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12 Secrets to successful step parenting; part 1
Topic Started: Feb 3 2009, 08:06 PM (151 Views)
Dadofour
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Twelve Secrets for Successful Stepparenting
Communicate
Communicate
Be flexible and patient
Humor, compromise, respect, accept, and be yourself
Back off, escape with your spouse, be positive
Be honest


Parenting and stepparenting is probably the most challenging job you can tackle, yet there are no job requirements (other than having kids). It doesn't require getting a child care license, serving an apprenticeship, passing an exam, or getting a degree. Worst of all, no instruction manual comes with the kids. You certainly wouldn't buy a refrigerator or computer that came with so little back-up information.
You're not professional parents, you're amateurs. What's more, even the professional counselors and therapists you go to for advice struggle just as much on a personal basis with their kids because it's hard to stand away and be objective about your own.

So relax. Trust your instincts. Follow the advice of the American physician and author, Benjamin McLane Spock. He wrote, "The more people have studied different methods of bringing up children, the more they have come to the conclusion that what good mothers and fathers instinctively feel like doing for their babies is usually best after all."

This advice was echoed by a Tampa pediatrician, Lane France, who said, "The biggest problem I see with young parents today is that they don't trust their own judgment." Parents and stepparents interviewed for this book agreed with this counsel and happily divulged their secrets for success in blending their families.


Communicate
This was the number one suggestion on everyone's list. Communication, which includes listening as well as speaking, is the key to opening the door to conflict resolution, for creating better understanding, and for solving problems that are bound to come up in daily life. Stepfamilies may have some difficulty with communication skills in the beginning. That's because the family members come from different original families, bringing with them varying styles of communication, different jargon, and dissimilar body language. But with time, patience, and practice, they should begin to blend even their communication styles and meet with success.
Open communication helps to keep expectations realistic.

"It startled me to realize that my new husband loved his own kids as much as I did mine," a newly remarried woman told me. "I guess that should have been obvious. But I wanted him to instantly love my girls as I did. When we started talking about it, I understood why he couldn't. It wasn't just a question of loyalty. He didn't have the history with my kids. We both knew we'd have to take things more slowly. I'm glad we could talk about it."
Be flexible and patient
Communicate
Be flexible and patient
Humor, compromise, respect, accept, and be yourself
Back off, escape with your spouse, be positive
Be honest


Be flexible
The happiest and least stressed stepfamilies seem to be those in which all the members are flexible and willing to compromise when necessary. This includes being willing to change plans when needed. With so many individuals in their lives—including the other biological parent, stepsiblings, half siblings, and extended family—schedules often don't adhere to a rigid timetable. While routine is important, especially for younger children, the ability to adapt creates a less stressful environment for everyone. It's a good idea for all of us.
Realize too that a "bonus baby" coming into the family will change your lives once again. Fortunately, most blended families said the changes created by the arrival of an "our baby" were positive for the most part.

"The twins sort of solidified our blended family," said a mother with a daughter from a previous marriage and two stepsons. "They were everyone's babies and quickly became 'our babies' for the entire family. We found less sibling jealousy than our friends had in their nuclear families. I guess our kids were more used to sharing before the babies were born."


Be patient
Stepparents must move slowly, planting the seeds of love and helping them to grow through respect, caring, and appropriate affection. It usually doesn't happen quickly, just as any tender plant grows in its own time.
Patience indeed is a virtue, one that every stepparent must develop. It's often hard, especially when you feel as though you are doing everything you can to befriend your stepchildren and they don't seem to appreciate any of it. The cruel fact is, they may never give you what you want or need in return. Many of the adult stepchildren interviewed said it wasn't until they themselves were grown (and some of them became stepparents), that they fully appreciated the effort made by their stepparent. Some of them even shared that discovery with their stepparent.

Be patient, and even if you don't develop the relationship you would have preferred, take comfort in the knowledge that you have done your very best. Try not to overreact over real or imagined slights. All kids tend to be somewhat thoughtless and even cruel at times. You don't have to be a stepparent to feel unappreciated by your kids.

Humor, compromise, respect, accept, and be yourself
Communicate
Be flexible and patient
Humor, compromise, respect, accept, and be yourself
Back off, escape with your spouse, be positive
Be honest


Keep your sense of humor
Almost everyone agreed that a sense of humor is an important ingredient to stir into the blended family pot. Humor softens the rough spots and brings families together. Just remember to never use humor at another person's expense and never permit any of the children to do so either.

Learn to compromise
Although finances may prevent you and your new spouse from buying a new home, do so if you can. It's difficult enough for a stepparent to move into an already existing family. When it's the same home as well, the kids (and often the biological parent) may openly or subconsciously resent any changes in decoration, traditions, or actually anything suggested by the stepparent.

Respect others
Members of a blended family don't need to agree with each other necessarily, but they must to learn to respect not only the opinions of the other members of their family, but also the privacy and personal possessions of those members. Children often need to share a room with a stepsibling or double up so a stepsibling or half sibling can have their former room. They need to have the confidence that their "stuff" will be safe from prying or curious hands. This is also vital when the parents' other children come to spend time in the blended family home. These tumbleweed youngsters need a private place that's secure for their things as well.
Biological parents should make it clear to their children that they will tolerate no disrespect to the stepparent. The parent also should be careful that he or she is always respectful both in word and action to the stepparent. Children model our behavior.


Accept Imperfections
Don't try to be the perfect blended family. If you strive for perfection, you'll only succeed in becoming frustrated. Accept the fact that you and your spouse are not Norman Rockwell models and that The Brady Bunch was only a television show, not an actual blended family.
Accept too that there will always be a former spouse, your stepkids' parent, in the picture, even if that person is deceased. Actually, a ghost parent can be more difficult to deal with because his or her faults seem to vanish in the midst, leaving nothing but pictures of perfection. And that's hard to deal with.


Be yourself
Be yourself at all times, as kids can easily see through our masks and discern what is really us. You'll wear yourself out trying to play your characterization of the perfect stepparent twenty-four hours a day. Don't try to impersonate what you think the kids (or your spouse) want in a stepparent either. Just be you.
Rather than thinking of yourself as a stepmother or stepfather, consider yourself more as the children's adult friend or a friendly aunt or uncle. It will give you the distance you need while they size you up and is a role you can continue to live with if the kids don't eventually warm up to you. Usually, they'll come around to some degree if they sense you aren't trying to usurp their other parent's role.


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Grizz1219
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I'm thinking if both sides just thought about what was best for the kids without letting ego's play into it at all, the court system would be bored...

But this is all good advice, someone has to take the high road...

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