Institute of Step-Family Dynamics

Category: Parenting

Just Do One Thing…

For much of my life, the biggest obstacle in front of the life I wanted was myself. For many years I battled my inner saboteur, the aspect of self who would shout ‘Hell No!’ to any plans I had for self improvement or creating less chaos. She was the one who protects me from being shamed for being ‘too much’. She is the one who saw the other kids mock me for getting As and learned to switch between and A and C to limit my exposure to the wrath of my mother for bad grades and the ridicule of my classmates for good ones. She is the one who learned the best way to avoid pain is to avoid success.

It took a long time for me to create a life that felt safe for her. Lots of therapy, lots of talking with my inner child, and many, many false starts. She will still show up if I get wobbly or over extend myself, but we’ve reached a place of truce. If I listen to myself and try and maintain a healthy balance, she will step back and allow me to be in the driver’s seat.

For lots of reasons, I’m running on fumes at the moment. Today was a day I had planned to spend creating in my space. I could feel the saboteur sneaking in. She knew I was pushing too hard. She started to whisper sweet nothings about not doing the things. I heard her. She was partially right.

Where she was wrong was in which nothings to do. I had to invoice a client and set up a Google Meet for a last minute session. She suggested I put that off and instead lie down and do a meditation. I knew not doing those two things would mean I couldn’t fully relax. For me to enjoy doing the ‘nothing’ I had to do the thing that was weighing on me.

I decided to do ‘Just One Thing’.

Once I had my computer out, and the calendar and invoicing open, it made sense to do the invoicing for the coming week, that was something that would weigh on me till done. I had to make some calendar changes, as clients wanted to switch their sessions times. I had the calendar open. I made the changes. Another weight was lifted. I had a scheduling conflict with a new client I had been dreading dealing with. The calendar was open, I sent the email.

My mantra of doing ‘Just One Thing’ is the truce my saboteur and I have found. The gains I feel from taking one weight away give me the energy to do the next thing, and very often the next. It’s become a choice about balancing stress. My saboteur now recognises that the stress of things weighing on me is often more draining than the actual doing. She relents, relinquishes control. I find peace.

Telling her off, shaming her, hating her, trying to silence her…none of these things made the saboteur budge. She stood resolute between me and the things I wanted to do to make life easier. She had to learn to trust me to make good choices. I had to learn to listen to her concerns.

So next time you get stuck, getting through the day feels like wading through molasses. Sit down and rest. Take a moment. Figure out what the most life enhancing choice will be.

Sometimes it will be rest.

Sometimes it will be a break.

Sometimes it will be doing just one thing that will take stress off.

29 August 2021
4 Simple Questions To Help Kids Change Their Behaviour

Parenting in step-families is a whole other world. We don’t get to set the boundaries and expectations in isolation, very often kids are dealing with an entirely different set of rules and consequences in their other home. Holding kids accountable can be hard as they navigate switching from one set of rules to another.

It’s also not uncommon for children with two homes to exhibit some behavioural issues, add in a high conflict parenting situation, and kids can seem like they are out of control. Having parented my own 4 children, and made SO many, many mistakes, I came into step-parenting with a different understanding of what kids need. I had to readjust that when my step-children developed some severe behavioural issues. It was incredibly frustrating to work so hard on getting them to understand boundaries and learn how to navigate our house and then 2 weeks later begin again.

As I researched more around parental alienation and pathogenic parenting, I began to understand a lot of these behaviours are stress responses. Punishment is THE last thing these kids need. We looked at several different parenting strategies and gradually adopted something that worked in our complex situation.

These 4 questions will work whether you have children the majority of the time, or part of the time. When something goes awry, sit down with the child and go through these 4 questions. Getting the child to sit down with you calms the situation down. We aren’t looming over them, creating more stress and fear. It signals this is a time to connect and discuss.

What were you FEELING when you made that choice?

Notice the choice of the word feeling, rather than thinking. Children aren’t thinking when they do dumb stuff, they are all in their feels and so not rational or logical. Helping them identify what was going on for them can help them identify their triggers and stressors. It can be like pulling teeth, and a painful process for them. It’s ok not to expect an immediate answer. In fact, sitting them down and saying – ‘sit here and have a think about what you were feeling when that happened and let me know when you have an answer’ is a great way for them to sit with their feelings. The first time I did it with my step-son, he struggled so hard. He didn’t want to feel those feelings again, he gave me some random answers that I knew weren’t the truth. When he finally was able to dig deep enough, he had tears and explained he had been jealous. Even adults struggle to identify their feelings at times, and match them with their responses and behaviour. Teaching our children how to do this sets them up to navigate relationships later in life.

Please note – this isn’t sending kids to their rooms for a time out. I think it’s really important we don’t send kids away when they have made mistakes. Sit them down in a room where you are so that you can maintain eye contact and check in how they are doing with their figuring out.

The next question is:
What would you do next time to make a choice that works better for you? What would that look and feel like?
This question gets the child to analyse their role in the conflict or poor choice. What choice did they make? What would be a better choice?

Followed by:
What do you need from me to help you make that choice next time? How can I help you with that?
This sends the message that the child is not alone in this, they can ask for help.

The final question is
What can you do to try and fix what happened? What can you do to make it up to the person you hurt or the damage you caused?
The first time I asked this questions, I was blown away by the answer. The 9 year old came up with a solution I hadn’t even considered. It was entirely appropriate and really worked. He had stolen the candy his sister had earned doing chores. His solution was to do chores to earn candy and to give her the candy he earned to replace what he stole. I’ve never seen a kid so happy to do chores. He was so proud of himself, he felt empowered to be able to fix what he had broken.

Obviously this is not the entire strategy we employed to turn his behaviour around. It was combined with ‘catching him be good’ , a relentless campaign of telling him all of the good choices we noticed and how well he was doing. It works with all 3 very well.

When we’re on a road trip and they start niggling, I jump in with – Hey you kids have been amazing today! I’m so impressed with how well you’ve done, I know it’s boring sitting there. You’ve been so kind to each other, it’s so great to see. Hang in there, we’ll take a break soon’. Magically, the niggling will stop.

Reward the behaviour you want to see repeated.

If we notice positive behaviour and comment on it, the positive behaviour will be repeated as long as we keep commenting on it and rewarding the child with positive attention. If we consistently comment on negative behaviour, we are inadvertently rewarding the child with attention. They will repeat this behaviour as long as we keep giving them attention for it.

Recently we had our boy, who is on the spectrum and delayed, go through a phase of lying. Lying to us, to his mum. We tried so many different solutions. In the end I realised we were rewarding the wrong thing. I decided to start Operation Catch Him Being Good. I gently reminded him about the expectations he had missed on his first night. I spoke with him about being sorry about forgetting he needed more help to remember things. We talked about making better choices. He brought up the lying and said he would try not to lie but it was hard because he was used to lying all the time and the lies just came out. We made a deal – if he said he had lied as soon as he told a lie, it wouldn’t count. That seemed to take a huge weight off, we got through a whole week with no obvious lies. He was fit to burst with pride.

After 28 years of being a parent, the biggest lesson has been that kids respond to love and positive attention for more than punishment and being told off.

3 February 2021
Why Kids Should Not Be in Charge of the Visitation Schedule

This article was originally published in http://stepparentmagazine.com

Permissive parenting is something I see a lot in the step-family dynamic. It’s custodial parents who think children should get to dictate to schedule, it’s non-custodial parents who are too scared to set boundaries. It’s when kids are put in the driving seat of the decision making in the family unit. It’s when kids are given too much control over the family dynamic. It’s when kids get to dictate the visitation schedule.

One of the big warning signs of pathogenic parenting (alienating parenting) is when a parent keeps saying ‘But why won’t you listen to the child?’ or ‘I can’t make the child call you/spend time with you etc’. Strangely enough, these parents usually manage to get the children to do other basic tasks they may not particularly want to; like going to bed, eating a meal, getting to school, but anything to do with the other parent is mission impossible…

A parent who is invested in their child having a healthy relationship with both of their parents will respond firmly, but lovingly, to any expression of ‘I don’t want to go’. There are many reasons a child will choose not to go to the other parents, the majority of those are benign. They hate having to change routine, they miss their toys, they want to be able to do things with neighbourhood friends. All of those are understandable reasons for a child to express a reluctance to change houses, they are not reasons to allow a child to miss time with their other parent.

One of the greatest tragedies for children with two homes is the ability they have to play the homes off against each other and to avoid having to face responsibility when they screw up. If we allow our children to avoid dealing with conflict with the other parent, we are doing them a great disservice. None of us are perfect parents, we all make mistakes. Giving the other parent the space to repair from mistakes is essential for our children’s well-being and developing skills to manage relationships. If we simply say ‘Oh dad was mean last time, you can stay here’ we are teaching children avoiding conflict is a valid response. Instead, to promote healthy conflict resolution, we could say ‘Yeah, I know things were rough last time, but I think it’s important that you go and spend some time together and figure things out’. The only exception to this is when children are subjected to abuse that is worthy of a child services notification. If it’s not notification worthy, it’s not a reason to withhold the children or allow them to dictate the schedule.

Children who are subjected to pathogenic parenting are also often subjected to permissive parenting. The children are told their feelings, wants, and needs should take precedence over the wants and needs of everyone (except the pathogenic parent!). So when the child goes into an environment where they are not the centre of the universe, where the world does not revolve around their wants and needs, they act out. When the parent who is the target of the pathogenic parent has time with the children, the children are set up to be unhappy. They have an expectation everything they want and need should be supplied by the targeted parent, and that the targeted parent doesn’t understand them so therefore, won’t be able to meet their wants and needs. Sound familiar?

They pout, they tantrum, they use every available tool in their toolbox to assert themselves in what they deem as their rightful place – the centre of attention. They will often come back and complain vociferously that the other parent was mean, didn’t listen etc. In fact, what happened was the other parent set necessary boundaries and the child didn’t like it. Not liking a boundary is not a reason to opt-out of seeing your parent.

It takes a very brave parent to go against this conditioning. There is a very real fear that setting boundaries could result in losing your child completely. When I say very real fear, I mean a fear that is grounded in reality. There are many stories of parents who have lost their children to pathogenic parenting. It’s this fear that leads to permissive parenting by targeted or non-custodial parents. They are scared to set boundaries with children who already have said they don’t want to be there. How on earth do you risk making them hate being there even more by imposing rules and boundaries?

The answer to this is not simple, and what I am about to say may not be relevant to your situation. There is no one size fits all, but this is what I have seen work in my own family and in the families of people I have worked with over the years. Enforce the visitation schedule, go to court if need be. Setting a boundary that the schedule must be adhered to when dealing with pathogenic or permissive parenting is key. It takes the pressure off the child, it allows them to keep the pathogenic parent happy by saying they hate the targeted parent, but it means they get to maintain a relationship with both of their parents. It’s a sad fact that this dynamic is still not recognised by many involved in the judicial and therapeutic community. It doesn’t mean you don’t keep on enforcing the schedule.

Boundaries are the means by which children feel safe and held. It’s scary being in a world where you get to call the shots and you are 5, 10 or 15. You know on some level you are not equipped to make decisions for yourself, but you have adults around you allowing you to do that. Is it any wonder these children lash out and tantrum?

The most important thing is realising that being a permissive parent will not protect you from losing your child to pathogenic parenting, or parental alienation. In fact, it will probably fast track the process. Kids need to know adults have their backs and that adults will make the hard calls. Leaving kids in charge of the schedule puts the burden of disappointing a parent on them. Most of the time they will side with the parent who is most vocal about being hurt by them choosing time with the other parent, i.e. the permissive/pathogenic/alienating parent. Enforcing the schedule takes the burden off your child, giving them space to have a relationship with both of their parents.

NB – I know there are genuine situations where children are forced to spend time with abusive parents due to the courts not recognising the abuse. This is not what I am talking about in this article. The situations I am talking about here are those where loving parents are being kept from having a relationship or time with their children because of the other parent wants to be the chosen parent.

24 November 2020
Step-Families in a Pandemic – Coping with Covid-19

This article was first published in Stepparentmagazine.com at the beginning of the pandemic.

Covid-19, or the Corona virus, is big news around the world. Schools are closing, borders are closing, toilet paper stocks are at all time lows. This is the perfect storm for step-family conflict. The support groups I am part of our blowing up with stories of parents wanting trips cancelled and being called unreasonable and parents bitterly disappointed at being asked to cancel plans and interpreting this as scaremongering and ways to create disconnects with the children.

So let’s set aside the emotions and get practical.

This is not a drill.

This is not a hoax.

This is not some political ploy created to make lots of money or get anyone voted out of office.

This is the real deal.

A pandemic.

The World Health Organisation, who are not known for being panicked, have declared this is a world wide problem that needs proactive handling. The measures with which it will be handled are up to each country, so if countries are struggling to find approaches that work, how are families split over several houses going to manage?

Here are some tips and guidelines:

Follow the official directives.

Crazy as it sounds, the official directives are there for a reason. It’s not about protecting your family, or whether you will be safe. It’s about the entire population and trying to ‘flatten the curve’. Without these measures the health system will be inundated with Covid-19 cases requiring hospitalisations. Think about how much stress the health systems are under just coping with existing health conditions, so imagine how impossible it will be if demand for services doubles, triples, quadruples. If you’re sceptical – have a read of this and check out the information about how the health system in Italy has been overrun.

Be smart about resources.

Yes, I know everyone is worried about running out of toilet paper and hand sanitiser, but these things will not keep you safe or your family fed if you are quarantined for 14 days. Money is also a factor for some families. If you are struggling to put food on the table at the best of times, trying to shop for an extra week or two can be mission impossible. Check out budget meal planners, make a menu and a list. Don’t buy more than you will need, I have heard of stores in the US being stripped bare.

We think of being quarantined, but how many of us think about if we are sick while in the quarantine. Tins of beans and tomatoes are a great pantry filler, but are they something you will be able to manage to prepare if you are ill? I’ve stocked up on some packet pancake mix because I know the kids can make those. I’m usually a from scratch cook, but I’ve bought some risotto and other things that are heat and eat.

What about medication? Have you got meds in stock for you and the children? What about paracetamol? Vitamins, chest rub etc? The time to get those things is now, before you need them.

Be smart about the schedule.

Now is not the time to be rigid about custody schedules. Lots of kids are off school. Some workplaces are closed and there are parents working from home. I know there are a load of work from home/at home stepmums right now terrified they are going to be landed with home schooling a load of kids because they are supposedly available.

So what do families do when kids are sick or need to go into quarantine? Do the kids go from home to home, and therefore put 2 or more homes into quarantine as well? Or do they stay in the home they were quarantined to? Each family will have to work this out. It needs to be something that all adult family members, including stepparents are consulted about.

Some possible discussion points are: who has vulnerable people in their home? Should the people in that home be exposed to people who have been exposed to risk of the virus? Who still needs to be able to go out to work? Should kids go and put the people in that home under quarantine, or does it make sense to restrict the risk?

These are unusual times. The world won’t end if the kids spend 2 weeks in a row in one home. School work is not the end of the world. Be understanding if the tasks set aren’t done in the other home, you don’t know what pressures they are trying to handle right now.

The universal advice so far…

Wash your hands. Wash your hands. Wash your hands.

That means wash them with soap. Wash them for about 20 seconds. Dry them.

Wash them before preparing food. Wash them before eating. Wash them on coming into the house. Wash them after using the bathroom. Wash them after blowing your nose or sneezing.

Wear a mask.

Stay away from other people if you feel unwell, and get a test.

Sneeze into your elbow.

Limit physical contact – stop hugging/shaking hands etc with people outside your immediate family.

Stop unnecessary travel – pretty much all travel now is unnecessary.

Don’t flush wet wipes down the drain – it creates blockages and sanitary issues.

Be kind – to yourself, people out and about, and damnit yes, even your difficult ex!

Postscript: We are now over 18 months into this pandemic. New Zealand is experiencing it’s first nationwide level 4 (strictest) lockdown for over a year. We have been incredibly lucky till now.

People in other countries are not doing so well. They are fatigued from dealing with Covid stress. It’s wearing people down and taking a toll. Old anxiety and depression foes are ramping up, relationships are bearing a toll.

Don’t be afraid to reach out for help. I can guarantee you that it’s not your lack of coping skills, it’s incredibly difficult coping with the pandemic.

22 November 2020
What About Me? Step/mums and Family Holiday Traditions
It’s amping up to ‘that’ time of year.

Holiday stress is a thing. It’s more often a thing for women. It’s often a very different kind of thing for step/mums.

Traditionally women are the keepers of family traditions, the holiday planners, they are the ones to whom the responsibility for creating a celebration that brings joy to the family falls. Doing all of that in a step-family dynamic adds a whole other realm of stress. Bringing different family traditions and expectations into a day that works for everyone, even when there are different custody schedules going on is exhausting.

I’m not going to go in to a whole diabtribe about how gendered this is and how unreasonable these expectations are…because they absolutely are, or encouraging a whole wave of feminist rejection of tradition social norms. That’s not because I don’t believe that’s exactly what should happen, it’s because as women we are too damn tired to stage a revolt this close to the silly season. Let’s start that in January or February to make sure there is a fairer division of tasks and responsibilities next year!

So in the meantime, how do we deal with the layers and layers of stress this can bring?

Here are 5 tips I find useful:

Lower expectations

Lower…lower…lower…and still lower

Am I being a Debbie Downer? No, I’m being Samantha Survivor!

So much of our hurt in this season comes from the disconnect between our hopes and expectations and the reality that comes to pass.

Is the ex who is a grinch all year suddenly going to be overcome with festive cheer and become super generous about access and time over the holidays? Unlikely! They have shown you who they are during the rest of the year – believe them!!

Are family members who struggle with each other going to put all their differences aside and sit round holding hands singing carols? Also unlikely! They have shown you how they feel about each other during the rest of the year – believe them!!

Is a partner who is an expert ducker and weaver when it comes to dodging household management going to stage a miraculous conversion to Martha Stewart or even Martha Stewart’s assistant come the holiday season? Nope, not likely. They have shown you their engagement in the household management during the rest of the year – believe them!!

Finally – if you are not a Martha Stewart clone from January to October, are you going to suddenly become someone who decorates like an Insta story and cooks like a Pinterest board? Trust me, this is also unlikely.

This is a nice segue into tip #2

Set yourself up for success

I can’t tell you how many times I have had grand plans (my family might say delusions of grandeur) about the kind of Christmas I was going to create. I can tell you those plans didn’t come off exactly that number of times.

Life gets super busy at the end of the year. The days of me thinking I can bake cute cookies, make homemade bath bombs, and create an elaborate menu are a dim, distant memory. I know I will be tired. I know getting drunk on Christmas Eve makes for a challenging Christmas Day. I know inviting 23 people for Christmas Dinner and getting over exuberant with the Christmas Eve celebrating/stress drinking is even worse.
- Make realistic menu plans
- Ask for help
- Leave something in the tank for the big days
- Up your self-care
Here comes tip #3

Be selfish rather than selfless

Sure, it’s the season of goodwill and going out of our way for others, but a stressed out step/mama is not able to be the font of goodwill. She’s likely to be the fountain of stress and ill will.

Take some time out to plan. Take some time out to reconnect with yourself. Have a list of go tos that you know help soothe you. Mine are lying on my shakti mat listening to binaural beats, having a good supply of herbal teas, and a secret stash of my favourite chocolate bars. I pop in some moments of focused breathing and nice candles too.

More importantly, I know when to say no and when to ask for help which is tip #4

You don’t need to carry this load alone. Even though tip#1 was all about not looking for help in the wrong place, we still need help.

Asking what people are willing to do is a game changer.

I find rather than telling my darling what I want him to do – laying out the list of things that need doing and then asking him what he can take on is really effective. Sometimes he has no idea of what’s required, let alone how to do the things that are required. Sometimes he will then proactively engage our kids to step up and help. Him just doing that takes a massive load off me. I don’t have to deal with the arguments and excuses, and since he asks them to help out far less than I do…he gets a more positive response.

The final tip is be clear about what you need.

Whether it is the gift you would like, the response to your efforts, or how the day is going to play out. Speak out and speak up. So often we aren’t clear in our expectations and end up feeling disappointed in how the day unfolds. People only let us down if they didn’t follow through on what they said they would, often it’s us letting ourselves down because we didn’t make clear what we needed.
29 October 2020
Stepmums Stepping In for Happiness…

One of the pieces of advice I often see given to stepmums is to step back.

They’re not your kids, step back and leave the bio parents to do the parenting. It’s not bad advice, but it is advice I’ve seen leave stepmums feeling disconnected from their families and powerless in their own homes. I’ve seen it lead to stepmums feeling they quite literally hate their stepkids, and their relationship is doomed.

Being a stepmum is like dancing the Hokey Tokey – step in, no not that far – you’re overstepping. Step back, no not that far – you don’t care about your stepkids, you’re an awful person. Love those kids like your own, no not that much, that’s their mother’s role – how dare you try and replace her!!

And round, and round, and round we go…Dizzy and exhausted with trying to contort ourselves into just the right amount of stepping in and stepping back to make everyone happy.

There is our first mistake.

There is no ‘making everyone happy’. It’s a mission in futility that most often ends in abject misery on our end.

How about we start with the idea that it’s our job to make ourselves happy.

*GASP*

SAY WHAT NOW?!?! We are supposed to make our own happiness a priority? What about the kids? What about my partner? What will the mum think?

Putting our happiness in the hands of someone else is such a dangerous game to play, for our own wellbeing and also for the wellbeing of our relationship. We are unconsciously setting our partners up to fail. We’re expecting them to know what we need, when we need it, and exactly how we need it.

How on earth are they supposed to manage that?

Yet, when we expect our partners to parent alone and to parent in the way we think the children should be parented, we are doing exactly that.

I’ve seen so many stepmothers go from hating their stepkids to enjoying healthy, happy, loving relationships with their stepkids through stepping in.

What do I mean when I say ‘stepping in’?

Lots of times we talk about stepping up as part of becoming more of an active stepparent, but I prefer the idea of stepping in. It’s about moving into the family circle; it’s about creating a closer connection.

Parenting is usually seen as how we mould kids to become functioning adults. We are teaching them who and how to be in the world and giving them skills to navigate life; that role is definitely the responsibility of the bioparents. As stepparents we can be co-pilots, but the main course setting and navigating needs to come from the bioparents.

So, if the bioparents are in charge of that, what can stepparents be in charge of?

Their own happiness in their homes.

I correct the children for eating with their mouths open. I can hear a kid chew with an open mouth 2 rooms away. It is definitely in my top 10 triggers. My husband has a 50% hearing loss, he couldn’t care less, he can’t hear it. I am in charge of telling kids to close their mouths while eating. Not because I want them to have good manners, but because it drives me nuts when they don’t. I take responsibility for making sure my home environment works for me. The stepping back advice would be to eat separately. I’m not going to be pushed out of eating with my family because kids haven’t learned to eat with their mouth closed.

See how that works?

The priority is me ensuring that my home works for me. It’s an absolute bonus that the kids learn some basic table manners at the same time, but it’s not the end goal; my happiness and calm is.

So often we expect our partners to care about the things that make us unhappy, when those things are not a priority for them. How would we feel if we kept being asked to tell kids off for things we don’t really care about, on top of telling them off for the things we do? How difficult would it be to catch them doing something we know upsets our partners, when we have become numb to it and have learned to tune it out? How frustrating and soul destroying to be in conflict with our partner because we just can’t parent how they think we should?

It’s a double whammy. Our partners are caught in the middle, between an angry partner and resentful kids. Throw in an angry ex who is challenging why our partner is suddenly changing the rules…it’s a perfect storm of chaos and resentment.

What does this mean in practical terms?

It means it’s ok to ask kids to upskill their table manners, it’s ok to ask them to say please and thank you, it’s ok to ask them to pick up things and put them away. Exactly where this line starts and ends needs to be something you and your partner agree on. If your partner insists you can have no say in how things work in your home regarding the children and their behaviour, it is probably time to call in some expert help. Expecting you to live in a home where you have zero input in how it runs is not usually sustainable in my experience.

While all of this might sound reasonable and doable, how do we prevent stepparent burnout while stepping in?

I am very familiar with overextending myself when it comes to trying to make up for what I saw as deficits in the parenting of the children. For a long time I felt like I needed to make up for the things the children had not been taught or given by their bioparents. Finally – I got it.

As stepparents we can’t be more invested than the bioparents are.

Read that again.

If it’s not a priority for the bioparents, we can’t expect to create sustainable change in our family. I’m talking big things here, like homework, chores, behaviour. The smaller things, like close your mouth or pick up your stuff, those things we can manage to a level that works for us. Being invested in kids getting a good education and being on task, those are the things where bioparents need to take the lead.

So if you’re feeling powerless in your home, or as if the stepkids will be the death or you or at least your relationship, what can you do to take back your power and make your needs and happiness your priority?

22 July 2020
The Ugly Truth About The Ex

When I came in to this stepmum gig, I thought I was pretty well prepared. I was a stepchild myself, had successfully navigated the relationship with my kids then stepmum…how hard could it be?

Harder than I could ever have imagined.

Like super hard.

Like the hardest thing I’ve ever done, including pushing out 4 babies without pain relief!!

Prior to all this happening I’d been following a spiritual path with the core values of gratitude, acceptance, and humility. I’d curated a life where it was relatively easy to practise those. I’d eliminated people I struggled with, kept my world small, and restricted to people with similar values. Well was I about to get my safe, secure world rocked to its very core!

I did all of the things stepmums are often guilty of in the beginning. I went overboard to be super stepmum. I wanted to show I was a better mum; more competent, better organised etc etc. My darling was very proud of me, and was more than comfortable telling his ex what a great job I was doing.

Daggers.to.her.heart.

It’s hindsight, it’s hardly surprising her response was to shut down, and try and keep us out of her world. Her world revolved entirely round the children, so that meant she did her very best to ensure we never got to see them. There was court, breaching of court orders, weeks and months we never saw the kids. The toxicity ramped up. She thought we thought she was a terrible mother and an awful person, she did lots of things that made us think she was a terrible mother and an awful person.

It was only recently, after nearly a decade of conflict and drama that I was able to ‘own my shit’ in this whole debacle.

Yep – for all of the really awful things she did, and there were plenty…I also had a role to play in the dysfunction.

I didn’t realise how deeply wounded she was when ‘her man’ decided to take up with me. I didn’t realise she still held hope that he would come back to her and they would be a family. I didn’t realise her life experiences that made that so important to her.

I didn’t give her space to grieve her very, very deep loss.

Instead, I expected her to behave like I would. I expected her to know that I would never replace her as a mother. I am very secure in my role as mother, I’d had a conversation about this with my own children – telling them it was ok to like their stepmother, that I wanted them to like her and her to like them.

I wanted my kids to have a great time when they were with their dad, because what kind of parent wants their kids having an awful time somewhere?!?!

I can tell you the answer to that now; a parent who is terrified her children will chose someone else, a parent who isn’t secure in her role or herself, a person who doesn’t feel like a person who people will chose, a person who is reeling from rejection from a person they loved.

If I have one regret in all of this, and I’m a person who doesn’t do regret, it would be that I hadn’t understood the depth of her pain. I didn’t give her grace when she so desperately needed it. I didn’t understand her actions, that were so abhorrent to me, came from pain. She was incapable of separating her needs and her pain from the children. She saw her attempts to destroy their relationship with their father as her protecting them from him, and me.

Looking back, if we had been less full of judgement, less cutting in our assessment of her shortcomings, I think she would have found peace much earlier. I think if we had allowed her space to find peace, we all would have had peace, instead we pushed and fought for custody of the children.

Court is an ugly thing for step-family dynamics. There is no grace in court documents, instead every action and response is put under a microscope of fault finding and point scoring. Things that normally would be brushed off as ‘meh life’, instead become a stick to beat the other side with.

One of our biggest complaints was her unwillingness to coparent and share information. Why would she when there was a high likelihood it would be turned against her down the track? Really there was no winning, we either came after her for being inadequate or came after her for not sharing information that could be seen as confirming or highlighting her inadequacies.

All three children have been disadvantaged by us being unable to work together. My skill set when it comes to managing challenging behaviour and learning issues is pretty strong, unfortunately instead of it being a resource the professionals and both homes could utilise, it became a source of insecurity. I was shut out of everything, and so yet again this too was used against her.

We finally have reached agreement, the kids spend week about at each house. We parallel parent. I’ve learned to parent with my husband and leave him to parent with his ex. There are still moments of frustration and things happen that both sides perceive negatively and as competitive or undermining behaviour, but it’s calmer.

It’s calmer because the ex is no longer under constant attack. It’s calmer because the worst has happened and the kids still love and adore her. She hasn’t lost them, and has some space for her and a life beyond the children.

The ugly truth about the ex is that I, albeit unwittingly, contributed to the dysfunction and conflict as much as she did. I have been able to frame myself as the long suffering victim for many years, and I have valid events and circumstances to prove that. She has done the same, and also has valid events and circumstances to prove that.

I think in the end, we have all been victims. Victims to not understanding each other, victims to a highly adversarial and inadequate court system.

Are you ready to face the ugly truth about how much you contribute to the current conflict with the ex?

It’s not easy. It’s not pleasant. It is however freeing, to lift the shackle of victimhood, to recognise our role in creating and sustaining conflict…that’s where the healing begins.

24 April 2020
Beyond Repair?

We have some dining chairs that have seen better days. I’ve spent months trying to justify replacing them with something new and fancy. Between my scrooge-like and greenie tendencies, buying new chairs when we have perfectly serviceable ones is a hard sell. Too hard, it seems.

So I decided that I would repair the 17 year old chairs. They are plywood and some of the laminate had begun to lift. Between that and the varnish that was very patchy, some wood putty and a paint job seemed like the solution. They may well last another 17 years and the trials of 7 children and associated family and friends.

Yesterday I broke out the wood putty I’d purchased the day before. I didn’t get the tiny tin because I knew there were quite a few of the 6 chairs needing repairs. I puttied up the first chair. Easy! I then went looking for the next one.

Nope, not that one. Nope, nope, nope, nope. Wait what? I went round again inspecting more slowly.

Oh my goodness! The falling apart dining chairs was in fact a single chair. I have spent the last couple of years solid in the belief my set of dining room chairs were on their last legs. This was absolutely a false belief.

One single chair had 2 areas of peeling laminate. A quick run over with wood putty sorted it out. I have put this off for so long because it seemed like such a daunting job! The sanding and painting will take some time, for sure. But the repairing of the broken chair…quite literally took a couple of minutes.

It set me to musing.

How often do we feel something is very broken, or will take a huge amount to repair, or needs replacing, when it is actually a simple fix. I was sorting clothes with one of my daughters, her favourite top had a pull in the fabric, she was about to get rid of it. I said I could fix it. I pulled the threads back through. It was fiddly. I swore a bit, but in the end, she had her top back. A top that previously she had thought was lost to her.

These simple repair jobs remind me of my work, especially relationship work. People usually wait to seek help when the wheels are falling off. Things are so bad they have come to the realisation they need help. Often the first session is filled with expressions of hopelessness and fear the relationship can’t be repaired. There seems to be so much wrong.

As we work together and unpack what the issues are, the number of chairs that are damaged lessens. We begin to see the problem is often the same issue, it just wears lots of outfits and manifests itself in different ways. Fixing it is not the huge job it seems, because it is a single problem, not a whole dining suite.

Focusing on what is broken or what is wrong can lead us to believe things are hopeless or broken beyond repair. Someone with the ability to see the larger picture than the everyday disconnects can see a pattern and identify the common thread. They can see it can be a relatively simple fix. A relationship that seems broken can be mended with the right skills, knowledge, and tools.

Relationships can be hard work, they can feel unfixable. Just like the top and the chair, very often they can be repaired. If you are wondering how you can repair your relationship, contact me on [email protected] and we can discuss a repair or maintenance plan for you and your partner.

16 April 2019
Why Step-moms Get Jealous & Insecure In The Most Stable Relationships

One of the things I see step-moms struggle with over and over is feeling jealous and insecure when it comes to the ex. We know in our heads it doesn’t make sense. We know in our hearts our partners love us. We know that our partners chose us day after day, but still…the tiny voice in our heads whispers terribly painful things that make us feel crazy and insecure.

It’s not attractive to feel insecure or jealous. We are ashamed for even having these feelings. Secure, confident women don’t feel like that! Women who are loved and secure in their relationships shouldn’t feel like that! I call bullsh*t. I have seen some of the most secure, confident, successful women I know brought to their knees by their feelings around not being enough in their step-mother roles.

Being grossed out by the idea of our partner having sex or being intimate with their ex is a congruent response. It’s not about us being jealous or insecure, it’s just icky thinking about the person we have sex with doing that stuff with someone else. Only in a step-family are you expected to interact on a regular basis with someone your partner has been deeply intimate with. Not only are you expected to interact, you’re expected to feel ok about it, and ignore how uncomfortable it makes you feel. If you don’t – there is something wrong with you! You are jealous, or insecure, or lacking something in your relationship. Newsflash – almost no-one wants to be hanging out, making nice, and swapping recipes with the person your person used to love and want to make babies with.

It’s also congruent to feel off balance when we are faced with or reminded of the experiences our partner and their ex share, experiences that we are not a part of. It’s hard to see there is a wealth of shared experiences, often involving the child we love, that exclude us. That doesn’t make us jealous or insecure, it just means we find reminders of the shared experience challenging and uncomfortable. These feelings will pass more and more as our wealth of shared experiences build.

Sometimes our responses to situations are not congruent; things like feeling unloved or unworthy because of an event or conversation. If we unpack that experience, we see this single moment or incident does not invalidate the myriad of experiences we have that show us we are loved and valued. We can lose sight of that in moments of being off balance, so it’s our job to look at whether our feelings are congruent with what happened.

We need to know we will be tipped off balance from time to time, it’s life. No matter how zen or woke we are, life will come along and tip us off balance, usually when we least expect it. Being off balance actually has a very important purpose, it is a learning opportunity. It’s an invitation to unpack more of our baggage, to examine our responses and insecurities.

It’s ok to tell our partner we are not feeling solid. It’s ok to say – I’m feeling wobbly, I need you to take some time to connect with me to help me feel ok. Telling your partner you are feeling insecure and jealous can immediately put them on the defensive. They can feel as if they are doing something wrong, they are not making you feel loved enough or secure enough. Ironically, this feeling of being wrong can have the exact opposite effect of what we need. They retreat, not knowing how to make us feel better. We feel rejected, and even more insecure. We double down on our ‘I’m feeling insecure I need you to show me how much you love me…’ and round and round the merry go round goes. Except no-one is feeling very merry.

Finding ways to let our partners know all is not right in our world, without them feeling shamed or blamed is key. Telling them we are feeling off balance or wobbly is a softer way to let them know we need connection. I tell my husband I need pats. It’s a running joke in our house, that started with one of his cats. He knows when I say I need pats, I’m feeling I need some coddling, I need to know he is there and he has my back. Creating a phrase that conveys this to our partner can be a great way to avoid falling down the neediness rabbit hole that ends up pushing our men away.

You’re not weak or silly for feeling unsettled in your relationship when your partner’s past is so present in your home and family. It’s not weird to feel grossed out by anything that suggests previous intimacy. It’s not wrong to feel sad that our first experience of having a child with our partner is not their first experience. What is important to realise is that for them it is a first. It is their first with you. The experiences they had with their ex will fade, and their focus will increasingly become more about you and the family you are creating together, a family that will include their children from another person.

So it’s ok to feel those feelings. Just don’t get stuck there, seek out connection in a way that your partner can respond positively to. Join a community of women who understand. I can highly recommend Stepfamily Circle. I see women come in to groups feeling so isolated and alone. The difference in their lives once they realise they are not alone and these feelings are pretty normal is almost miraculous.

This step-mom gig is not an easy one. Hang in there and know you are not alone in feeling jealous and insecure from time to time.

7 March 2019
The Ghosts of Christmases Past

We laid a few ghosts from Christmases past to rest this year. Christmas #9 for our blended family was a resounding success. It was not always that way. A time of joy and celebration for my children and I became a nightmarish stress that we all began to dread. It was a big wake up call for me. My kids quite rightly pointed out that Christmas was the one thing their father and I had got right. They loved it. It was the highlight of the year, and something they dragged friends along to so that they too could experience the Christmas joy.

I started our blended family journey filled with dreams and optimism about a wonderful big family who all got on as well as the children did. That was my first mistake. It wasn’t that they didn’t get along, just that there was a very large gap in the family cultures. The way we celebrated Christmas was very different, and me trying to make something that fitted with everyone’s wishes left me a stressed, disappointed mess, and everyone else feeling like they had been cheated of the Christmas they wanted and expected.

It was my mother who made the brave call and set a boundary. She told me she wasn’t going to come to Christmas with my darling’s family any more. She explained it wasn’t about them, or not liking them. It was about her and my step-father being unwilling to embrace creating a new set of family traditions and cultures. They liked the ones we had just fine and were simply not on board with having to feel uncomfortable about someone else’s.

My family are very focused on Christmas being about the food and hanging out. Presents are a very small part of the whole thing. My darling’s family was all about the gifts, and the food, but the food was very different to the food my family prepared. My parents found the amount of gifts exchanged too much. My in-laws hated my cooking, finding it too rich and fancy, to the point of them bringing their own Christmas lunch one year.

I was stuck in the middle trying to find a way to make everyone happy, and failing.

So the boundary set by my mother was a start to a new way of doing family and Christmas. It was awkward, my in-laws were hurt. It didn’t matter how much I tried to explain it wasn’t personal, it was about safeguarding their family traditions, it still felt like a rejection. I get it. It’s not nice to be excluded. The older kids then became more vocal about wanting to retain their traditions from their childhood and it became apparent that my dream of a big happy blended extended family was not the dream of everyone else.

We tried several different incarnations of Christmas, none of them really felt right, until this year.

This year the adult children came down on Christmas Eve eve. Santa came on Christmas Eve morning, so we had a relaxed time to enjoy opening presents. We had Christmas dinner with my parents and all of the 7 children on Christmas Eve. It was a nice relaxed day. We then had Christmas breakfast on Christmas Day with my parents and the 7 children. This was slightly less relaxed, with me losing my shit momentarily about showers, as we tried to get ready for a 9am start. This will need a little fine tuning for next time.

After breakfast, we headed off to the in-laws and had a lovely afternoon and evening with them. My in-laws prepared a lovely meal, in the way they like to do Christmas. Having 7 people in their home was manageable and worked well. Today, Boxing Day, as I reflect on the previous couple of days, I feel as if we all had a good time and finally we have the recipe right.

Creating new traditions is not an easy thing. Expecting people to give up their roles and traditions to accommodate yours doesn’t always work either. I love doing the hosting, but so do my in-laws. This way, we both get to host and shape a Christmas that fits our traditions and family cultures. My kids get their family traditions and also then get to go and spend the rest of the day with their paternal grandparents on what is traditionally their Christmas day with me. They get to experience their whole family, this is something many kids lose over the holidays.

It took my mother stepping up and saying this is not working. It took my kids being miserable and threatening to boycott Christmas. It took me being sick of being disappointed and exhausted from the juggling of competing wants and needs, and failing. From the ashes of Christmases past, we have found a way to celebrate with our step-family dynamics. We have found a way to meet the competing wants and needs, without anyone feeling like they have been disregarded or missed.

We only have the children every second year, we have chosen to do year about. It means I get a year off every second year and we do a mid-Winter Christmas instead. I used to try and do a special Kids Christmas before the actual one on the years the children are with their other parents. It become another obligation and stress for people to try and fit in around an already busy time of year. Doing something mid-Winter means it’s easier to find a time that works.

We do a Secret Santa gift exchange, and Santa comes for all 7 of the children. It cuts down the costs for everyone, but I’m especially mindful of the costs for people as my parents approach retirement and the adult children are responsible for purchasing their own gifts. We each purchase one gift and sit round while each person unwraps. It’s fun, no-one feels like they are missing out and the joy each person gets from one single gift seems to be more than they get from a mound of presents.

I encourage you to reflect on your celebration this year. Look at what worked and what didn’t. Decided whether some brave calls need to be made, and start designing a Christmas that will bring joy and peace for next year. Christmas is not about a single day in the calendar year, it’s about tradition and rituals that create memories of what family is. Let’s make them good ones.

25 December 2018