Theme Of Parental Roadblocks

The theme of striving to become your own person in spite of parental roadblocks was very evident in the book TDBU in both Mami’s and Papi’s behavior towards their children. Throughout Reyna and her siblings lives Mami and Papi were not present. Even when their father was present he was abusive and thought all of his children were going to be failures. Despite their parental roadblocks Reyna became a successful adult. I identify with this because I am still striving to be my own person in spite of parental roadblocks. I am very similar to Reyna In this aspect because I am also trying to go to school even though my parents didn’t think I would go to college or even follow through with it and attempt to graduate. I am very motivated to get my college degree even though I don’t have total support from my parents. Reyna’s father did not believe that she would follow through and finish school because both of her other siblings did not. In spite of that Reyna was determined to graduate even with the lack of support from her father and the roadblocks from it. Papi also would not let her turn in her college application
Throughout most of the second part of the book Reyna and her siblings were abused by Papi. Mami also told Reyna how Papi used to abuse her as well when they were married. I do not identify with this topic because I had a very loving childhood. Reyna and her siblings did not have a loving and peaceful childhood. They mostly were abused because of their fathers drinking habits and not doing what he said. When they disobeyed Papi disciplined them in the way of embarrassment and shame. This is worse than just getting spanked or slapped. When I got in trouble I would usually get talked to and maybe grounded, but never was punched or yelled at to the point of crying. This is one of the topics from TDBU that I did not identify