The Family Ties I wish I Had

Most times, I do wish I have uncle or aunties that I can call or visit. When I was young, I do envy my friends who always talk about their extended familes and how good they have been to them.

Extended family ought to be a united big family but reversed is the case now. Extended family has become a place of deceit, envy and bitterness.

All through this years, I have always been with my nuclear family. I don't have any extended family to visit neither do I have any extended family who calls or care about me. I have grown to know my parent and my siblings only. Is it that I don't have any extended family? The truth is that I have extended family, but we don't relate with one another.

Being called a family is far beyond bearing the same surname or sharing the same blood, it's more about the bond of love and unity that bind them together.

I remember my roommate during my undergraduate days. She lost her dad when she was still schooling. Her mum was working as a civil servant when the incident happened.

Thank God they had good extended families. They never lack anything after the sudden demise of their father. Her uncle and her aunt sponsored her and her siblings education till they all graduated. Not only that, her uncle do take her and siblings for vacation outside the country. There was a time she traveled out of Nigeria to USA. She came back with lots of cloth, shoes, bag and more. As I speak, she's currently based in Canada and she's happily married. Her extended family really cherished the bond of love and unity they had.

Most times I do wish I had a good extended family like that of my roommate.
I have grown to leave without them and I don't care about them either. My parent really wanted to have a united family with the extended family but when they realized my extended family negative attitudes, we all stepped back.

My mum really loved her family and she really want us to bond with them. I remember a time when my maternal grandmum use to visit us before she passed away, she was a good mother. At that time my aunt and uncle do come and visit us then. We thought we had a wonderful extended family from my mum's side not until when things get different after Grandma's death.

Shortly after then, my mum was abit ill, every of our extended families left us and none of them check on us. The painful part is that it was my mum who sponsored them in school till they graduated.
See the level of betrayal, they left us when we needed them. After a short while, when she recovered from the ailment, they showed up and pretended to care all because they wanted her to give them money just like she always do. But things are different now. The incident changed a lot of things and the perspective at which we see them. The love they had was basically so that they can't get things in return and that's not a genuine love.

As for me, I don't plan to have anything to do with my extended family . But for my kids I won't deprive them from having a good relationship with the extended family, most especially with the good uncles and aunts.

Thanks for reading

All images used are mine