Granted we all love our siblings dearly, but let’s be honest, sometimes they’re a bit of a pain. According to NPR, statistically 51 percent of all children born in the US are male. This means many families have only male children or more males than females. Take my family for example. I am the only female child and have two younger brothers. While there certainly are some perks to living with younger brothers, they don’t wear your clothes, for example, there definitely are some downfalls, such as the constant stench of belches, gas or body odor. For all of you who don’t live in a house full of males, here’s a sneak peek at what it may be like. However, for those of you who live similarly to myself, I’m certain you can relate to the perks and struggles.
The constant amount of dirty laundry. While this is more of an issue for my mother, since she does the laundry, it’s pretty evident the amount of laundry piling up never shrinks. Between pajamas, regular clothes, work uniforms, workout clothes, and sports uniforms, I feel my brothers wear more clothes in one day than I do in three. However, even though my brothers are younger than me, they are now slightly bigger than me; this works nicely in my favor. If I notice they have a nice pair of sweatpants or a t-shirt that I like, I can usually snag it from their closet knowing it will fit me. Sadly, this isn’t to say they won’t notice and harass me about it.
While all siblings bicker and yell, I’ve noticed that brothers tend to be a bit more physical with each other. Both my brothers have wrestled at some point in their high school careers which means the living room floor often doubles as a wrestling mat. While this provides moderate entertainment, it’s not uncommon that anything breakable in the house has been broken. Along with being aggressive towards each other, they’re aggressive towards the entire family, including the cat. In his younger years, I recall one of my brothers pushing our cat down the slide.
The amount of food growing males consume is outrageous. A dinner made to feed 10 people feeds five in a house of primarily males. This isn’t the end of it, however. It’s well known that every household has a favorite food. In my house, the favorite is fresh berries. This means within 30 minutes of my mom coming home from the grocery store, all the fresh berries are devoured. You can bet that if you’re not home when the groceries come home, you are either left with rotten berries or no berries at all.
It’s a pretty common thing for teenage boys to be heavily into weightlifting. This means that in a house of boys, you hear more about protein powder than anything, and there’s always workout music playing and the desktop image on your dads laptop is now of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Oh and don’t forget the workout plan that’s on the refrigerator, so every time you go for some ice cream, you are reminded of how you didn’t go to the gym for the third day in a row.
Even though there’s always dirty laundry, constant fighting, a lack of appetizing food, and a constant blare of music in a house of primarily males; at least I always have access to comfortable sweats, entertainment, endless information on protein powder, and daily updates on the Arnold Classic Worldwide body building competition. Living with brothers surely makes life more exciting, and at the end of the day, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
