Seven things to know about forming a blended family

Seven things to know about forming a successful “blended family”

You may not be ready to think about this yet, for either yourself or your child’s other parent. However, two-thirds of divorced adults recouple. For the well-being of all involved, it is vitally important to know that what works for successful “blended families” differs fundamentally from what works in first-time families. Although you may not need this information right now, there’s a very good chance that it will come in handy down the road.

Three things to know for parents about forming a new “blended family”

• A step at a time saves nine. Adults in love are thrilled. They are often eager to move forward into forming a new family. However, children do much (much) better when adults move very slowly, one very small step at a time.
• If you are the other parent, an ex-spouse’s recoupling can be anxiety-provoking. It may be comforting to know that solid research tells us that stepparent-stepchild relationships are additive, not competitive. Children do best when they have positive relationships with all of the adults in their lives: Both mom and dad, both mom and stepmom, both dad and stepdad. What’s bad for children is distant or conflicted relationships with any of the adults in their lives.
• Finding a new love can be distracting for most humans. However, children do best when recoupling parents maintain strong relationships with their own children. Continue to provide both warmth and structure. Be sure to spend one-to-one time with your kids. (New partners are outsiders to your parent-child relationship. It will help immensely to balance parent-child time with one-to-one time with your new partner.)

Four things to know about successful stepparenting

• Positive stepparent-stepchild relationships make a huge contribution to children’s well-being. But stepparenting and parenting are usually different.
• Overwhelming research finds that children in stepfamilies do best when parents retain the disciplinary role, until or unless stepparents have built a trusting caring relationship with their stepchildren. Because children’s behavior is generally more irritating to stepparents than to parents, this can be challenging. But it is crucial. Do talk about discipline as a couple—kindly. But the guideline is: Stepparents have input, parents have final say about their own kids.
• Successful stepparents focus on building relationships, not on setting rules. Express warmth and caring. Play games together. Talk about school and friends. Help with homework and school projects. Dance together. Explore the child’s special interests. Make the child’s favorite foods together. Shoot baskets together. Spend one-to-one stepparent-stepchild time without their parent.
• As long as stepparents lead with warmth and not control, a very wide range of roles is linked to well-being for kids. Some stepparent roles are parent-like. They are the minority! Positive stepparent roles include: Friendly caring grownup, warm adult mentor, academic coach, “like an aunt” or “like an uncle.” ALL of these roles are linked to high well-being for children. Successful stepparents stay flexible. What works may be different for each child.