My Experience With My Family

Making a genogram can enhance one’s training as a helping professional by laying out points in a person’s life and family that have caused distress and could affect practice in the future. By self realizing the crisis points in one’s family it can help to identify triggers that could lead to countertransference as well as resurfacing of old traumas during counseling or leading a group. Plotting out one’s life is a way to organize a family especially if there are multiple marriages of parents and non-traditional family ties within a standard family tree. By knowing where you come from and the experiences that shape your family you can better

A year of having little contact with my grandparents, and only one visit that winter for Christmas. My grandpa David’s mother, Dorothy Grell, passes away March 18, 2014. I never knew Dorothy so I do not refer to her as my great grandmother. My mother has always explained that grandpa’s family doesn’t get along. My grandpa knew about the family’s arrangements, but did not contact my mother, but instead my mother’s second cousin reached out to her on facebook. My mother contacted my grandparents. The funeral was held in Holstein, and my mother was the only member of David’s family to be present. My grandparents did not make the effort to go to the funeral. However on March 23 my grandparents did visit Holstein without informing my mother.

In 1912 a child was born his name was Everett Babcock (1912-1974), he eventually would become my grandfather. In 1937 he would marry my grandmother, Mary McFarland (1910-1969) and they would have 3 children Everett Babcock (1937-2017) my father, Edna Mae (1940-2004), and Thomas (1944-2008). Everett worked as an auto mechanic and Mary as a beautician to support and provide for their 3 children. In 1969 Mary was diagnosed with colon cancer and die a short time later, 5 years later in 1974 my grandfather would be diagnosed with lung cancer but would suffer a heart attack and die. Since I was still a young child and didn’t live close to my paternal grandparents I don’t remember what the relationships were like. The most I remember is when we

A genogram is a diagram that shows family members and their relationships. The information can sometimes include, ages, dates, deaths, and or geographic locations. Males are represented by squares and females are represented by circles. The horizontal lines indicate marriage; while the vertical line indicates parents and children. This paper outlines the assessment and analysis of the three generation of the Jones and Sheffield family, relationships, structures, and health struggles. The interview was conducted by myself (Katroya) and the interviewer was my mother (Sheryl).

The genogram is an analytical tool, which enables one to visualize the family structure by a succinct and rapid graphic image often over several generations. It shows the alliances and ruptures, the generational repetitions of behaviors of dependence or vulnerability (Phaneuf, (n.d.)). Genograms are used as practical tools in social work practice, both in terms of assessment and intervention. Historically, the genogram is the most commonly thought of in relation to practice with children, adolescents, and families to explore the quality of relationships and behavioral patterns across generations. Diagrammatically, the genogram is an inter-generational map of three or more generations of a family and a primary assessment tool that focuses on inter-generational patterns and relationships among family members. It can represent

Genograms are used to graphically represent a family tree and display detailed data on relationships among the individuals included in the family tree. In essence, families are complex systems that interact with kin groups in specific ways, and a genogram helps to show a diagram of a family tree, but also maps out interactions, relationships, traits, and characteristics that may otherwise not be noticed. The purpose of a genogram is to identify and understand patterns in family history which may influence an individual’s personal behavior and traits. Family Systems Theory, presented by Dr. Murray Bowen, suggests that an individual cannot be understood in isolation from their family members. According to Dr. Bowen, the family is an emotional

Mapping out relationships and interactions between a family system can present a visual aspect to assist with understanding the function as a unit. Creating a genogram gives the clients realizations of why family traditions exist and traits that family members pass from generation to generation.

My genogram has three generations and includes the most important or influential people in my family life. The genogram includes my grandparents on both my dad and mom’s side, my parents, their siblings, and spouses, and on the bottom row, my siblings and I. My family has had unique challenges personally and systematically that created a stronger bond as the years went on. Though, today, we are spread out around the country, our familial connections have been strong overall.

The genogram provided a visual aid for information, allowing it to be shared and monitored. In synchrony with developments in systemic family therapy such as attention on the process and not just the content of family interactions, the use of genograms broadened according to McGoldrick, et all {2008} a focus on not just generational systems but the systems of various dissimilar/similar characteristics of families such as rules, beliefs, role, structure and secrets.

On this genogram assignment my partner was Elizabeth Enoksen. My partner was able to identify a trend that I didn’t pick up on when I was completing my genogram. As I discussed with her about my family I shared with her about me and my kid’s relationship with their dad. Unfortunately, our relationship was not good and I became a single mother of two little boys. Elizabeth made the connection that my mom became a single parent with me and I took her strength and persevered as single mom with my children. She also noticed the trend of divorces on my father’s side of the family. Elizabeth did see the trend of me and my cousins having children before marriage.

I chose to create my family genogram based on my father’s side of the family because there are varying degrees of closeness, distance, discord and disconnect. I found this interesting because my mother’s family which consists of 13 siblings, 22 in-laws, 60 grandchildren, and close to 30 great grandchildren has a much lower degree of drama and hostility than that of my father’s family.

A therapist will observe a family’s interaction with one another, any sign of triangles or triangulation, and exploration of nuclear family and intergenerational connections (Gerhart, 2014). During systemic assessment, therapists will focus on individual and familial strengths and making sure that all members of the family recognize and reflect those strengths within themselves and one another. Genograms are use to help translate issues that could be passed through dynamics in familial relations not just in the present, but multigenerational as well. A therapist can adapt a genogram to have as much or as little information needed to benefit their client. This information will usually include, birth and death dates, any type of illness—mental, physical, marriage, divorce and patterns of interaction within family members (hostile, close, emotional cutoff, abuse, fused). Lastly, when a therapist complies the essential components of the case conceptualization they will discuss their ideas with their client to see if they approve with the proposed ideas or opposes. This component is called client perspective—it allows the therapist to verify information they have about their client and see if new meanings about the information come

Another assignment that involved my family was a genogram assignment. Here, I learned about the history of my family. I’ve never explored my family’s history because we are not close to either side of the family. During this assignment, I felt more confident of my family’s past. It was delightful to see the genogram on paper, after processing it in my head for days. In social work, a genogram is a practical to assess and intervention. According to Pope and Jacquelyn, "in general, the genogram is useful in gathering information, understanding relationship dynamics and behavioral patterns, promoting, the client's self-understanding, conducting, assessments, and guiding the practitioner to interventions" (2015). Throughout this genogram assignment,

My family happens to be deeply religious, conservative and often closed minded about certain aspects of life. In other words, everything that they tend to support and believe in as a family unit, tends to be something I can not personally agree with. As anyone can imagine, this has deeply affected my interpersonal relationship with my family in a negative impact. As an adult, I have come to my own conclusions about my personal beliefs about life and what those entail for myself. These beliefs are usually the exact opposite of what I grew up with, much to the disappointment of my family which has created a deep divide between us. This has probably affected my relationship with my father the most, as he has always been the most outspoken about his disappointment.

When I was eight years old my parents separated, and they got officially divorced when I was twelve. After my parents separated, my mother took on being a single-parent. My father gave up all his rights to my sister and I. Prior to my parents separating, my family was considered upper-middle class. My dad worked as a computer engineer, and my mom was a stay at home mother. After my parents split, my sister and I went from having everything to nothing in a day. My mom had to move back in with her parents until she could find a full-time job and a place for us to live. Because I have seen my mother struggle as a single-mother, I matured a lot faster than most children my age. Even though we struggled with money growing up, my mother always made it a point to go on vacation yearly with my sister and I; I have been to over 30 states because my mom loves to road trip. Additionally, it has always been a family tradition of ours to go to the state fair every year. Because of my family experience growing up, I am very independent. I also learned to appreciate the little things in life. My mom always taught my sister and I that time spent with family is far more valuable than materialistic things. My mother and I are very close to this day, and I will forever be grateful for everything she has done for my sister and me.