I'm an only child and this affected me more than I can explain. Due to the lack of predecessors, I was the guinea pig of all my parents' experiments. Every decision or mistake I made was on me from the beginning and I always had my parents' full attention. This is both a good and a bad thing. From a positive point of view, every achievement in my life has been amplified and every effort has been supported to the fullest. On the other hand, every mistake, failure, wrong decision and judgment has been like a permanent mark in my existence. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay My lack of family members, even in extended family, has changed the way I behave towards groups of people. I have never had an example to follow and I have never had to set an example for anyone. This gave me a strange sense of isolation that I learned to embrace. I find comfort in solidarity and often feel nervous around people. When compared to the birth order characteristics chart, I find many similarities and some significant differences. I am certainly a perfectionist, often having significant emotional meltdowns whenever a deadline approaches and a project is imperfect or incomplete. I am extremely organized and borderline OCD. Sometimes it helps, but mostly it's just annoying. I'm a "driver" who will do almost anything to achieve a goal if I set my mind to it. I am logical and studious. I spend most of my time alone listening to music or reading. On the other hand, I am the exact opposite of confident. I need the approval of others and often find myself working too hard or changing myself just so one person can think better of me. I also don't make lists unless I have to pack for a trip. Even then, I record items in a very sporadic way that makes sense to me, but almost no one else. Many variables influenced my birth order traits. I am an only child and I am adopted. I have a cousin, who is four years older than me. My family is extremely small, consisting of a mother and father, two aunts, two uncles, three cousins, and a grandmother and grandfather. (until last year) An aunt and uncle live in Colorado with their 20 year old daughters, two of my cousins. Needless to say, they haven't affected my life dramatically. Many expectations my parents had for me were based on my practically perfect cousin, giving me some traits of a last born, but not enough to be justified. My mother is a middle child, born the second of three. Her brother was born four years before her and her sister was seven years behind her. Although the birth order normally resets after five or six years, it is clear that my mother has taken on the traits of a middle child, or even an older one. My mother wanted a little sister for her sixth birthday and when she was seven my grandmother was expecting a little girl. After Missy was born, my mother welcomed her as if she were her own daughter. My grandmother often told me about having to send my mother on errands to leave the baby alone. This dramatically affected his personality and completely upset his birth order. Mom was the youngest daughter for seven years. His older brother, Chuck, was by far the wildest of the family, earning a few years of military school in his twenties. My mother learned from her mistakes and took on the role of the perfect daughter by comparison. She was both mama's girl and daddy's little princess. Until Missy arrived, seven years later, mine.