If you have been alive for more than a minute, you might have heard this saying a time or two: blood is thicker than water. If you have, you are nodding your head. If you haven’t, let me explain. This has become the obligatory theme of families suggesting that a family member should always take precedence over anyone else. Family should always come first! Family should be above everyone else! I might have already lost a reader or two that might have experience this is not always a truth to adhere to. In a perfect world, this would be a fundamental truth. But you and I both know this is not a perfect world. It has become more of a you choose your family for the most part. So it might surprise you, as it did me, the original saying and meaning of this adage.

Let me start by saying, while family should be our first circle of a functioning society and provide us with a built in support system that is not always the case. That in itself is not new news. Look at Cain and Abel to see how far back family dysfunction reaches. Some utopian families have achieved a working and sometimes envious model. Siblings are best buds. Cousins are included in group chats. Grandparents are honored and revered. Parents are respected. Strong family bonds are not a unicorn, they do and actually exist for some. Just not all.

For those who haven’t spoken to a sibling in years; or those with cousins they don’t recognize; or grandparents they have never met even though they live in the same town; or parents who bring more drama than support; or any combination of any of those that really, really stinks. Not reaching or obtaining the ideal can be painful. Especially when we can see others that seem to achieve that lofty status.

If you roll your eyes when you hear the saying blood is thicker than water you might want to try a variant of the original saying. The genesis of the saying has been traced back to 12th century Germany and it sounded a bit different because it had the opposite meaning than how we say it now. The original saying went something like this: the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb. Which means bonds formed from shared experiences (ie soldiers in wartime) are stronger than familial bonds. And that brings us to where we are at today and the whole you choose your family thought process.

I have always been one of those family is family type of people. But it takes a lot of work to protect and strengthen those bonds. If there isn’t work on both sides to maintain that relationship it will fall by the wayside. It’s much easier to fall into a dysfunctional family than to grow a functional, healthy family. Here’s the point of all this: blood may be thicker than water but not if it stops flowing. Time and shared experiences are required to keep it going and keep it growing. Nurture those relationships you want to maintain. Then you won’t be able to tell the blood from the water.