10 Strategies to Protect Your Marriage in a Step Family Or My Stepchildren Are Stressing My Marriage!

Living in a step family can be dangerous to a marriage.

It is not easy to rear children.  Each child is different and requires thoughtful work and planning for the best way to teach and discipline.  It may be hard when you are married to your child’s parent.  It can be many times harder when you are not married to your child’s parent … and you are married to someone else!

In all marriages, there are disagreements.  (While some couples may say that they never disagree, that does not mean that they like and agree with everything that their spouse does, they may just not talk about it.)  Money, sex, children and in-laws are the top 4 but we could name the top 25 pretty easily.

All perpetual issues are heightened in a step family.

Differences in parenting may also be one of those perpetual issues that couples argue over.  When the children are the birth children of your spouse, it is often easier to believe that you both have the same goal in mind.  When the other parent is a step parent, however, that is often not so easy.  Stepchildren make it much more complicated.

It is too easy to let the parenting disagreements bleed over into the fabric of the marital relationship, especially in a step family.  When someone that you care about criticizes your child or your success as a parent, good feelings erode and, over time, can erode good feelings about each other and about the marriage.

Nurturing a marriage is hard as well when there are children around. Life is just busier and time together is often hard to get. When some of those children are stepchildren and may actually resent you being a part of their family, it is hard to find quality time as a couple.  High quality time (it’s not always possible to have high quantity) is crucial to maintain a healthy and viable marriage.  It is paramount to keeping the love alive, especially in a step family.

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Surviving, and Even Thriving in a Step-family

Want to read more of our articles about step-families?  Click here now.

We have more details with suggestions for step-fathers, step-mothers and step-families at our website, Counseling Relationships Online.

Email or call us and let us help you with your own step-family challenges.

Counseling Relationships Online

Couples Counseling of Louisville

Children in Step-families Struggle With Divided Loyalties

It is not easy being with one parent and his or her new spouse.  Children often feel left out and lonely.  They may feel conflicted by the need for family time and connection.  Activities together, especially ones involving step-siblings that they may not like, can be difficult for them.

Try to get “inside” the children’s heads.  Find some way to understand what it might be like for them and respect their struggle.

Today’s Tip for Step-families: Give the children space when they need it.  Don’t ask too many questions, just be there if and when they need you.

Want some help with your family?  Contact us.  We have a lot of experience navigating these dilemmas with couples and families and would be glad to help you.

Counseling Relationships Online
Couples Counseling of Louisville

Step-families: The Wicked Step Mother

For a long time, there has been a stereotype of stepmothers as wicked people. Women who are in that role often begin their new relationships feeling as if they are facing an uphill battle. Step-moms often start out the process with strikes already against them and it can be hard just to get to neutral.

Even when they face uphill battles, stepmothers make mistakes as well. They may try too hard to create a loving family, well before the children are ready.

They may enter into issues of discipline too quickly, maybe out of necessity because there are times when she has primary care of the children.

They may also feel resentful because the children do not seem to appreciate their hard efforts … and that resentment shows.

Today’s tip for step-mothers: Find time alone with the stepchildren, even if only a few minutes a day, just to ask them about what is going on in their lives.

Counseling Relationships Online
Couples Counseling of Louisville

Step-Mothers and Nurturning

Step-mothers often mistakenly believe that they can nurture the children into a loving and caring relationship and that the children will be thrilled to have that opportunity.  Step-mothers often believe that, with their love and support, their will be no problems building a loving and caring connection.

What a challenge this is!  It rarely happens quickly, only over time.  Step-children most often still have a mother and, even if there is tension or stress there, she is still their mother and the likelihood is that they will resent anyone, especially a step-mother, trying to take her place.

Today’s tip for stepmothers: Set more realistic goals for your step-children and their relationship with you.  Celebrate even the smallest smile, positive comment or show of connection.

Counseling Relationships Online
Couples Counseling of Louisville

Step-Fathers and Discipline

One of the biggest mistakes that men often make is to think that they can “get things in shape” with their new step-children.

New step-fathers often see their new wife, the children’s mother, as too lenient or soft and believe that what the children really need is a firmer hand and clearer rules and consequences.

If he has children of his own, a stepfather may be used to setting rules and enforcing them, and yet, that is one of the last things that he can do when entering this new family.

Today’s tip for step-fathers: Build a positive relationship with the children before attempting any kind of discipline.

You can do this from conversations about them and their lives, playing sports or games, attending school events and initiating family gatherings.

Children will rarely accept discipline from someone that they do not respect … and respect takes time to grow.

Counseling Relationships Online
Couples Counseling of Louisville

Step-Families and Gratitude: What Is Realistic For The Children?

Step-parents, and natural parents, often expect their children to express gratitude for the many things done for them.  While this is certainly something to work toward and indicates “manners”, pushing often brings resentment.  A feeling that you do not want to have between step-parents and their step-children.

Appreciation and gratitude grow as positive relationships grow.  Nurture the relationship with your step-children and look for signs, albeit maybe small, that the relationship is growing in the right direction.

Tip for today: Do not look for or expect “thank you” or appreciation.  Celebrate when it does happen.

Want some help with your family?  Contact us. We have a lot of experience navigating these dilemmas with couples and families and would be glad to help you.

Counseling Relationships Online

Couples Counseling of Louisville

Rituals Help Make Transitions Easier In Step-Families

Rituals help couples and families come together in regular and important ways.  Some rituals are simple, maybe done on weekends, evenings or specific times like Saturday mornings, while others involve holidays, birthdays and anniversaries.

Look long and hard at the rituals that your family is used to from the time when you were together in your original family as well as those that you developed as a single parent family.  Some may be so important that you want to keep or modify them.  Others need to be discussed, maybe grieved, and then changed in a way that recognizes and acknowledges your new family constellation.

Our tip for today: Develop rituals.  Some ideas are: a special dinnertime event, birthday and holiday celebrations, evening and winding down rituals, welcoming children home after visiting with their other household rituals.  Think together about what might be rituals and routines to develop for your new family constellation.

Counseling Relationships Online

Couples Counseling of Louisville

“Insiders” and “Outsiders” in Step-Families

In step-families there are “insider” and “outsider” positions. Each step-family has members who are “inside” and the others who are “outside”.  Different family members can have more than one position … and it is tough being an “outsider”

Finding ways to navigate this new terrain requires skill, patience, kindness and grit.  Step-families often have questions about time as a nuclear family vs. time with the step-family, how to handle issues of authority and discipline and how to handle differences with the “other” family.

Our tip for today: Find some way to help an “outsider” feel a little bit more included and wanted.

Want some help with your family?  Contact us. We have a lot of experience navigating these dilemmas with couples and families and would be glad to help you.

Counseling Relationships Online
Couples Counseling of Louisville

Step-Families, Learn How To Set Realistic Expectations

Two adults fall in love with each other and often believe that everyone else will welcome and feel their love.   Most of the time, this is not a choice for the other family members which, in itself, may cause dilemmas.

The adults who fall in love expect others to embrace this new unit lovingly and may be discouraged, frustrated, even angry when that does not happen.

Children, if their other parent is still alive, may continue to harbor wishes that their parents will get back together and this new marriage may cause another round of feelings of grief and loss.

Parents and other family members of the new relationship may still have a connection to former spouses, may disapprove of their child’s choices and changes and may have difficulty in welcoming the new member into the family.

A realistic goal for a step-family to work for is that everyone can feel comfortable and respectful of their new relationships.  It is unrealistic to think that they will love each other.  It is possible that they may learn to tolerate, even like, each other, over time.

Our tip for today: Recognize and respect that many, if not all, of your other family members may not be happy with your new marriage.

Counseling Relationships Online
Couples Counseling of Louisville