Family vs friends or strangers - does family rate higher? Should it?

If its not my mom, step dad, brothers, or niece, my friends come first. Even then sometimes my friend will come first. I don't get along well with my father, and the only reason i keep trying is because if it wasn't for him i wouldn't be here and he is not in the greatest of health. Even then half the time i wonder why i even try, because he is that big of an @sshole, even to his own children he is horrible. The rest of my family are too quick to use you and stab you in the back. I swear my family is the poster child for Dysfunctional. I wont even get into the latest trick a family member of mine did to me, but she ended up paying for it in the end. Needless to say i don't have much to do with them, but the worst part is, if they needed me i would probably do my best to help. I have to much of my mom in me. She likes taking in stray members of the family. Right now she has her brother and his wife living with her, and they are just using her, but she wont turn them out. They take things without asking, don't really help out financially, and are always complaining about how they need this or that and get upset when no one goes and gets it for them, which we dont because they are always wasting there money on things they don't need.

Hello, mommyboo. No, we do not choose our parents. We do not choose our family. But we do choose if we will spend the time happy by their side or angry because we didn't have the luck to get better relatives. No matter how a personality differs from the other, I still believe that friendship is possible. It will only depend on them both. If one agrees to open his/her heart to the other, then there aren't bad things going on in a family. A family will always be there. You can find friends and escape to another country, but your family will be left behind. Do not run from it. Do not pretend that your family doesn't exist. Learn how to love it. You can have friends, but they will never get as close as your family could be. Respectfully, Munhozmib.

In Malta the value of being a family is still treasured a lot. We live in a small island so that you often meet your extended family. However individualism and hectic life has alos influenced the lifestyle of the maltese people. I am afraid to see that I see one of my brothers only a handful of times a year. He lives about half an hour away by car from me and we don't see each other much. Though we contact each other by telephone often. I try to help my family as much as possible. However I do treasure my friends as well. It depends on what is the situation is. I try to juggle between the two responsibilities. © ronaldinu 2008

Friends are important, but family comes first friends come and go but family is forever and you'll always need there love and support, but dont get me wrong we all need friends, and I think its just a matter of balancing both, but there is no rank for me when it comes to my family though because my family will always come first before anyone else if I had to choose.

you need your family's support,and your family need yours.

Yes family should always be rated higher because they are the only prople who really care for us and admire us and stay with us when we are in real difficulties so family should be given higher rating and there are also friends who give us moral support so they can also be given importance

I am lucky because I dont have to do anything for anyone in my family just because they are family. I dont care that I have only 1 male cousin and he is the oldest an old that I refuse to go visit him in jail because I simply dont care any more about him and his life style and the things he choose to do I dont care that he is family. But if someone deserves my simphaty and my time and effort I dont care if its the first person on the street that I meet in the morning. In my family we dont asume that because we are family we are going to stick together and help each other and all that. We all know that if we deserve that we are going to be there if not then they should not expect us to be there. How can my cousin for eg. expect me to do something for him when all he does is lie to us, puts our lifes in danger and all that. He is smart enough to know that he does not deserve it.

At some point in our lives we make choices about family members, those that have a high slap factor, sometimes have to be put in the closet and forgotten. I know that sounds cruel but it is simply the truth. Blood is not always thicker. Blood does not entitle you too abuse me. Sorry that door shuts and the lock is turned at some point if you have any sense of self-preservation. There comes a time when dysfunction turns into idiocy and then into simply pain, why should we tolerate this? If the holidays become a chore, or even painful for us; something akin to having our wisdom teeth pulled while still awake ... well this should be avoided. I have several family members that I find difficult. Some I know are that way because they are simply ignorant, no brought-upsie as we say. It isn't their fault and if they are young enough I am willing to work with them to correct the damage done and hopefully help them to understand why their bad manners are problematic. Usually this works to everyones advantage. I have some members who simply have extraordinarily high slap factors, my mother is included in this membership. My defense against this group is to avoid.....duck and dodge is the name of this game. Their sense of entitlement is not my problem. I am pretty upfront about where they stand with me. Guilt trips don't work, I don't walk on that freeway nor do I pay that toll. My mother is a travel agent with a standing order for guilt trips, my brother buys regular tickets and tries to pawn them off on me. These days I just laugh, thank him for his thoughtlessness and move on. I speak to her every 90 days whether I have anything to say or not. My friends are my choice.

i think family shouldnt get any special treatment or forgiveness at all! family can hurt more than friends can and i dont believe in sticking around people that hurt you because your suppose to because they are your family.. i think that is bs!! but its amazing how many people just bend over and take the abuse because they feel they cant turn their backs on family.. like the people tht are abusing them now are REALLY going to help them in the future!! i was telling my best friend who says she feels like every one she is close to (including me) is a part of her family and i was saying i dont ever feel like that.. and that to me family is some one you are stuck with but friends choose to be with you

Hi, If you keep family in one side of a balance and yr friend on the other always the side of your family wl be weighty . As you said you hv no choice of yr family, yr parents, yr relatives . yes, life is that much mysterious and full of illusion. You dont know what is going to happen to you the next moment. A good family relationship can be had when all the members of it have a sort of give and take policy, is caring and helpful to each other if need be. There are many selfish friends too who turn their back when a friend in need . Of course a good friend wl never do that. You cannot find a substitute to ur mother, her love towards her children. She never expects anything from her children but always loves them and pray for their well being. This you cannot expect frm yr friend.

I think even though you don't get to choose your relationship to your relatives, you do have the right to decide your interactions with them. I don't think that as an adult that you have to treat a non-deserving person in any special way because of their relation to you. I run into this a lot, as I am better off financially than 99.99% of my family. And for some odd reason, most of them think that somehow I owe them something because I was born into their family...NOT! I help those that I think deserve to be helped, not because they are sorry, lazy, don't want a job, didn't get a education, is waiting on a hand-out AND my relative. As adults I think we have the right to choose who we associate ourselves with regardless of whether they are family or not.

Hi mommyboo! I always love your discussions! Well that kind of sounded like how I used to feel with my miserable dysfunctinal family when I was a kid and I was made to go to the family "events" I hated them with a passion! I hated everyone in my damn family on both sides! And I was right, because today whoever is still alive in either side of the family I wouldn't know or give a rats azz and neither would my Mom who will be 78 years old and her damn brother is still alive and 5 years younger than her and she has nothing to do with him either! My point, I kind of lost it thinking about my Uncle whom I despise, is that I have made my friends family! They have in most case been better to me than my "blood relatives". So, the point being~Is blood thicker than water? Hell frigen no! Give me a friend any day over a relative, Please!!!

family should be given more importance.friends are also important but more than that family is important.people who are ready to sacrifice thier lives for us are definetly family members.friends can sumtimes cheat us ofcourse true frnds will not do it.but family members will never cheat,our parents will not cheat us,our sibling will not cheat us.will they?

we all ways should stuck with our family and also with friends,we are here outbeacouse of our family support and encaragement.friends are those who clears our path and makes us to reach the destiny by providing solutions.we cannot success with out the support of family and friends.

Because there are members of the family that do feel that entitled I have learned to not put family first indiscriminately. Some of my family members sure are right there on the top. But that's because of who they are, not just because they are family. ON the other hand, it is true that sometimes we do cut family some slack, but for me... just some members of the family, not all. I have been hurt, abused and upset by people that would not be even acquaintances by choice, but were family. Not anymore for me :) I have of course, friends, that rate much higher, deserve much more, and are, in my heart family.