Parental Influence on Love Life Professor Ramos Blog

Parental Influence on Love Life Growing up you are told if a child acts good or bad it’s because of their parents, and they are reflecting them. If that is so, does your children really reflect your relationship mistakes or action when they start dating out in the world? According to Karen Stephens from Parenting Exchange, â€Å"Children, in general, do tend to grow up to be a lot like their parents. Social scientists and genetic researchers have identified many cycles that loop from one generation to the next† (Stephens). In the story Never Date a Mexican by Sandra Cisnoros this is to be true. In Never Marry a Mexican the main character Clemencia talks about her mother and farther who got married in America. Her mother and farther are the average loving couple which started with a romantic encounter involving a dance. You could say that her farther swooped her mother off from her feet, â€Å"†¦ She turned around to the voice that was asking her to dance. A big show-off, she’d say years l ater† (Cisneros 71). One day Clemencia’s farther fell ill and was on his death bed. Was Clemencia’s mom there like a wife should? No, instead she was with another man. This later leads to Clemencia’s actions in her own love life. Clemencia mom states, â€Å"Never Marry a Mexican† (Cisneros 68). Clemencia’s mom first husband was from Mexico and she was from America. Clemencia mother compares her relationship to her first husband to how being married to a Mexican is unhappy. This makes Clemencia also think this way. Not only Mexicans but being married to any man. It said in the Story Never Marry a Mexican, â€Å"So, no. I’ve never married and never will.† (Cisneros 69) When she marries her new husband Clemencia feels like there is no home for her to go back too. Because her mom’s new family has taken over the house. â€Å"When she married that white man† and he and her boys moved into my father’s house, it was if she stopped being my mother† (Cisneros 73). This shows that Clemencia is saying that her affair with Owen separated their family and Clemencia’s mom is no longer her mom. â€Å"Shit! Because she knew as well as I did there was no home to go home to. Not with our Mother† (Cisneros 73). This has a direct effect on how she sees Drew and pursues him just like her mom pursues Owen, and also why she feels that it is okay possible ruin a family because Clemencia believes her mom ruined theirs. Parents are everything to children most of the time and when one of your parents are on their death bed it is a horrible time. What is the job of the other parent? It is believed the role the other parent is to be there for her kids and do all they can to make it better and at least not make it worst. What does the mom do the exact opposite for her family. She goes out and sleeps with another man â€Å"†¦ Owen Lambert, the foreman at the photo-finishing plan, who she was seeing even while my father was sick† (Cisneros 73). While her family is spending their last time with the farther before he passes away. This is similar to what Clemencia does with Drew on the night that his son is being born. â€Å" †¦ while his mother lay on her back laboring his birth, I lay with in his mother’s bed making love to you† (Cisneros 75). Clemencia and her mom are both involved into cheating, the one being cheated on both happen to be in the hospital during the act, and the one committing the act should be there for the wife or husband not doing what they are doing. Some might say this is a coincidence. I believe it is not for the reason that Clemencia sees her mom do it so why would it not be okay for her to do it also? Clemencia sates that she is a romantic but not at the same time in the text, â€Å"†¦I’m too romantic for marriage. Marriage has failed me you could say† (Cisneros 69). Her mom and farther started off happy with the romantic stuff that we all love. Things goes downhill in her parents love life and her mom cheats on her dad. Clemencia’s mom makes a lot of excuses on why she cheated. She says, â€Å"because I married to young, mi’ja.† she say, â€Å"Because your farther, he was so much older than me, and I never had a chance to be young† (Cisneros 73). Clemencia then sees that all good things come to an end and only wants the good stuff, â€Å"Just the cream skimmed off the top. Just the sweetest part of the fruit, without the bitter shin that daily living with a spouse can rend† (Cisneros 69). So that is why Clemencia states that she likes her men barrowed which means that whatever man that she is messing around with belongs to someone else, â€Å"Borrowed. That’s how I’ve had my men†¦.† (Cisneros 69). This is because she learned from her mom because she was with another man why her husband was dying in the hospital and she never has to get hurt like her dad and his family. How hard we try not to we seem to start to copy are parents in some way. If your daily influence was cheating and not happy with their relationship don’t you think that would affect your romantic choices on life. This is what happened to Clemencia, because she learned from her daily influence growing up and then lead to her choices of her love life. You won’t notice the things that you learn from your parents, but at the end of the day we represent them in some way. We can learn and repeat good or bad things from our parents on what to do and not to do. Clemencia took her mom’s cheating on her dad in a negative and positive light. She learned about relationships, to not to get into one because you will get hurt, and cheating or being with someone cheating is okay. That is what life lessons Clemencia took from her mom. Cisneros, Sandra./Woman Hollering Creek and Other stories./New York,Vintage,1991 Stephens, Karen. â€Å"Parents Are Powerful Role Models for Children.† Parenting Exchange, 2007, easternflorida.edu/community-resources/child-development-centers/parent-resource-library/documents/parents-powerful-role-models.pdf.