are at a stage when they are living together to see how well they complement each other or whether or not they have a future together. Both of them have been in relationships earlier and have faced disappointments, and hence, this time around, they are playing it wisely without heading into an impulsive decision. They would like to marry each other in the near future and hold a family.
Their wisdom and pragmatism make their family stable. The fact that they respect each other's opinion and would like to monitor each other as a couple for a few years more before tying the knot is worth commendable. Their relationship is further fortified by their friendship, which helps them sail through a crisis period through discussion.
The biggest challenge to the cohesiveness of the family is the uncertainty of their relationship. They both have suffered betrayal and infidelity in their earlier relationships, and their fear of commitment to a relationship is what poses a big challenge to them as a couple. They are also pretty concerned about Ryan's excommunication and the overall society's view towards gay marriage. They have faced and are still facing a lot of criticism, bully and shunning because of their sexual orientation.
Though I have observed the existence of a healthy friendship between Dave and Ryan, the lack of commitment towards the relationship for the future is quite apparent from the way they keep their individual business separate. Though they have been staying together for the last one year and give each other ample space, there seems to be a gap in the mutual trust, which might pull them apart in the future.