How CLOSE are you to your immediate family?

[Oldschool Flip]

Being Filipino, my understanding of close is wanting to be around family for all occasions including just hanging out. I actual have more fun hanging with family then with friends. With my family on the west coast and my wife, daughter and I on the east coast, it makes us feel as if we are missing out on a lot of family outings. Some are regular events, like B days and holidays like Easter and the 4th of July, but we travel home every 6 months to do Christmas/New years and be there for my daughters B day in late July.

People always ask why my wife and I like family around so much ( my mother in law stayed for 3 months after the birth of my daughter) and how it must have been torture for her to stay that long. I'm always surprised that more people don't embrace this kind of family time because once it's gone, it's gone.

So what do you consider close?

[UPINTHEMGUTS]

Old School---love your Filipino women, by the way. Absolutely beautiful.......


To answer you........ I totally agree with the idea of embracing your family while they're here. I remember being a dickhead teenager and fighting with my father ALL THE TIME over the most mundane things. Like two bulls butting heads. Over time, as I've gotten older( I'm 33), I've come to REALLY appreciate my father and his sound advice. He went through cancer and chemotherapy a few years ago and I was really praying for him to pull through(he did--cancer's in remission). Today, he's grateful for his new lease on life and I couldn't be happier that he's enjoying his golden years doing whatever he wants.

I still may not agree with his point of view sometimes but we've gotten a lot closer in the last few years and I am very thankful. Wish I could say the same about my mother who I have little or no relationship with. She's lived in the Virgin Islands since 1985. But, I did see her recently after over three years and I'm trying to make up for lost time as much as I can manage.

Nowadays, I have no qualms about spending excess amounts of time with my immediate family. When you're younger, you don't always grasp the importance and value of your loved ones. I love learning as much as I can by way of my family's past life experiences.

It sickens me to see young people take their immediate family for granted, such as grandparents. But, at the same time, it's youthful ignorance and I'm sure all of us went through that stage at one point of our lives when we were younger. Live and learn, I guess.


Good topic.........

[Oldschool Flip]

Old School---love your Filipino women, by the way. Absolutely beautiful.......


To answer you........ I totally agree with the idea of embracing your family while they're here. I remember being a dickhead teenager and fighting with my father ALL THE TIME over the most mundane things. Like two bulls butting heads. Over time, as I've gotten older( I'm 33), I've come to REALLY appreciate my father and his sound advice. He went through cancer and chemotherapy a few years ago and I was really praying for him to pull through(he did--cancer's in remission). Today, he's grateful for his new lease on life and I couldn't be happier that he's enjoying his golden years doing whatever he wants.

I still may not agree with his point of view sometimes but we've gotten a lot closer in the last few years and I am very thankful. Wish I could say the same about my mother who I have little or no relationship with. She's lived in the Virgin Islands since 1985. But, I did see her recently after over three years and I'm trying to make up for lost time as much as I can manage.

Nowadays, I have no qualms about spending excess amounts of time with my immediate family. When you're younger, you don't always grasp the importance and value of your loved ones. I love learning as much as I can by way of my family's past life experiences.

It sickens me to see young people take their immediate family for granted, such as grandparents. But, at the same time, it's youthful ignorance and I'm sure all of us went through that stage at one point of our lives when we were younger. Live and learn, I guess.


Good topic.........

Glad you brought up the youth subject into this. The thing is ALL of my immediate family feel the same way about spending time together, including the teenagers and adolecents. We've even had friends of the teens come over and party with us because they don't have "fun" with their families.

I guess my point is when I hear someone say they have a close family, does that mean they just call each other once a month to catch up and then maybe spend Christmas or New Years together for a couple of hours? My family starts New Years party at 5 PM and we ususally don't finish until 2 AM. And everyone's involved in activities (games) and of course eating altogether, shooting the BS and just laughing our asses off! And we would have get togethers, not so much for my wife and I though, at least 10+ times a year.

People have said, "Isn't that a lot of time to spend around family?" and I'm always dumbfounded by that remark. I guess it has to do with cultural differences. Anyway, my daughter will be raised the same way because our family belief is ALL family comes 1st.

[Debussey]

[Always Sore]

Being Filipino, my understanding of close is wanting to be around family for all occasions including just hanging out. I actual have more fun hanging with family then with friends. With my family on the west coast and my wife, daughter and I on the east coast, it makes us feel as if we are missing out on a lot of family outings. Some are regular events, like B days and holidays like Easter and the 4th of July, but we travel home every 6 months to do Christmas/New years and be there for my daughters B day in late July.

People always ask why my wife and I like family around so much ( my mother in law stayed for 3 months after the birth of my daughter) and how it must have been torture for her to stay that long. I'm always surprised that more people don't embrace this kind of family time because once it's gone, it's gone.

So what do you consider close?

Like the wife and Kid and always want to spend time with them. Wife's family is fun and we spend major holidays with them and I enjoy it. My own father lives to far away I go years without seeing him and were not very close anyway. Mom is around a bunch but she can run hot and cold. I find it's hard to fit in family time because everybody is so freaking busy with life.

[jaejonna]

OSF, my heart goes out to you...both me and my significant other (who is filipino like me) spends almost every other weekend with family, its good to have a strong home base.

[~flower~]

  I made that first one!!!          

[Rimbaud]

Old School---love your Filipino women, by the way. Absolutely beautiful.......

As do I...I married one. 

[onlyme]

I'm filipino but was adopted when I was 3 days old.  SO I didn't grow up with that tradition.  We had a very distant family. 

[Oldschool Flip]

I'm filipino but was adopted when I was 3 days old.  SO I didn't grow up with that tradition.  We had a very distant family. 

I feel for you bro. I have many friends that don't have good relationships with their families and you can tell that some of them really wished it were different.

[onlyme]

I feel for you bro. I have many friends that don't have good relationships with their families and you can tell that some of them really wished it were different.

You could be my dad.

You know the funny thing is all my friends always envied me.  My mom was a bank executive and my dad was an engineer.  We had everything.  Nice cabin in the mountains for vacations and weekend getaways, nice house, everything.  When my parents died I got hardly anything compared to my brother and sister.  It is totally different growing up adopted.  You don't think about it at the time but years later you see how differently you were treated.  I'm not bitter or anything but it is not always the best thing to be adopted.  I haven't talked to my brother in 10 years.  I talk to my sister maybe once a year.  No big deal.

Even my favorite uncle died and didn't leave me anything.  I was his favorite nephew even more than his own kids.  I did allot for him when he needed help or support.  He died with a $33 million estate and none of us got anything.  Even his kids got hardly anything after probate.  I was the only one who supported him when he bought the SS. Catalina.  He would cry in my arms because his kids and even my parents were calling him an idiot and a wacko for buying tht thing.  I was there all they time supporting him and helping him.  I got nothing.  Oh well, so much for family even if it is an adopted one.

[Rimbaud]

On a serious note my wife's not very close to her family. But that's mainly because most of them are overseas. However, she's got a huge extended family here that sees each other regularly.