I wrote this about three years ago and found it in my drafts the other day. Back then I was living with my family in the US. I have six siblings and I’m the eldest one of them so it was always a thrill. So let’s look at the 19 year old me that wrote this and what it was like to live with six siblings these days. Enjoy:)

In my house in Richmond, Virginia, a total of nine people live in it. Two parents and seven children, 3 girls and 4 boys. I’m the eldest out of them, meaning whatever problem happens I’m the one getting blamed. EVEN IF I WASN’T THERE. There are many good and bad things about having many siblings. I´ll list them out for you, let’s go!  

Here are the difficulties of having 6 siblings:

1. Having six siblings means living with six devils that sometimes are in a form of angels. They will make sure they are always there for you in times of need, but sometimes can annoy the hell out of you. They can insult the hell out of you in the most irritating ways, but will defend you in front of other people or behind your back. They can say the worst things, but won’t allow anyone else to say anything about you. 
2. Whatever food you buy, make sure you eat it right away because these little nuggets also turn into dinosaurs that eat everything they see in front of them. EVEN IF THEY DON’T LIKE IT. Their rule is:”Let’s eat it so that he/she can’t eat it”. (Evil.. I know) Or sometimes they are hungry and don’t care about your feelings and make sure to eat all of it and not leave anything for you. Hunger is war. Dividing food is always complicated, when it’s us the eldest dividing to one of us who is also an “eldest”, it has to be as equal as possible and make sure the other person doesn’t get the a bigger piece, but when the eldest divides with the young ones, young ones get a smaller piece than the eldest one. Young ones usually are not allowed to be the one dividing, unless they snitch to our parents and make us give them a bigger piece. 
3. Blackmailing is a weapon we all use to survive in our house. The more information you have of the others the more powerful you are, which means you can boss them around, or be in the safe zone that none of your doings will be exposed because you have more dangerous FBI information than they do. Six siblings means six secret agents that are trying to put you in jail. It’s a daily fight of trying to get as much information as you can. (This happens mostly from the ages of 5-16) Whoever is older than 16 stops using this weapon and starts using the information they have to roast the hell out of you. 
4. It’s always too crowded if you don’t get more than 4 rooms, but it’s more expensive to get more than 2 rooms, so you usually get 2. So that means that there is a war fight over who will sleep on the bed and who will be the loser that will sleep on the floor. 
5. When it comes to carpooling..even a Cadillac Escalade isn’t big enough for us. If you get caught by the police, you will get a ticket for two reasons: someone is not wearing their belt,(but that is sometimes handled really quickly because we have time to wear it before the police reach the car, but there is always someone who doesn’t wear it.) too many people in the car, and actually there is also a third one that rarely happens, however ages from 5-12 cause it, they expose your crimes to the police officer. When actually you didn’t commit any crimes, but they are scared of a man holding with a gun and start saying stupid things like “Mom tell him that you threw a flip flop at me, he knows!! Be honest so that you don’t go to jail!” However, we have luck when the police officer doesn’t understand Arabic. So no one is in jail…yet.
6. You can’t hide ANYTHING in the house. Even if you’re able to find a good place to hide something, they usually find it in a matter of 5 hours maximum. 
7. 80% of our talks and negotiations eventually turn into fights.

Our fights have four to five stages depending on how bad the fight is. Here I’ll give you an example. Once my little sister and my little brother got in a fight over who’s better at Fortnite.  Keep in mind when someone in the family starts a fight, the other people’s job is NOT to stop the fight, but to choose a side. It’s very important to choose the strong side, and weaken the other one.  You listen for the first two to three minutes and from what you hear and gather, you choose a side. So when we heard them fighting, we observed quietly and carefully, and then each one of us chose a side. I for example chose my little brother because I believed that he was a better fighter and can go at the discussion better than my sister, in other words I believed he had the bigger mouth. 

So when they fight, they argue about the topic with evidence they have. For example with the Fortnite, they talked about who got killed quicker, who helped the team, who has better weapons, etc. This goes on for about 5 to 10 minutes.  When they run out of evidence they go into stage 1.

Stage 1: Roasting opponents Appearance

You start roasting the hell out of their appearance. Whether it’s true or not true, you try your best to make every feature of them ugly.  Roasts used are:

You look like a boiled frog, you’re a skinny bone, camel face, fish eyes, buffalo(meaning they’re fat)(mainly was my nickname), squidward(big nose), Dora the explorer( was used for my little brother because he had long hair), Gorilla unibrows, Subway (for my little sister because her name was similar to it, it was a roast because we think Subway is not good), monkey, worm, your hair is like a mop, you smell like sweaty armpits,…. and I can keep going.. but it would take days.

Stage two: Roasting opponents intelligence

Talking about grades, stupid stuff done, and how unsuccessful you are in life.

Roasts used: “You’ll always live at home  because you’re too stupid to make a living”, “you’re so stupid even a monkey is smarter”, “if I had your grades I would rather be a piece “, “no one will like you cause you’re ugly”, “I feel bad for whoever that will be your husband/wife”, “I feel bad for your friends I bet they think of how to get rid of you”, “you don’t have a boyfriend/girlfriend because you’re ugly and weird”., “you don’t know how to make eggs”, etc.

Stage Three: Bring up past mistakes and how stupid you are to have made them. 

Stage four: Start using violence which consists of pulling hair, slaps, kicks, pillow choking, and using kitchen utensils as weapons.

Most of the time it ends at stage four. However if they’re unlucky they enter stage five.

Stage five: Parents get involved, ground you, and you become friends because of how sad it is to be grounded. You start talking about how mad you are together and then think of fun things to do together since you have nothing better to do. 

The good things about having six siblings:

They are your friends forever, no matter what and where you are.

You support each other and have each other’s back. No one is allowed to mess with them other than you.

You always have people checking up on you and never feel alone.

Happy times are six times better and sad times are six times easier to handle.

In other words having six siblings is the best thing ever. It’s a beautiful journey. You learn so much from it. Everyday is full of thrills. I’m so thankful for them, they are the best thing in my life. Family is the only thing that I believe is forever. Even if you don’t have siblings, your family can be the friends you choose. You just have to choose wisely and remember that no matter what you’re a family. Don’t let obstacles and mistakes split you apart. That’s not what family is. Family means no matter the obstacles, and no matter the mistakes and flaws, you’ll always be one. You’ll always be a family:)

So I hope you enjoyed it, what I wrote above was almost three years ago. My 19 year old self and my 23 year old, they are two different people now. My 23 year old self doesn’t believe that there is such a thing as forever anymore. There is no such thing as forever. Family and friends that you chose to be your family, they can all overnight not be a family or friends anymore. That’s just how life is, everything is temporary. Friends, family, money, health, etc. Everything has an end, and eventually dies. Life will test you in the greatest ways, and if you are strong enough you will get through it, however you will end up with scars. Especially when it comes to family and friends that you always thought will be there. Life will  test you and both sides need to fight in order to stay as family and friends, it requires a lot of forgiveness and patience which sometimes is very difficult for some people. When one can’t forgive anymore then it will break your relationship with them and it will break you. Keep in mind though.. you will be broken to pieces for a short period of time, but then you will get stronger afterwards. I believe the hardest lessons in life are people who died, but are still alive in this world. My 19 year old self was very full of life, and my 23 year old is trying to survive life. That’s why the views have changed a lot. It will also keep changing, and maybe one day I will believe again in forever. If you have a family around you, cherish them. If you have great friends around you, cherish them. You never know what might happen and how long this relationship will last, so make the most out of it. Tell your family and friends today that you love them and that you’re thankful for them. Have a great day!