Blended Together

Divorce is prevalent. It is a fact in this world. I wish it weren’t but the fact is that it happens a lot. Most of the time it is unnecessary. Sometimes it is necessary. The point is that it is a reality that there will be blended families. Those can be really hard.

What is a blended family? An untraditional or blended family includes anything that is not the traditional biological mother, father, and children in the household. That includes step siblings and step parents. That also can include adopted children. Basically when there is a loss or an addition, most typically caused by divorce and remarriage, the family dynamic changes and adjustments have to be made which can be really difficult.

I want to focus on the blended family. This means what is left after parents divorce and one parent gets remarried. It can be very difficult if it isn’t done correctly.

There are a few suggestions that were made to me by a family therapist professional I was talking to recently. He said that the first thing you have to understand is that it takes about 2 years to reach “normal” again. That makes sense if you think about it. You have to go through each stage of the year a couple times to establish a firm understanding of what to expect from each stage. For instance, my brother got a divorce. About 5 years later he remarried. She has a child. They have had to really establish their relationship together with his 3 children and her 1 daughter. It took a while because of distance and other contributing factors, but after about 2 years they have established what to expect and the children get along very well.

The next advice that was shared was that heavy discipline should not be handled by the new parent. It should always be handled by the birth parent. Of course both parents can talk about it and discuss what would be best, but ultimately it needs to be the birth parent who enforces it. That is because the birth parent is the one that the child trusts the most. If the new parent were to try to discipline there might be problems that arise. These problems include resentment from the child toward both parents, pulling away from the biological parent, etc. It could even cause a rift to start forming between the husband and wife because of the way the new parent disciplines the child. It is always best, at least for the first several years, to let the birth parent handle disciplining.

The next advice was given to the new parent. If you are a new parent, try to have more of a “fantastic aunt/uncle” relationship with the children. This will cause a bond to form between the new parent and the child that will get closer as time goes on. Just make sure to be fun and engaged in their lives.

The last piece of advice that was given is that it is still important for a husband and a wife to counsel together as to what is best for the family. Hold regular councils so that it actually happens. This dynamic can be hard, but if you counsel together and try to involve the Lord, you will see the family come together and it will be easier to make decisions about how to make the family as close to the ideal family situation as possible.

Divorce is ugly, But if the situation happens, and you find yourself in a mixed, blended family, these steps and precautions can really help salvage what is left of the broken family.