Blended Families Research Paper Essay Example

trust comes love, it is immensely easy to build a stable blended family when you have a strong foundation of trust, respect and love.Believing that the biological parents will always see your side and support you when it comes to their children can be another unrealistic expectation. It is important to establish a unified parenting front that applies to all in the family. The human species is not one that can read minds, so parents will need to function as a team and learn to not take the sides of their biological children.

Communication is something that is very important in creating that unified front. It is important to set aside alone time with both biological and stepchildren.It allows you to have key one-on-one time that will establish a sense of belonging to the child. Another example of this is to have family meetings. This gives everyone an opportunity to express their opinions, vent and encourage them to contribute their input on important family events and day-to-day life.

Family meetings will also show the parents working as a team. Communication is a key factor in any family, but much more so in a blended family. Not only do the children need to communicate with their biological parents, they also need to feel comfortable communicating to with their stepparents.Communication between each set of parents is also essential. This leads us into co-parenting. Co-parenting is important because it keeps all the parents on the same page for discipline, activities, grades, and so forth.

The rules and regulations that are enforced at one parent’s house need to be implemented at the other’s. If this does not happen, the

children will learn how to “play” one parent off the other. Sometimes a child is more likely to confide in a stepparent because it is not their “real” mom or dad and they feel more comfortable. It is important that the step parent communicate to their spouse anything of importance.For example, if a child confides to a stepparent they are considering becoming sexually active or experimenting with drugs, the step parent needs to let their spouse know so that the situation can be handled properly. Even though the child may become angry with the step parent, the child’s well being must come first.

On the contrary, some stepparents will pull away from their step children because they do not feel like they have a right to “parent” the child. Some will step back from conflicts between their spouse and step child because of this feeling instead of figuring out what they can do to help the situation.There is a common myth is that “steps” are evil and mean. Not all steps come into the family with the thought that “these aren’t my kids so I don’t care about them” or “my step is just trying to replace such and such family member”. As a child, my grandmother passed away fairly young and after many years, my grandfather remarried.

I remembered my grandma and felt resentment for my dad’s new stepmother. It was many years before I realized that she was not trying to take my grandma’s place and to accept her as part of the family.On the other hand I recently remarried and am fortunate enough to have a man who loves my sons and

treats them as he does his own daughter. I also do the same for my stepdaughter. I have never treated her as anything less than mine.

Our children have been very accepting of the family we make. There are no “steps” between them; they are just brothers and a sister. They are split up a lot because they spend equal amounts of time at their other parent’s homes so sometimes they aren’t very nice to each other because they feel like they need to compete for our attention.No matter how much they may fight or bicker at times, they are always ready to jump to each other’s defense and to lend a sympathetic ear. While members of a blended family are extremely courageous, it is important to ask for help when you need it.

” Stepfamily members have each experienced losses and face complicated adjustments to the new family situation. ” (AACAP) Many blended families will turn to counseling to help with these adjustments. Sometimes they will go the less formal route and seek counsel from grandparents, clergy, or support groups.Parents might need to seek professional psychiatric help for children that exhibit signs of not adjusting, being torn between the different sets of parents, of feeling left out or isolated. While facing these issues may be difficult, most stepfamilies do work out their problems and although they don’t live “happily ever after”, they bump along quite comfortably.

Blended families are not limited to stepfamilies. They are born from same sex relationships, foster families, adopted families, and even in certain situations where a grandparent, aunt or uncle takes in a child.These types of blended families may

have more difficulty in adjusting because of the special circumstances. In conclusion, despite the similarities and differences between the two types of families, there is no such thing as a “perfect” family.

Each family will learn to build and strengthen new relationships between their parents, stepparents and stepsiblings. Family members will learn to support each other and to develop new skills in order to make decisions as a family. “Most stepfamilies, when given the necessary ime to work on developing their own traditions and to form new relationships, can provide emotionally rich and lasting relationships for the adults, and help the children develop the self-esteem and strength to enjoy the challenges of life. ” (AACAP) Erma Brobeck says “The family. We are a strange little band of characters trudging through life sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us all together. [quotegarden.

com] Works Cited AACAP. (n. d. ).

Stepfamily Problems. Retrieved August 1, 2008, from familyresource. com: http://www. familyresource. com/parenting/blended-families/stepfamily-problems Blended Families Conflicts and Problems are Common. (n.

d. ). Retrieved July 17, 2008, from http://www. cyberparent. com/blended-family/blended-family-conflicts. htm Chick Moorman, T.

H. (2003, August). Creating a Blended Family: Dos & Don'ts. Retrieved August 1, 2008, from familyresource. com: http://www.

familyresource. om/parenting/blended-families/stepfamily-problems Jaelline Jaffe, P. J. (2008, January 8). Retrieved July 16, 2008, from Helpgiude.

org: http://www. helpguide. org/mental/blended_families_stepfamilies. htm Marsolini, M.

(2008). The ABC's for Blended Families. Retrieved July 18, 2008, from Rebuilding Families: http://rebuildingfamilies. net/index. php?

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Blended Family Facts. Retrieved July 1, 2008, from Cyber Parent: http://www. cyberparent. com/step/blendedfamily. htm