“I love all my children, but differently.” My grandma said this to me almost every day. She had 13 children and said she loved them all equally but in their own special ways. I believe that this statement is true for all parents. I am the youngest in my family and the only daughter. Like most families from my county my parents only had two children. My brother and I are only two years apart, while growing up we had many of the same friends because other families had children that were the same ages as us so it was only natural that we had play dates with these other children. When we were younger there were no significant differences in how my parents treated my brother and I. This was because I was never really interested in sports designated towards girls such as cheerleading and dancing. This was may have been because my parents did not make it available that I could be in sports such as gymnastics and dance. They did not have the financial funds to allow me to participate so they never encouraged my attraction to these types of sports. With my brother as well as my other cousins and friends we only played baseball in the summer as the organized sport. This was effective because my brother and I could ride to games and practices with our cousins who lived close and our parents could take turns being the chauffeur.
Our parents began to treat my brother and me differently when we got into higher grades in school. When I was in the fourth grade I was then old enough to participate in an organized sport through the school. My brother had preferred not to participate in organized sports other than baseball. This continued for the rest of our lives. I always participated in sports and he in arts. He loved photography when he reached high school. This was when another change occurred in our family. I had always loved school because I excelled in the classroom, obtaining friends, and in the sports that I would partake in. My brother tended to have trouble in the classroom. This was most obvious when we were in high school and he was taking lower level classes than I was. My sophomore year he actually had to take the math class I had taken my freshman year. Math was his least favorite subject. I offered to help but this made an awkward situation for us and he began to resent the fact that math came easily to me.
My parents began to treat us differently because I had always wanted to learn. My brother would much rather have a career that expressed his creative side with his photography and working with his hands. I had the obvious hobbies but they always knew I was centered on my schooling. From when I was little I had always discussed that college was in my future. My brother has never liked the process of school and did not want this to be in his future. This made my parents have expectations of me furthering my education while my brother got a job as soon as he graduated high school.
When my parents began to enforce these expectations, they began to monitor my results from classes more frequently and would become angry with me if I received a grade lower than an A. This was no way to impress schools or scholarship foundations which I would need. My brother was allowed to only pass classes. They knew he had no intention to apply for colleges and just hoped he would obtain a diploma. I was required to have a Core 40 Honors diploma. This would help to influence admission programs and scholarship boards that I was different from every other applicant.
I am grateful that my parents pushed me to be the individual that I am. Their influence has made me become focused and driven. I want to excel for them as well as myself. My brother on the other hand has not had their positive influence. He has grown up thinking that they don’t approve of the decisions he has made or that they believe in him as much as they do me. For this I feel regretful for him. I always encourage him to take business classes so that he can pursue his love of photography with a business degree and is prepared to run his studio alone. I am sure my parents did not initially want my brother to feel that they do not support him but it is a consequence of the actions they had pertaining to his grades and how they responded to them. I am very proud to be their daughter and that they support me, I just hope that someday they will realize that my brother needs the same encouragement.
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