Normally It Takes About a Year for Remarried Families to Stabilize and Develop Their Own Customs
The therapist returns a call in order to prepare an appointment with a new client. The client, waiting anxiously for the therapist's call, responds by saying,
At the time of remarriage the adults may have rosy expectations virtually their time to come. They believe that the children will welcome the wonderful new person entering their lives. From a child's bespeak of view, however, the picture may look very different. Many children of divorce not only want their biological parents to reunite simply also practise not wish to have their present relationship with their custodial parent interfered with. The presence of another person in their parent's life threatens both of these desires. Consequently, children often actively attempt to disrupt such impending relationships and changes in their lives. Fourth dimension and the interest of the ex-nuclear members seems to assist overcome this obstacle. After children realize that the state of affairs is non going to revert back to the one-time condition exercise they go more accepting of the new remarried situation. Acceptance of this is facilitated by encouraging the child to express their feelings without imposing judgement. Former partners and in-laws could prove to be instrumental in managing this matter, if they willingly cooperate in helping the children to make this adjustment.
Resolving Mourning and Loss Issues
The process of divorce and the transition to remarriage evoke an virtually universal feeling of loss and grief in parents and children alike. Incomplete mourning of past relationships can interfere with efforts to create a successful new stepfamily. For example, such mourning may be interrupted in the single-parent family, when children are used past either parent for condolement and support. Here, the children have not been allowed to admit and experience the hurting of their losses considering they have been allotted the chore of caring for the emotional condition of the parent. The kid's pain remains suppressed and unattended to. Remarriage may rekindle these suppressed feelings since the child may fear the loss of his/her relationship with the custodial parent through remarriage. Anger and deviant beliefs of the children may result, which oft produces further loss . After the remarriage, the children must share their parent with another adult and perhaps with other children. They wonder how often they will come across their biological parent. They may be deeply concerned most whether at that place volition be a place for them in the new household unit. Teenagers may exist asked to give up their role equally man of the house or father's helper and return to being a child once again. One such situation involved a stepmother who came bursting into the family unit in which her new married man had lived with his 16 year daughter. The teenager had cleaned and cooked for her begetter for 2 years post-obit her female parent'due south death. Her new stepmother wanted to have accuse, pushing her out of the kitchen. The sense of loss the young woman experienced was so acute that the teenager tried to come between the new couple to regain her former status and position in the household. There are also less easily recognized losses: the dream of what the onetime wedlock was going to be even for the spouse who initiated the divorce, or the lifelong expectations of what marriage would be like for a person not previously married who was marrying a person with children. The task of letting go of these fantasies and dreams is so difficult that many go through times of anger, then sorrow before accepting the reality. When the divorce finally takes place, even if the marriage has been miserable, the parents experience the loss of a dream. The children are confronted with a parental loss that they have non chosen. At the time of remarriage, the parent and particularly the children may nevertheless exist grieving their respective losses. In addition, the children feel a 2d loss when their custodial parent remarries, seemingly abandoning them. Many children believe that they are non gaining another parent but are being abandoned past their only remaining parent. Hence, many children feel rejected. The new stepparent is faced with helping the children deal with their loss and feelings of anger, guilt, rejection and despair. This tin can exist a great source of stress to stepparents who enter remarriage believing the myth of instant love: that stepchildren will immediately love and appreciate them as their new parents. Stepparents feel confused and disappointed when their stepchildren withdraw from them. Dealing With Divided Loyalties
Children often experience a sense of divided loyalty toward their custodial parents and their new stepparents. A child may view the stepparent as an intruder and cling to the custodial parent. During the divorce menstruum the children and the custodial parent are both experiencing a loss and often enter into an exceptionally shut relationship. When remarriage occurs, the custodial parent or the children may have difficulty letting go. In add-on, considering the new husband and wife do non hands have fourth dimension alone together, he or she may feel jealous of the attention the spouse gives to the children. Thus, the stepparent is faced with both a spouse and stepchildren who have their loyalties divided. The stress caused past this situation ofttimes makes the stepparent experience jealous, resentful, and disappointed. A manner of handling these crises is to provide aplenty opportunity, fourth dimension and free energy for the expression of these concerns. Each fellow member must be afforded the opportunity to express his/her concerns and feelings and to contribute to effective solutions.
Resolving Issues With Onetime Partners
Former Partners can create problems that are past definition related to the first marriage. Studies have found that both spouses in a stepfamily experience stress as a result of three major bug: (1) custody and visitation difficulties, (ii) children being upset by the onetime partner's phone calls, cleaved promises, or late arrivals, and (3) competition between current and quondam spouse. In addition, jealousy ofttimes results if the stepparent's partner is preoccupied with emotional luggage left over from his or her first union. These unresolved feelings toward a onetime partner frequently stir upwards anger and rivalry in the remarriage. The unresolved emotional baggage often takes the following form. Although spouses promise that the remarriage may offering them a "new lease on life", they may fearfulness that it will not last, because marriage never has in their lives. They fear that they might repeat by mistakes. When these fears become a preoccupation, a cocky fulfilling prophesy tin exist put into effect. The solution to this trouble often extends across the objectivity and resources of the new family unit system and often therapy is the best solution. At times, these issues may exist too emotionally charged, needing an objective viewpoint to finer resolve them. Reducing Role Defoliation
The part of the stepparent becomes the measure of the pace-family unit'due south evolution. The caste to which all members accept and provide a meaningful part for him/herself determines how well established the family'south role and rules volition exist by the firsthand family members, other relatives and outsiders. Perhaps the greatest source of stress in stepparenting results from the fact that the stepparent function is not conspicuously defined. The stepparent is a newcomer--many times the intruder or interloper--to an established family unit arrangement. In that location is usually an try by an existing organization to expel a strange body. Initially, considering the stepparent is an intruder, there may be an effort, either overtly or covertly, to expel him or her. This discomfort and upheaval may exist the result of children not knowing what to expect from the stepparent, since the role of the stepparent is ambiguous and ill-divers. Because at that place are few models for a stepparent, information technology is a difficult task to prepare for the office. There is no legally sanctioned office; the stepparent-stepchild human relationship confers no rights and imposes no obligations. Experiences and circumstances and then reinforce the reality that the stepparent is a non-parent. The role of the stepparent gradually develops over time through shared experiences and involvement with the family. Deciding on the Function of Discipline
Remarriage involving children brings with it instant parenthood. Sharing the parental function as an instant parent is a major source of stress for the stepparents. A problem faced by stepparents as they try to share the parental role is the field of study of the children. Effective subject field is a major central to the integration of the stepparent into the family. At that place are many problems around subject field faced past stepfamilies. There could be different methods of field of study. The custodial parent may experience difficulty in sharing the role of disciplinarian with the stepparent. The custodial parent may believe that the stepparent is picking on the kid. Custodial parents frequently feel defensive and may feel inadequate when stepparents criticize their children. The child may turn down to obey the stepparent. There could have been an absence of children in the stepparent's prior marriage and hence no prior parenting experience and in that location could exist a previous lack of discipline by the custodial parent during the single parent period that spills over into the stepparenting situation. Often what occurs is that the stepparent remains an outsider with regard to subject area while the custodial parent functions equally sole authority figure in the family. As a result, matters of discipline are ofttimes left unresolved and the lines of authorization remain unclear.
Strengthening the Marriage The salubrious development of the marriage often suffers with the premature presence of children , as is often the case in remarriages. The demands of childrearing may distract from, if not interfere with, the development of a good for you marital relationship. For example, time for each other is often short-circuited past other family duties; everyone may experience uneasy and trapped. Couples in stepfamilies have many alien forces that can weaken their relationship. For instance, they may feel guilty at forming a new adult-adult human relationship because it seems to be a betrayal of their before parent-child relationships; there may be divisive behavior on the part of the children who may still retain the fantasy of getting their biological parents back together again; there may be nonacceptance of the new partner and children past stepgrandparents or other close relatives and at that place may be fail of the needs of stepfamilies by many institutions such as the schools, churches, and legal codes. In addition, at that place may be fears of repeating by mistakes. There may be inequality issues, such as unequal financial funds upon entering the marital human relationship. There may be extended family ties to the former partner. These internal and external stresses for remarried couples require that they make fourth dimension to nourish their human relationship, remaining conscious that sustaining a commitment to one another will serve to stabilize the new household unit. Such a commitment also acts as a model for the children as they grow upwards and separate form the family, establishing their own adult relationships. In stepfamilies, the near crucial unit is the marital one, which needs to be given special consideration. The marriage is the bonding unit of measurement that caused the stepfamily to come into being. It requires nurturing if the stepfamily is to proceed in a healthy manner. Weekly time must be fix aside for the couple to spend solitary, along with daily tranquillity time. Open up communication, keeping each other informed and involved in the daily activities of the household is crucial. The children find marital emphasis comforting because they begin to come across information technology as strong and united. They then tin can trust that it as well will be strong and united for them. Such function modeling eventually will aid the children in eventually separating from the family and establishing their own healthy adult relationships. Household Management
Another complexity facing the newly formed stepfamily is how to financially and logistically manage the affairs of the household. For example, Johnny has soccer practice; Anne-Marie has a dance recital; Paul has a dentist engagement, and Mom has to do the grocery shopping. How is all this accomplished between 4 and half-dozen p.m.? Weekly meetings are frequently an effective manner of managing these concerns. Here all concerns tin can exist identified and prioritized, and the ways for effectively achieving these goals can exist explored. This process volition exist needed again and once again to provide for the ambulation of personal feelings and thoughts. Finally, each fellow member in the stepfamily needs to take another basic tenet of the stepfamily system: Parents cannot be all things to all children at all times. Family meetings so provide the opportunity for members to limited feelings virtually what cannot exist. There seems to exist three phases to the procedure of achieving stepfamily integration. First the family must attain a common history by sharing memories of the past. This requires coming to terms with the past in the context of the present, which so constitutes the second phase. Third, these processes so trigger the activation of the family's own inner resources. Equally the authentic problems that have been avoided are addressed, family members' feelings of existence trapped by one another yield to an expanded sense of possibility. Instead of reducing each other to roles, family members tin can now become three dimensional persons, and through that transformation they can begin to use one another to create a common civilisation.
Joan D. Atwood, Ph.D. is the Manager of the Graduate Programs in Marriage and Family Therapy and Director of the Marriage and Family Clinic at Hofstra University. Dr. Atwood is past President of the New York State Association for Spousal relationship and Family unit Therapists and was awarded the Long Island Family Therapist of the Year honor for outstanding contributions to the field.
Aid!!! Betwixt united states of america we have six children, a son 21 years erstwhile, a daughter eighteen years one-time, a girl 14 years former, a son 13 years old , a daughter 13 years one-time, and a daughter 2 ane/ii years erstwhile. We accept been married ii months.This call clearly conveys the complexity, the stress and the anxiety that can suddenly announced when a remarriage betwixt two people with children from a previous relationship takes place. When a number of persons of varying ages and stages of development suddenly come up together from a variety of previous family and household backgrounds, each i already has set ideas about how their lifestyles should be. The problem, of form, is that at that place is generally no agreement. Everyone brings different family traditions from their former family experiences. In addition, family unit alliances form, with insiders and outsiders vying for positions based on parent-child relationships that preceded the new couple's relationship. For example, an just kid may suddenly find herself sharing a sleeping room with two new sisters. A biological parent may remain in the kid'due south memory, if non in reality. The children may be members of 2 households, going dorsum and forth, experiencing culture stupor. The problem is increasing. As reported by the Tribunal, Diocese of Rockville Center, New York, in 1988, the number of marriages annuled nationally was 65,262. No statistical information are kept as to the number of marriages that end with the death of a spouse. Post-obit a divorce, information technology is estimated that 79% of the divorced men and 75% of the divorced women remarry. Sixty percent of these remarriages involve children (Glick, 1984; Glick and Lin, 1986). Information technology is estimated that one child in five under the age of 18 is a stepchild and that by the year 2000 this type of family unit will actually outnumber all other kinds of American families. There may be close to 15 1000000 children nether the historic period of eighteen years living in stepfamilies. Although stepfamilies are similar to natural or intact families, they have of import structural and functional differences that crave attention. For case, not just does the stepfamiliy accept the same growth and developmental bug that whatsoever other family has, just they accept additional problems equally well which are rooted in the remarried situation. As this new family form continues to get more than prevalent, it is of import to become aware of the traps and pitfalls unique to this type of family. In remarried families, but some family unit members take a common history. Lacking a common history in which to locate one's identity and one'due south experience with one'south new spouse, it is no wonder that remarried relationships often feel arbitrary and false. People report that nothing feels quite right. Blending two families is an inherently disorganizing feel that involves a total transformation of the individuals' earth. There is a lack of a common history and therefore a lack of a common culture. Generally, when people meet in developed life, they slowly accrue a sense of each other'south past history. Their increasing intimacy allows for a kind of empathic imagination that often includes a mental picture of someone's boyhood or girlhood etc. These mental images are essential to a couple's sense of context, both historical and current. This natural and intimate progression results in a family unit history that often does not occur in remarried families. Suddenly two families are thrown together and in many cases there is very little cognition of the family member's history. In a sense all remarried families are faced with an impossible developmental challenge. They must accomplish the chore of becoming a family. At the aforementioned fourth dimension they must function like a family farther along in the family life bicycle. In other words, they must operate as if they had developed the complex inner structure of a family who has been together at least as long as the age of the oldest child; still, at the aforementioned time, they only actually possess the rudimentary construction of a family only starting out. They must function at two stages of the life cycle at once! This creates all sorts of problems. It ways that the developmental needs of the family as a whole may be in conflict with the developmental needs of the individuals who comprise it. There is therefore no way for remarried families to avoid a period of profound disequilibrium. It takes time for spouses to develop their ain history, to establish rules regarding sequences of contact and altitude, sexuality, conflict expression and resolution, Similarly it takes fourth dimension for spouses to organize themselves as parents of infants, toddlers etc. At the same time, it takes time for children to organize themselves as siblings and to establish hierarchies of control and nurturing that reflect birth order relationships. In a remarried family in that location is no time for such structures to develop. All at one time a unmarried woman becomes a mother of three or a child moves from existence the younger of two to the eldest of four. Given this picture, the question becomes non why some remarried families become problematic but rather why and how they go on to succeed and grow! Research on the process of remarriage indicates that information technology takes about 2 years for the remarried family to stabilize, to develop a coherent sense of itself including internal rules, traditions, and subsystems and likewise developing viable rules regarding relations with noncustodial parents and with siblings living with former partners. Below are some of the common pitfalls of the remarried family and suggestions and guidelines for overcoming them.
NECESSARY TASKS IN THE ACHIEVEMENT OF STEPFAMILY INTEGRATION
Resolution of Fantasized ExpectationsAt the time of remarriage the adults may have rosy expectations virtually their time to come. They believe that the children will welcome the wonderful new person entering their lives. From a child's bespeak of view, however, the picture may look very different. Many children of divorce not only want their biological parents to reunite simply also practise not wish to have their present relationship with their custodial parent interfered with. The presence of another person in their parent's life threatens both of these desires. Consequently, children often actively attempt to disrupt such impending relationships and changes in their lives. Fourth dimension and the interest of the ex-nuclear members seems to assist overcome this obstacle. After children realize that the state of affairs is non going to revert back to the one-time condition exercise they go more accepting of the new remarried situation. Acceptance of this is facilitated by encouraging the child to express their feelings without imposing judgement. Former partners and in-laws could prove to be instrumental in managing this matter, if they willingly cooperate in helping the children to make this adjustment.
Resolving Mourning and Loss Issues
The process of divorce and the transition to remarriage evoke an virtually universal feeling of loss and grief in parents and children alike. Incomplete mourning of past relationships can interfere with efforts to create a successful new stepfamily. For example, such mourning may be interrupted in the single-parent family, when children are used past either parent for condolement and support. Here, the children have not been allowed to admit and experience the hurting of their losses considering they have been allotted the chore of caring for the emotional condition of the parent. The kid's pain remains suppressed and unattended to. Remarriage may rekindle these suppressed feelings since the child may fear the loss of his/her relationship with the custodial parent through remarriage. Anger and deviant beliefs of the children may result, which oft produces further loss . After the remarriage, the children must share their parent with another adult and perhaps with other children. They wonder how often they will come across their biological parent. They may be deeply concerned most whether at that place volition be a place for them in the new household unit. Teenagers may exist asked to give up their role equally man of the house or father's helper and return to being a child once again. One such situation involved a stepmother who came bursting into the family unit in which her new married man had lived with his 16 year daughter. The teenager had cleaned and cooked for her begetter for 2 years post-obit her female parent'due south death. Her new stepmother wanted to have accuse, pushing her out of the kitchen. The sense of loss the young woman experienced was so acute that the teenager tried to come between the new couple to regain her former status and position in the household. There are also less easily recognized losses: the dream of what the onetime wedlock was going to be even for the spouse who initiated the divorce, or the lifelong expectations of what marriage would be like for a person not previously married who was marrying a person with children. The task of letting go of these fantasies and dreams is so difficult that many go through times of anger, then sorrow before accepting the reality. When the divorce finally takes place, even if the marriage has been miserable, the parents experience the loss of a dream. The children are confronted with a parental loss that they have non chosen. At the time of remarriage, the parent and particularly the children may nevertheless exist grieving their respective losses. In addition, the children feel a 2d loss when their custodial parent remarries, seemingly abandoning them. Many children believe that they are non gaining another parent but are being abandoned past their only remaining parent. Hence, many children feel rejected. The new stepparent is faced with helping the children deal with their loss and feelings of anger, guilt, rejection and despair. This tin can exist a great source of stress to stepparents who enter remarriage believing the myth of instant love: that stepchildren will immediately love and appreciate them as their new parents. Stepparents feel confused and disappointed when their stepchildren withdraw from them. Dealing With Divided Loyalties
Children often experience a sense of divided loyalty toward their custodial parents and their new stepparents. A child may view the stepparent as an intruder and cling to the custodial parent. During the divorce menstruum the children and the custodial parent are both experiencing a loss and often enter into an exceptionally shut relationship. When remarriage occurs, the custodial parent or the children may have difficulty letting go. In add-on, considering the new husband and wife do non hands have fourth dimension alone together, he or she may feel jealous of the attention the spouse gives to the children. Thus, the stepparent is faced with both a spouse and stepchildren who have their loyalties divided. The stress caused past this situation ofttimes makes the stepparent experience jealous, resentful, and disappointed. A manner of handling these crises is to provide aplenty opportunity, fourth dimension and free energy for the expression of these concerns. Each fellow member must be afforded the opportunity to express his/her concerns and feelings and to contribute to effective solutions.
Resolving Issues With Onetime Partners
Former Partners can create problems that are past definition related to the first marriage. Studies have found that both spouses in a stepfamily experience stress as a result of three major bug: (1) custody and visitation difficulties, (ii) children being upset by the onetime partner's phone calls, cleaved promises, or late arrivals, and (3) competition between current and quondam spouse. In addition, jealousy ofttimes results if the stepparent's partner is preoccupied with emotional luggage left over from his or her first union. These unresolved feelings toward a onetime partner frequently stir upwards anger and rivalry in the remarriage. The unresolved emotional baggage often takes the following form. Although spouses promise that the remarriage may offering them a "new lease on life", they may fearfulness that it will not last, because marriage never has in their lives. They fear that they might repeat by mistakes. When these fears become a preoccupation, a cocky fulfilling prophesy tin exist put into effect. The solution to this trouble often extends across the objectivity and resources of the new family unit system and often therapy is the best solution. At times, these issues may exist too emotionally charged, needing an objective viewpoint to finer resolve them. Reducing Role Defoliation
The part of the stepparent becomes the measure of the pace-family unit'due south evolution. The caste to which all members accept and provide a meaningful part for him/herself determines how well established the family'south role and rules volition exist by the firsthand family members, other relatives and outsiders. Perhaps the greatest source of stress in stepparenting results from the fact that the stepparent function is not conspicuously defined. The stepparent is a newcomer--many times the intruder or interloper--to an established family unit arrangement. In that location is usually an try by an existing organization to expel a strange body. Initially, considering the stepparent is an intruder, there may be an effort, either overtly or covertly, to expel him or her. This discomfort and upheaval may exist the result of children not knowing what to expect from the stepparent, since the role of the stepparent is ambiguous and ill-divers. Because at that place are few models for a stepparent, information technology is a difficult task to prepare for the office. There is no legally sanctioned office; the stepparent-stepchild human relationship confers no rights and imposes no obligations. Experiences and circumstances and then reinforce the reality that the stepparent is a non-parent. The role of the stepparent gradually develops over time through shared experiences and involvement with the family. Deciding on the Function of Discipline
Remarriage involving children brings with it instant parenthood. Sharing the parental function as an instant parent is a major source of stress for the stepparents. A problem faced by stepparents as they try to share the parental role is the field of study of the children. Effective subject field is a major central to the integration of the stepparent into the family. At that place are many problems around subject field faced past stepfamilies. There could be different methods of field of study. The custodial parent may experience difficulty in sharing the role of disciplinarian with the stepparent. The custodial parent may believe that the stepparent is picking on the kid. Custodial parents frequently feel defensive and may feel inadequate when stepparents criticize their children. The child may turn down to obey the stepparent. There could have been an absence of children in the stepparent's prior marriage and hence no prior parenting experience and in that location could exist a previous lack of discipline by the custodial parent during the single parent period that spills over into the stepparenting situation. Often what occurs is that the stepparent remains an outsider with regard to subject area while the custodial parent functions equally sole authority figure in the family. As a result, matters of discipline are ofttimes left unresolved and the lines of authorization remain unclear.
Something One-time and Something New: The Evolution of New Traditions
When stepfamilies begin, daily and personal activities are thrown into disarray. Things will never be the same again, nor should they be. 1 firsthand obstacle to becoming an integrated stepfamily is the numerous changes that require adjustments, including new ways of doing things and especially changes in values. Decisions need to be made concerning new sets of roles, rules, and traditions for the new household. In improver, meaningful traditions from whatsoever fellow member'southward past need to be maintained, whenever possible. This is necessary in society to demonstrate respect for individual members' preferred style of doing things and that to demonstrate to the children that there is neither a right mode or a wrong mode of doing things. The stepfamily needs to emphasize that everyone's input is needed in order to creatively develop effective solutions. This needs to be an on-going procedure. In this style, important one-time traditions are maintained and new traditions develop, adapting to the changing arrangement. Forming New Interpersonal Relationships In a nuclear family the couple has the opportunity to solidify their human relationship before the children are added. This is non the case in a stepfamily, in which the new couple may be attempting to take a honeymoon in the middle of a crowd. Likewise, there are parent-kid relationships of longer duration than the relationship of the new couple. Frequently, children are dropped on the doorstep of a remarried couple who have not planned to include them in their new household. Anybody may feel uneasy and trapped. The parent of the newcomers may feel guilty at the unhappiness displayed on all sides and may push for quick stepparent-stepchild relationships, increasing the tension. There may exist guilt, anger and frustration often followed by rejection and a sense of alienation. This can be particularly devastating for the stepfamily unit of measurement if the dissension interferes with the marital pair.Strengthening the Marriage The salubrious development of the marriage often suffers with the premature presence of children , as is often the case in remarriages. The demands of childrearing may distract from, if not interfere with, the development of a good for you marital relationship. For example, time for each other is often short-circuited past other family duties; everyone may experience uneasy and trapped. Couples in stepfamilies have many alien forces that can weaken their relationship. For instance, they may feel guilty at forming a new adult-adult human relationship because it seems to be a betrayal of their before parent-child relationships; there may be divisive behavior on the part of the children who may still retain the fantasy of getting their biological parents back together again; there may be nonacceptance of the new partner and children past stepgrandparents or other close relatives and at that place may be fail of the needs of stepfamilies by many institutions such as the schools, churches, and legal codes. In addition, at that place may be fears of repeating by mistakes. There may be inequality issues, such as unequal financial funds upon entering the marital human relationship. There may be extended family ties to the former partner. These internal and external stresses for remarried couples require that they make fourth dimension to nourish their human relationship, remaining conscious that sustaining a commitment to one another will serve to stabilize the new household unit. Such a commitment also acts as a model for the children as they grow upwards and separate form the family, establishing their own adult relationships. In stepfamilies, the near crucial unit is the marital one, which needs to be given special consideration. The marriage is the bonding unit of measurement that caused the stepfamily to come into being. It requires nurturing if the stepfamily is to proceed in a healthy manner. Weekly time must be fix aside for the couple to spend solitary, along with daily tranquillity time. Open up communication, keeping each other informed and involved in the daily activities of the household is crucial. The children find marital emphasis comforting because they begin to come across information technology as strong and united. They then tin can trust that it as well will be strong and united for them. Such function modeling eventually will aid the children in eventually separating from the family and establishing their own healthy adult relationships. Household Management
Another complexity facing the newly formed stepfamily is how to financially and logistically manage the affairs of the household. For example, Johnny has soccer practice; Anne-Marie has a dance recital; Paul has a dentist engagement, and Mom has to do the grocery shopping. How is all this accomplished between 4 and half-dozen p.m.? Weekly meetings are frequently an effective manner of managing these concerns. Here all concerns tin can exist identified and prioritized, and the ways for effectively achieving these goals can exist explored. This process volition exist needed again and once again to provide for the ambulation of personal feelings and thoughts. Finally, each fellow member in the stepfamily needs to take another basic tenet of the stepfamily system: Parents cannot be all things to all children at all times. Family meetings so provide the opportunity for members to limited feelings virtually what cannot exist. There seems to exist three phases to the procedure of achieving stepfamily integration. First the family must attain a common history by sharing memories of the past. This requires coming to terms with the past in the context of the present, which so constitutes the second phase. Third, these processes so trigger the activation of the family's own inner resources. Equally the authentic problems that have been avoided are addressed, family members' feelings of existence trapped by one another yield to an expanded sense of possibility. Instead of reducing each other to roles, family members tin can now become three dimensional persons, and through that transformation they can begin to use one another to create a common civilisation.
Reference: Atwood, Joan D. (1990). ten necessary steps to stepfamily integration. Wedlock and Family Living. 20-25.
Joan D. Atwood, Ph.D. is the Manager of the Graduate Programs in Marriage and Family Therapy and Director of the Marriage and Family Clinic at Hofstra University. Dr. Atwood is past President of the New York State Association for Spousal relationship and Family unit Therapists and was awarded the Long Island Family Therapist of the Year honor for outstanding contributions to the field.
Reprinted with permission of the author.
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