Blended Families – The "Yo" The family and its lessons

To encourage healthy interactions between stepfamilies, I share experiences from my practice. As always in professional writing, the identifying details have been altered. The following stories combine the challenges of stepfamilies into story-based lessons. I start with the story from the meeting of a couple to a moment of radical change in their lives. Lucille, a nurse, and Larry, an accountant, both in their early 30s, came to see me. Originally, Lucille was single, while Larry was divorced with a 5-year-old son, Louis. Larry was the full-time father of Louis, whose mother had recently come out as a lesbian and subsequently left the two of them.

Larry was studying for his CPA exam when he met Lucille, spending as much time with Louis as possible, even putting off phone calls and dishes until the boy fell asleep. When Larry first met Lucille, he continued to prioritize raising her child and did not bring Lucille into the home until her relationship was well established. Lucille was very loving to Louis and both adults worked to repair the damage caused by the first wife’s difficult decisions.

Things soon changed dramatically: Larry went to work, with many hours dedicated to moving up the career ladder. Lucille was not happy with her work and she retired once Larry had a good income. This left Lucille as a full-time mother to Louis.

At first she loved the part, making healthy school lunches and cooking fancy dinners, volunteering as a room mom at Louis’ private school, and even starting a local moms’ group. The two of them moved into a luxury condo in a fancy part of town, and Lucille was frustrated with Louis as he tried to keep the place clean and fancy, and he dragged dirt and crumbs seemingly everywhere he went.

This move added time to Larry’s commute, and as Larry became more successful, leaving work later and later, Lucille began to resent the carpooling, the teacher complaint notes, the constant restriction on her schedule because I had to be home at 4:00 am to meet Luis. She became increasingly irritable with Louis and let Larry know of his frustrations with the boy through emails at work and by the time he got home at night. She blamed him for making Louis self-centered by putting off chores until he went to bed. Louis’s mother, much less well off than Larry and Lucille, cut off all child support, leading to further feelings of resentment and aggravation.

Then, to everyone’s surprise, Lucille became pregnant.

The pregnancy certainly didn’t improve things between Lucille and her stepson. She becomes more. frustrated with him, insisting that her father put him in after-school programs and find someone to also take over his extensive carpooling duties.

The crisis occurred the night before Louis’s spring break, Louis was throwing a ball, as he had been told so many times not to, and as he lunged at it, he tripped over Lilly’s car seat, causing both of them to fall. children will collapse and scream. .

When Larry got home, Lucille told her husband in no uncertain terms what would happen now. Larry would drive his son to work every day of the vacation, since she had no intention of having Louis around, bothering and interrupting, every day for a week.

Now, let’s try to take a step back and think about the best way to avoid this scenario from the start. Some of these thoughts are based on How to earn as a stepfamily by Emily and John Visher. So, some lessons for stepparents:

Don’t be too strong, overwhelming your stepchildren and creating expectations that you can’t meet. Stop and let your stepchildren come to you.

Recognize that the relationship between you and your stepchildren is just forming. If you say you love them from the start, they often won’t believe you and may discredit other things you say.

Remember that stepchildren will be different from children raised by you. If you try to make them in your children’s image, you will get in the way of developing a good relationship with them. Household rules simply cannot make a person take a new form. Often stepchildren eventually absorb some of the new patterns you want them to adapt, but at their own pace.

Find out what things your stepchildren like and try to make them available, for example, a basketball net or their favorite drink.

Do things with your stepchildren alone without their parents, something that you both like and are good at.

It’s just a fact that you will feel differently about your stepchildren than you do about your own children. And your stepchildren will feel differently about you than they do about their own parents. Time can produce a very special relationship if you accept that the feelings are different at first and simply cannot be forced.

Similarly, accept that your reactions to your own child and your spouse’s reactions to their “darling 6-year-old” will be different. Support your spouse as he begins to bond with her children.

Avoid areas delimited by the child’s own parents. If her stepson says, “Dad says he’ll teach me to sail,” don’t run to the nearest shipyard.

Sometimes it can take until adulthood for stepchildren to realize the loving and special qualities of the stepparent. Be patient.

Do not make fun of or criticize the other biological parent. That parent is, not just chromosomally speaking, half the child, so you’re really attacking the child. Keep information about that parent’s love life and financial situation out of the child’s reach until the parent tells them.

Do not try to win your stepchild over through bribery (gifts, special outings, etc.) if your home is more financially comfortable than the other parent’s home. This can backfire as children may identify with the underdog.

Avoid the “romantic antidote marriage fantasy”: My partner’s first wife/husband was so bad that our new marriage will cure everything.

And finally, discipline. Now there is a difficult one. But during the first 18 to 24 months of marriage, she views her interaction with her stepchildren as more like that of a camp counselor with her camper. She’s there for her safety, but not necessarily to enforce the law. Only after the marriage is strong and you have come to know your stepchildren as persons, as they have seen you, should you take an active role in their discipline.

If you can follow some of these tips, you’re well on your way to making the “mine” and “yours” inherent in new marriages with children part of a well-rounded “ours.”