Family History Question Book

Family History Question Book

1.	Birth
1.1	What is your birth date ?
1.2	Where were you born ? County ? Town ?
1.3	Were you born on your due date ?
1.4	Where and at what time of day or night ?
1.5	What was life like for your parents around the time of your birth: their jobs, other children, where were they living ?
1.6	What was happening in the world then (i.e., politics, storms, anything) ?
1.7	Were you born in a hospital or at home - write all the details that are available to you.
1.8	Who was there (or in the waiting room) at the time of your birth - attending person and relatives ?
1.9	What was the weather that day ?
1.10	How long did the birthing last ?
1.11	What was your mother's physical, emotional, spiritual attitude through it all ?
1.12	Your father's ?
1.13	If you were not born at home, how long did you stay in the hospital ?
1.14	How did others react to your birth: other siblings, relatives ?
1.15	Describe yourself at that time: who did people say that you looked like ?
1.16	Were you thought to be especially long or chubby or bald or “easy” ?
1.17	Were many families, the first days and weeks of life are celebrated with rituals - religious or secular - to incorporate the new member into the family or group.
1.18	Were there any special words, actions, or clothing involved in these ceremonies or rituals ?

2.	Infancy & Childhood
2.1	When did you start teething, crawling, walking, talking ?
2.2	What were your favourite toys, games, foods, activities ?
2.3	Write the stories you have heard about yourself as you were then.
2.4	How do you feel about the way you-as-an-infant have been presented in your family stories ?
2.5	Describe yourself in those years.
2.6	What illnesses did you have ?
2.7	From when does your first memory derive ?
2.8	Describe that memory in detail. Be sure to include settings, actions, and any and all words you remember whether you or someone else spoke them.
2.9	Describe your siblings - physically, emotionally, intellectually.
2.10	Do the same for your parents and other significant people around you.
2.11	Where did your family live at this time ? Describe the house, the town, the county, etc.
2.12	What did your parents do for work, fun, etc., at this period ?

3.	An Early, Important Experience
3.1	Write about an event or occurrence that you remember from when you were very young.
3.2	Tell what it was that made this experience important enough to stick in your mind.
3.3	Explore its emotional or psychological implications.
3.4	Perhaps you can uncover what this memory reveals about you that is typical of you even today.
3.5	Have you had these sorts of experiences again ?
3.6	How did others react to this event ?
3.7	How did they react to your responses to this event ?

4.	Before You
4.1	Who were the oldest persons in your family when you were very young ? What was the role of these people in your family ?
4.2	What were some of the most striking things about him/her - looks, what he/she had done in life, his/her role in your family's life ?
4.3	What effect (directly or indirectly) did that person have on you ?

5.	Grandparents 
5.1	What are your grandparents' names ? (Be sure to mention maiden names.)
5.2	Where and when were they born ?
5.3	Who were their parents ?
5.4	Where did they live - name and describe the town and neighbourhood.
5.5	How many siblings did they have ?
5.6	What were the family circumstances - financial, emotional, etc.—at various times of your grandparents' childhoods ?
5.7	Did they go to school ?
5.8	Where ?
5.9	What did they like about school ?
5.10	Did they have any memorable teachers ?
5.11	What were their early work experiences ?
5.12	How and when did they meet ?
5.13	What was their courtship like ?
5.14	Describe their wedding - place, clothing, guests, etc.
5.15	Did they go on a honeymoon ?
5.16	Describe the various places where they lived.
5.17	Describe their home as you knew it.
5.18	Describe your grandparents physically and emotionally.
5.19	(What sorts of temperaments did they have ? How did they react to things and to you ?)
5.20	Describe their relationship: how did they "work" together as a couple ?
5.21	What sorts of jobs did they have in their lives ?
5.22	Were these jobs ones they liked ?
5.23	How many children did they have ?
5.24	Where are their children now ?
5.25	How did your grandparents feel about where their children went, what they became, and what they were doing ?
5.26	What was your grandparents' relationship to you ?
5.27	Which grandparent are you most like (and in what way) and which are you least like ?
5.28	How did your parents feel about these resemblances ?
5.29	Describe some activities that you did together.
5.30	What values of theirs do you maintain to this day ?
5.31	Describe in detail.

6.	Parents
6.1	What are your parents' full names ? (Include maiden name)
6.2	Where and when were they born ?
6.3	Where did they go to school and what did they study ?
6.4	What training did they undergo for the work they do or have done ?
6.5	How and when did they meet ?
6.6	Where have they lived ?
6.7	How many siblings did they have and when was each born ?
6.8	Describe your parents physically and emotionally at different times in their lives.
6.9	What sorts of temperaments do you associate with your parents ?
6.10	How have they reacted - at different times of their lives - to things or to you?
6.11	What sorts of jobs have they had in their lives ?
6.12	Are these jobs they have liked ?
6.13	How many children have they had ?
6.14	Were they married to someone else before they married each other ?
6.15	Did they have children with these mates ?
6.16	Are your parents divorced ?
6.17	Describe what that was like for them and for you.
6.18	Did you feel abandoned, hurt, scared ?
6.19	Are they now remarried ?
6.20	How old were you when your parent(s) remarried ?
6.21	Describe your step-parents and try to do this entire exercise for them, too. What is the relationship of each parent (and/or step-parent) to you ?
6.22	Which parent are you more like - physically, emotionally, interests-wise (and in what way) and which are you less like ?
6.23	In which ways are you least like your parents ?
6.24	How do or did your parents or step-parents feel about these resemblances and dissimilarities ?
6.25	Which of your parents’ values and traditions do you maintain ? Describe in detail.

7.	Brothers and Sisters
7.1	What are their names and when and where were they born ?
7.2	Describe their births just as you described your own above.
7.3	Perhaps you can remember the births of some of your siblings - write about your feelings at the time.
7.4	Do you remember the first impression you had of them ?
7.5	Describe their first year just as you did your own.
7.6	Write about some of the interactions that you have had with them - playing together, bathing together, fighting together.
7.7	Do all of your siblings live at home ? If not, describe how they came to live elsewhere.
7.8	How do you feel about this ?
7.9	How do you feel about them now that they are gone ?
7.10	Which of your siblings are you most alike and which are you least alike ?
7.11	Which do you get along with best and which do you get along least well with ? Why ?
7.12	Describe their mates and their children.
7.13	If any of your siblings have died, describe their deaths (illness ? accident ? how you learned about it, reacted/participated).
7.14	Was there a funeral ? Did you attend ? participate ? plan it ?
7.15	Did the experience bring you closer to your family ? or confirm the distances ?
7.16	How did your family re-form around the empty place your sibling left ?

8.	Other Family Members, Mentors and Friends 

9.	Self-portrait 
9.1	How tall were you ?
9.2	Were you thin or fat ?
9.3	How was your hair ?
9.4	What sorts of clothing did you wear ?
9.5	What were your most marked features ?
9.6	How did you compare to other people your age ?
9.7	How did this make you feel ?
9.8	What sorts of things did you do at this age - for fun, for learning, for getting attention, for mischief, in order to ask for love ?
9.9	What sorts of books did you read ?
9.10	What games/sports did you play ?
9.11	What arts did you learn - piano, dancing, painting ?
9.12	What movies did you watch ?
9.13	How did you typically spend time with friends ?
9.14	What games/sports did you play ?
9.15	Write something about your relationships to your parents and to your siblings at each of these times, too.
9.16	How do these word portraits help you to understand your life ?
9.17	Is your development smooth or can you see a period when you seemed to have slowed down and others when you seemed to leap forward ?

10.	Schooling
10.1	Write about your first day of school.
10.2	Where was that ?
10.3	Did you take a bus, walk, or go with your parents ?
10.4	What were you wearing ?
10.5	Who was your teacher ?
10.6	What was she/he like ?
10.7	Describe the building.
10.8	What happened when you first entered the building, the classroom ?
10.9	Can you remember some activities ?
10.10	Who were the other children ?
10.11	How many were there ?
10.12	What sorts of things did they do ?
10.13	Describe your later schooling. List all the schools you have attended.
10.14	Give names and describe buildings, teachers, classmates and anyone else who was important to you.
10.15	Write about classes and activities that you enjoyed.
10.16	What did you learn that seemed important ?
10.17	What would you have changed about each teacher, class, or school ?
10.18	What classes did you take outside of school: dance, theatre, art ? Give all the details.
10.19	Did you attend camps or programs or clubs ?
10.20	Compare what you learned there with what you learned in school.
10.21	Did you go to college ? Whether yes or no, how was this decision regarded in your family ? Amongst your friends ?
10.22	How did you choose your college and your major ?
10.23	Describe your college—physically, emotionally, and intellectually.
10.24	What were some of your most important learning experiences ?
10.25	Was college a significant learning experience for you ?
10.26	Would you do it over again ?
10.27	What would you change with hindsight ?
10.28	Did you use knowledge from your college education in your work ?
10.29	What was it like to leave college and go to work ?

11.	Work
11.1	Describe your earliest paying jobs - babysitting, lawn mowing, gardening, clerking at a store.
11.2	How did these earliest work experiences shape attitudes for the future ?
11.3	Was work a necessity or a choice for you ? Describe the circumstances.
11.4	Was work an experience of early independence for you ?
11.5	How did you spend the money you earned ?
11.6	What social life did work provide for you ?
11.7	Did you / have you maintained friendships from work ?
11.8	When and why did you change jobs ?
11.9	What kinds of advancement have been open to you ?
11.10	What training or education has been necessary ?
11.11	Were your bosses supportive or difficult ?
11.12	Was the work tedious, difficult, or satisfying ?
11.13	How did your work schedule fit with the rest of your Life - with schooling, family responsibilities, or other commitments such as church or clubs ?
11.14	Did you find your “life’s work” - meaningful, soul satisfying work ?
11.15	How did you come to this work ? Describe it in detail.
11.16	What did you do ? With whom did you work ?
11.17	If it was not satisfying, is there work you have always wished to do ?
11.18	If income or other restrictions were not an issue, what work would you do ?
11.19	What were your work conditions ?
11.20	What kinds of salaries, recognition, and satisfaction, advancement, disappointments, frustrations did you experience ?
11.21	What values did you learn from your family and community regarding work ?
11.22	What were (are) your own assumptions regarding work and what it should be in your life ?
11.23	How have these assumptions helped or hindered you ?
11.24	What work values have you passed on to your own children or other young people ?
11.25	If you are retired, write about your decision to retire.
11.26	How old were you ?
11.27	Was it your decision ?
11.28	What was the reaction of other people in your life ?
11.29	How did it feel to leave the structure of work ?
11.30	Were you financially secure ?
11.31	Emotionally prepared ?
11.32	What did you do once you were retired ?
11.33	If work was a source of identity, was it hard to
11.34	replace it in your life ?
11.35	How has it felt to be an older person ?
11.36	Have health issues played a role in your retirement ?
11.37	Is your spouse also retired ?
11.38	How has she/he reacted to your being retired ?

12.	Marriage
12.1	What did your upbringing teach you to expect in a mate ?
12.2	How did you meet your mate ?
12.3	Describe your engagement - was it long ? Short ? Stormy ? Content ?
12.4	Describe your wedding day. Include your feelings and apprehensions.
12.5	Were your ideas about marriage compatible with those of your mate ?
12.6	How were they the same and how did they differ ?
12.7	Did the reality of your marriage match your expectations ?
12.8	What were your first years together like ?
12.9	Do you remember your first disagreements ?
12.10	How were these symptomatic of your subsequent interactions ?
12.11	Did you have children ?
12.12	Were you in agreement about how to raise your children ?
12.13	About values and traditions you wanted to impart ?
12.14	Was raising children a satisfying experience for you ?
12.15	What was the best or favourite era of parenting ?
12.16	What was the hardest ?
12.17	What would you do the same again ?
12.18	What would you do differently if you could ?
12.19	Describe what it was like for you when your children left home, found mates, had their own children ?
12.20	What is / are your relationship(s) with your adult children ?
12.21	If you are divorced, describe what it was like to be in the process of divorcing and what it was like to be alone in the years afterwards. If you have remarried, redo this entire list for your second marriage.
12.22	Compare your first and subsequent marriages.

13.	Children
13.1	Answer questions with each of your children in mind individually as well as together.
13.2	How did becoming a parent change your outlook on your own life ?
13.3	What was it like to see yourself or other members of your family in your children ?
13.4	Did you see your parents differently after having your own children ?
13.5	What child-rearing customs did you maintain from your parents and which ones did you alter ? Why ?
13.6	What are you most satisfied with in your child rearing and what are you most disappointed with ?
13.7	How did having children affect your relationship with your mate ?
13.8	What funny stories do you remember about your children ?
13.9	What do you see in your child’s early years that, looking back, seems typical of their later choices and personality traits ?
13.10	What was the most painful or difficult part of parenting for you ?
13.11	The most satisfying and joyful ?
13.12	How was it when your children left home ? Married ? Became parents themselves ?
13.13	What relationship do you have with your children-in-law ?

14.	Grandchildren
14.1	Answer the above questions for your grandchildren, too.
14.2	Do you maintain a close relationship with some or all of your grandchildren ?
14.3	What do you do to keep these relationships close ?
14.4	How is your grandchild like you (like your spouse, like your child)
14.5	How is she/he different ? In personality ? attitudes ? looks ? life expectations and goals ?

15.	Celebrations and Holidays
15.1	List the holidays, vacations, events (for example, funerals and weddings) and birthdays that are (were) celebrated in your family and in your community.
15.2	Do you have a special way of spending Sunday afternoons or Saturdays in your family ?
15.3	Is there a seasonal celebration such as a barbecue or bonfire, a yearly sliding party or a summer trip to the beach ? Describe some of the most memorable of any of these formal or informal happenings.
15.4	Where are they held ?
15.5	Who attends ?
15.6	How do you prepare ? Plan ? Participate ?
15.7	What do other people do ?
15.8	What do you wear ?
15.9	Is there a program to be followed or are the happenings spontaneous ?
15.10	Who takes on the role of preparation ? Clean up ?
15.11	Is this celebration still held ?
15.12	How do you feel about it today ?
15.13	What role did it play in your family life - was it anticipated with pleasure or dread ? Were the event, the activities, the setting, the people involved reinforced by storytelling before and after ?
15.14	Was there silence around certain relatives or friends ?
15.15	Are there mysteries in your memories of family, church or ethnic get-togethers ?

16.	Sports, Arts, Hobbies, Pastimes
16.1	What are your favourite sports, hobbies, and pastimes ?
16.2	How did you start doing these ?
16.3	Are these solo or group activities ?
16.4	Is there a public forum of achievement and recognition for each activity ?
16.5	What have been some of your most memorable experiences in each one ?
16.6	Did you have a mentor, teacher / coach or hero who inspired you ?
16.7	If being better is important to any of these, how did you develop the skills ?
16.8	With who have you shared these activities - parents, siblings, children, or friends ?
16.9	Did you abandon dreams of success at a sport, or other skill such as performing ? Why ?
16.10	How did that loss affect your later choices ?

17.	Hard Times
17.1	What were some of the hard times in your life (or your parents' or children’s lives) ?
17.2	Has there been illness, poverty, prejudice, or family conflict ?
17.3	Describe the event(s) or choose a memorable scene that illustrates the time.
17.4	What happened ?
17.5	Who was there ?
17.6	How did you and the people who were there react ?
17.7	How did you or your family overcome this difficulty ?
17.8	Were you able to ask for and receive the support you needed ?
17.9	Has this influenced you in a permanent way ?
17.10	What have you gained from this experience ?
17.11	What have you lost ?

18.	Accomplishments
18.1	What have you done in your life that you are most proud of ?
18.2	Academic achievement ?
18.3	A longstanding friendship or marriage over the years ?
18.4	Overcoming a handicap or set-back ?
18.5	Financial success ?
18.6	Independence ?
18.7	Perseverance in achieving personal goals of any kind ?
18.8	Overcoming or adjusting to illness or physical limitations ?
18.9	Leadership at work or in your community ?
18.10	Sacrifice or dedication to family ?
18.11	Volunteer work ?
18.12	Surviving the death of a loved one ?
18.13	Making major personal changes ?
18.14	What was hard about achieving this accomplishment ?
18.15	What was easy ?
18.16	Who was there with you ?
18.17	Who helped you ?
18.18	Who didn’t ?
18.19	Would you do it over again ?
18.20	How did others feel about what you accomplished ?
18.21	Is your achievement on-going or a thing of the past ?
18.22	How have you passed on your skills or shared your enthusiasm ?

19.	The Future
19.1	List your goals and dreams - and steps to take toward realising them!
19.2	What are your hopes, dreams and plans for your life ?
19.3	Would you like to study something new Join a new club ?
19.4	Learn a new skill or trade ?
19.5	Have a second career ?
19.6	Travel ?
19.7	Would you like to form new friendships, romances, or affiliations with groups, clubs or communities ?
19.8	Reconcile an old conflict ?
19.9	Find a lost friend or relative ?
19.10	Adopt a child ?
19.11	Join the Peace Corps ?
19.12	Create a beautiful garden ?
19.13	Go into politics ?