"Only Daughter"

     Reading "Only Daughter" by Sandra Cisneros really opened my eyes to how different the world can be as far as the different periods of time as well as different cultures. For her, you could tell that growing up as the only daughter was a horrible experience. That shocks me for many reasons because I know many families where having a girl after having all boys is such a wonderful blessing and so exciting for the family. I have even experienced that first hand with my daughter. Her father was raised in a family of all boys, even all of his cousins on both sides of his family were boys. His parents thought for sure that we were going to have a boy as well but as soon as we found out we were having a girl, they were so ecstatic and couldn't be happier.
     You can't help but feel bad for her throughout her whole story. She never really comes out and says it, but for me I could sense how alone, unloved and unimportant she must have felt growing up. She just wanted to fit in and be thought of as her own individual self, not as, "just a daughter" that didn't matter. I wish there would have been more in the story of how her mother treated her. I would have liked to have known if she had a better relationship with her or if her mom just kind of sat back and never stuck up for her. The very end of the story brought so much emotion for me. Reading it I couldn't help but tear up because in that moment on her dads bed after he read her book, the response he gave her I felt was what she wanted to hear from him her whole life. He finally made her feel important and as if she actually succeeded in life, what she felt her father never believed she could.