By Hu Wo (Cuckoo’s Song)

SOMETIMES a family seems to be a kind of gift given by nature. Some peo­ple tend to lead a married life but end their lives all by themselves just because of their personality traits, especially having had no family spirit since their birth, or other family background situa­tions. It looks pretty easy to tie the knot with someone but quite difficult to be able to live a hap­py family life. Strangely enough, some are frightened of marriage simply because some women are afraid of childbirth itself or some men have little desire to bring up children. Despite this, lovemaking or marriage has always been an ancient human practice, as well as children can metaphorically be the tinkle of a small bell in a house, which means that children can make a sweet home. And also, a sweet home gives rise to a happy life. In a lovely and warm home will even be found some family psychology of interest.

Psycho 1: A daughter is more emotionally attached to her father while a son connects deeply with his mother. Whether it is right or wrong, this is because father and daughter or mother and son are not the same sex, I think. Natu­rally, humans like to cling to those who have different sexes from them more than those with the same sex as theirs. Because of this, daughters willingly rely on their fathers’ leadership and man­agement, which mostly cannot be obtained from females, whereas sons only want their mothers’ care and love, which can rarely be seen in males. However, fathers will give the same opportunity to both their sons and daughters as sons or daughters or both are their children only as well as mothers will have the same love for all their children for the rea­son that they have got a maternal spirit since birth, which enables them to equally look after their children with compassion. There may be an exception _ that is, some sons love their fathers and some daughters feel affection for their mothers, where the highly potential reason is that the chil­dren face a separate or divorced or adulterous family. In spite of this, most children rely upon their mothers, who live or even play together with them almost at all times.

Psycho 2: The eldest child of­ten carries the weight of responsi­bility more than the others. This usually happens in poor families and big families rather than in rich families and small families. Sometimes it can be found in families without a family head, particularly a father. But the fact that life is a struggle should be for the eldest children, boys in particular, in a house. Thus, there is a Myanmar saying, `An elder brother is in the place of a father and so is an elder sister´ (Akokyi­dot-aphaaya, Amakyidot-amiaya). Humorous to say, my mother gave birth to seven children. Among them, my eldest sister Ma Myaing Aye dropped out just in Grade 2 and laboriously worked together with my mother. My elder brother Phoe Kyaw also threw his lot with us immediately after he left school in Grade 7. Those who were re­sponsible for our family even in­cluded an uncle on my mother’s side Bagyi Tun Kyi. Of course, all family members may share the responsibilities of a family, probably making a difference to a greater or lesser degree, yet the eldest son or daughter in a family can do the most of it after the father.

Psycho 3: A son who respects his mother will naturally respect women. If a mother gives birth to a son, she will be the most respon­sible person regards as her son, I believe. The older a boy grows, the farther he stays from his father as well as the more disagreements are between them. At such a time, a mother becomes the key player in her family. She must be able to explain to his son critically and ra­tionally whatever cases occur be­tween his husband and son to an extent which is acceptable to him. A good son comes from a mother and a good fruit from the root, as the proverb goes. A mother has the responsibility of ensuring that her son is taught to respect his fa­ther. Sayama Kyi Aye once stated in her famous novel `Maung, Ko Ko and Myananda´ that if chil­dren see their parents having an argument in their presence, they can get a bad impression of them. So as to get respected, mother and father should avoid getting into an argument in the presence of their children like the plague whenever possible. Only a mother who treats her husband with re­spect will be passively respected by her son. He is self-assertive to express thanks to her. Also, only a son who has respect for his mother will be soft-hearted for every woman he meets. Oth­erwise, there will be a big problem in his married life, starting with no family spirit.

Psycho 4: Siblings who fight the most in childhood tend to become the closet in adulthood. As always, young siblings rarely get along well with each other, sometimes whether they have the same sex or different ones. Little siblings are always fighting due to food, clothes, pocket money or even an unexpected cause. But following a quarrel, they will come to terms quite soon. Such quar­relling makes them know about one another in the future. In other words, they get to see each oth­er’s likes and personal character­istics. Traditionally, children have the opportunity to come into their parents’ inheritance, especially after their death. At that time, these heirs will be able to abstain from undesirable problems with their eyes open while sharing the inheritance. Nevertheless, My­anmar people say `Blood talks´. What it means is that siblings get together or meet life sufferings together in important or urgent situations no matter whether or not they were on bad terms with one another in their childhood. Blood is thicker than water, which means that family relationships are stronger than any others, ac­cording to Oxford.

Psycho 5: People who mimic their parents’ habits often do so unconsciously. It is said that home is the first birthplace of manners of children, the environment the second and school the third. At home, parents are the role mod­els of manners for children. As usual, sons like to imitate their fathers’ manners and daughters their mothers’. In general, chil­dren follow their parents’ talking style, actions, clothing and table manners to the letter. Some man­ners such as sweet talks and us­ing polite or gentle language are very good whilst other manners like child abuse and domestic violence are bad at most. And many people are strongly of the opinion that children’s boorish behaviour and rude words may be due to their fathers and moth­ers respectively. Alternatively, if a father’s action is acceptable, his children will become well-bred as expected. Also if a mother’s talks are well-mannered, her children will speak softly and modestly for certain. Strange to say, some children can speak more early than expected when their parents are talkative at home.

Psycho 6: Children who grow up watching arguments often be­come peacemakers in their own lives. This is absolutely right. The way I see it, many children do not like their parents always arguing for any reason or too lit­tle purpose. Parent arguments only breed a family atmosphere without children’s emotional safety. Not only that, almost all arguments create nothing but a type of noise pollution in the environment. Any sensitive and high-strung child is scared of his or her hot-tempered parents to death so often. As far as I can see, a negative emotion called anger with effing and blinding might drive children to be of low intelligence development. As shown above, children look down on their fathers, who win or lose an argument with their mothers. People could stand overwork but not too much noise. Accordingly, young children have a long mem­ory of bad childhood incidents and then no desire to bring this occurrence to their adulthood, mainly in their married lives. In this way, children who meet with frequent family arguments wish for a peaceful life.

Psycho 7: The more a parent sacrifices silently, the more their children subconsciously respect them. Sacrifice is a noble spir­it that can hardly ever be done quite easily by a normal person. Among sacrifices made by differ­ent people, a mother’s sacrifice is unrivalled in that mothers bravely make the supreme sacrifice to their future children, although knowing they could die amid such a final sacrifice. On occasions, a father is not afraid to sacrifice anything for his children. None­theless, not all children are aware of this sacrifice for the potential simple reason that they are very immature for their age, but per­haps unconsciously acknowledge it. It cannot be said that parents’ sacrifices are seen in every family as the universal truth since a My­anmar saying states `A mother cannot help dropping and tram­pling her child in the burning world´. That case has been one in a million until now, however. As Buddha Myatswa sermonized, people love themselves most. Even so, parents’ sacrifices for their children stretch into infinity so that they will fully appreciate it one day.

Psycho 8: A child raised in love grows up to give love effort­lessly. Some children do not or dare not show affection for other children. Home is a house with love _ there is no place like home. Many children beloved at home adore their other mates. That is why they have well known the pleasure of getting loved and can love their friends as a child. In all honesty, most children in every corner of the globe long for lots of love and affection from their biological parents, siblings and other strange elders. When they are not loved by others, they ap­pear not to know how nice and innocent love is, to say nothing of caring for others. I can truthfully say that such children may even find it difficult to love themselves. On the other hand, many chil­dren have no difficulty showing childlike loveship to their peers. Every free child, but with little life knowledge, is worth loving. Not surprisingly, a child hungering for love never grows on others.

After all, family psychology can be perceived next in all re­spects. Some families put elder children first instead of the eldest and the youngest children, on ac­count of ill health or any other rea­son. Honest to say, I do not know if this is very fair or not. Surely, that is a kind of family psychology. Another family psychology will be viewed in the future as well.