My cousin and his wife have a marriage that I would frankly call a mistake. They are constantly fighting and disagreeing about the littlest things, and the worst part about it is that they have an innocent baby boy who is about to turn 1. His wife has shown no sympathy for the fact that I have lost my brother; in fact, she has told my cousin to “deal with it” and move on with his life. It’s always sad when you realize people’s ugly sides and how little they really care.

My cousin’s baby is barely a year old, and thankfully for now, he is blissfully ignorant of all the chaos and dysfunction that surrounds him. What worries me a lot, though, is what he will be like when he is able to understand what is going on around him at home, and how he may end up internalizing all of that. The worst thing you can possibly do for your child is put him through all the same crap that you went through as a child. As they say, we should be enabling a better life for our children, as they should do in the future for theirs. This isn’t just about money, though that is a part of it. It’s about time spent with our children – loving them and encouraging them. In my opinion, my brother never got enough of this. Repeating past mistakes of our parents and grandparents will only harm our future children.