Genograms

Since ancient times, families have been an important part of society. Often what family someone was a part of would determine social status and the way that person was thought of. Families were usually well structured with a head and many extended family members. In present times, the family structure has changed to the nuclear family with a husband, wife, and a few children. Often in these times, one could lose sight of the extended family and how they relate to each other. With divorce and remarriage, it can get very confusing tracing relationships within a family. The use of a genogram can help one see these connections by providing a graphical representation of a person's extended family and the relationships to each other. The following is a brief history of the persons within my genogram and their relationships with one another.

My mother, _________was born on 1938 in one of the farms in Belarus, right before Second World War. Since her mother passed away when she was 12, she had to do all housework and take care her little sister. She worked at the farm since she was six. She went to school for seven years, and she learned how to sew at the neighbors' house; however, she always wants to live in the city, so she left her parents house when she was 24 and moved to Cigulda, Latvia. It was not easy. She had to work very hard job in order to support her self. She met her first husband there. However, he passed away after a couple years due to medical complications from alcohol use. My mom moved to Valmiera, Latvia, where she met her second husband. He was a single father with four years old. They were living very poor, so they decided to move to Jurmala, Latvia, which is a bigger city and just 20 minutes away from Capital of Latvia. My mother got a job in construction. In addition, she was raising her stepdaughter. She had me after 11 years of marriage. When I was 3 years old, my father left us and his daughter moved to her aunt's house. After 15 years working for the same company, they gave her a three-bedroom apartment. My mother raised me and never remarried. Now she is 65 and still working for the same company on a front desk.

My father________ was born in Leningrad, Russia. I do not know much about him, since he left us when I was three years old. As I said earlier, he had daughter from his first marriage and after he divorced my mother, he received half of my mother's apartment. He never lived there; however, his daughter started living with us. Later on, my father began visiting her, but never talked to me, pretending that he did not know me. He never paid child support as well. Now he owns a construction company and a couple houses.

My half sister, __________, was born in Latvia in 1964. She does not remember her mother, and does not know what happened to her. Her father, grandmother and my mother raised her at different points in her life. When she was 18, and parents got divorced, she started living with us in the same apartment. We never lived as a family. In the beginning, she was using our dishes, furniture, and used to come to watch TV to our room. However, then she got married at twenty-four and she bought her own belongings. She had locked every door in the house even the food was locked. She had her first daughter, Svetlana in the first year of her marriage. Her first marriage lasted for about seven years. She stayed with her daughter. A couple of years later she started dating her second husband; he came to live with her. Last year they had a daughter,_____. They bought their own apartment and she sold her part to my mother.

I, ____________, was born in Latvia in 1978. I lived in one apartment with my mother, my half sister, and her family. When I turned sixteen, I went to a Technical College and moved out to the hostel. I was visiting my mother every other weekend, but never came back to live there. After college, I went to a university. My dream was to have my own apartment (you can get an apartment for about $10000 over there). Therefore, I decide to go to the USA for about a year, to make money. However, not every thing came out the way I planned. I met my husband at work, and we start dating. When came the time to go back neither him nor I wanted that to happen. I got married to _______when I was 23, and we had our son when I was 24.

My son____________ was born in 2002 in Orlando, Florida. During his first year of life, he had to move a lot. We moved from Orlando to Biloxi, Mississippi, where his dad had tech school, and we got stationed in Goldsboro, North Carolina. He is a growing healthy baby and very heavy, at his one-year check-up he weighed 25 lbs. He started walking at 11 months. He likes to play with everything that is not a toy. He says "dada" and "mama" and he just had his first birthday party on July 14 with some family friends.

My _________was born in 1980 in Puerto