Living in an Extended Family

Does living in an extended family good? What are the advantages and disadvantages of living in a larger family?

An extended family is a group of people who often lives in close proximity. It usually consists of parents, grandparents, uncles, aunties, nephews and nieces who live together in a house which is enough to accommodate all of them. Extended family, like any other, has its own advantages and disadvantages. In some instances, however, these advantages outweigh the disadvantages.

After marriage, normally, the newly-wed moves out of their parental homes and live independently in a new house that they have rented or bought. However, because of cases like financial shortage or both parents work and nobody is left to look after their house and child/ren, most newly-weds are forced to live with the parents of either the two of them until they can finally live on their own. Or in some cases, those newly-wed who are suffering from financial shortages would ask for help from one of his/her married siblings. These cases always happen in most families in the Philippines or even in other Asian countries and in the western world.

I found an article entitled The Family which is written by an anonymous writer. The article talks about the functions of the family and types of families where I found the advantages and disadvantages of living in an extended family. 

I can relate well with this topic because I am one of those people living with an extended family and I can actually tell the advantages and disadvantages of living in this kind of arrangement based on my own experiences.

The article provides us some of the advantages of living in an extended family. These are:

More economical by sharing expenses

I agree that living in an extended family is more economical than living in a nuclear one because expenses like electricity bill, water bill, groceries and etc. can be shared among the two or more generations of relatives living in the same household. For example, one family is in-charge with the payment of electricity bill, the other one for the water and internet bill and the other one is in-charge with the groceries.

Parents have support with child care

It is also true that the parents have more support with child care. For example, the grandparents or the aunties can look after the children while both of them have some businesses to attend with. During the day, the grandparents or unmarried aunties can watch the children while they play outside to make it sure that they are safe from accidents or from bad people. They can also talk to the children while both of their parents are busy doing some household chores.Through this, the kids can learn their language. And since there are other relatives who can take good care of their children, both of the parents are free to work without worrying about their kids safety. Also, the kids have the chance to learn the values and norms of their society. Thus giving them more experience and exposure than in a small family where they can only learn from their parents. However, their parents cannot teach them everything because of the little time they have. So, it is indeed convenient if there are some relatives like a grandma or auntie at home to whom the parents can entrust their children.

Sharing problems

I think that it is also advantageous to live with an extended one because the big support structure has a stronger influence in many facets of life. An individual member's problem is softened by caring close members of the the family.

Companionship

The children may bond with their cousins while their parents are away. They can play, share secrets and help each other like friends. Many people who have extended families find it advantageous with everyone being able to support or to comfort one another in times of crisis like the death of one of members of their family or one member loses his job. In times like these, their relatives can be their companions while going through the crisis and they are always there to support until everything has been settled. Also, children of this kind of family learn cooperative work and develop a sense of brotherhood and caring for others which may eventually help them to become good leaders in their society.

In addition, people living with their extended families have a stronger feeling of security because there are more people around whom they can turn to if problems, financially or emotionally, arise. Another advantage is that this kind of family can also give off the feeling of belonging and also, there are plenty of role models for the children.

If there are advantages, to make it balance, the following are some of the disadvantages of an extended family:

Lack of privacy

One of the disadvantages of living in an extended family is that one's privacy may sometimes be denied. One may want to spend his time to think or to work alone but it may be impossible in this kind of family especially if there are naughty kids who always want to interfere with him/her. For instance, I had my own room before until my siblings move here in Manila from Pampanga. Since there's no room available to accommodate them aside from my room, I had no choice but to share my room with them. There are times that I can't help myself but feel irritated/annoyed with them especially when they can clearly see that I'm busy doing something like reviewing for the next day exams. I am actually happy that I don't have to travel every weekends just to be with them. But they are like my temptations. Every time I see them watching movies, I am tempted to just watch with them and I ended up not studying. When I see them sleeping, I felt sleepy too. Therefore, I can agree that there is really less privacy if there are lot of members in a family.

Overcrowding

For instance, it came such time that the unmarried aunties and uncles have already their own family and children to feed and they still live in the same household. As the number of family members increase, the house may tend to be overcrowded and it can't anymore accommodate them all. Because they are jobless and so they can't afford to have an extension or buy/rent a new place, the children or the other members' comfort will be sacrificed. 

In addition, there is also a kind of monarchy in this kind of family where the decision of the head of the family can't be challenged by any member. Because of such monarchy, one may not be able to exercise his rights of freewill. And also, although the grandparents are helpful in looking after the children while the parents are away, they can also meddle with the upbringing of the children and will tend to boss around the house which may be sometimes against the will of the other members. In such a case, the Golden Rule "whoever has the gold rules" applies which means whoever owns the house is the one who should rule and should be obeyed by the other members.

These are some of the advantages and disadvantages of living in an extended family. Looking at both sides, I can assume that although living in this kind of family has some disadvantages, still yet, the advantages outweighs the disadvantages. We should realize the value of having family no matter what who can help us in times of crisis and may give us wisdom in ways that were never thought to be possible. O:)

 :-h :-h :-h