Chapter 17: Marrying again and Stepfamilies

(Note. Many prefer the term "blended family" rather than "stepfamily". For more information go to Stepfamily resources.)

PART ONE: MARRYING AGAIN

If either of you has been married before, you will want to give special attention to a number of issues. In addition to combining your personal lives and extended families, you may be bringing children into a new marriage, or you may need to incorporate the lives and histories of older children living outside the marriage. There may be grandchildren to deal with. But even if neither of you is a parent and there are no children to deal with, your most important first consideration has to be the history you are each bringing with you, and how that will impact your relationship as a couple.

In addition to a careful study of and dialogue about your family of origin (see chapters 2, 3, 4, & 5), you will also want to carefully examine and share with one another the positive and negative dynamics of any former marriage. If you have "lived with" another person, even though you did not marry, it is probably just as important to examine and share about this relationship as well.

Why bring up these previous relationships? Your basic value system and your ideas about relating to others were primarily developed while growing up in your family of origin. However, your intimacy and communication skills were also shaped and adapted ~ for better and/or for worse ~ in the most significant relationships of your life. If it was a healthy relationship (even though you did not marry) or a healthy marriage (which may have ended with the death of your spouse), you may have very hopeful and positive expectations about marriage with a new partner. If it was an unhealthy relationship or marriage (perhaps ended by civil divorce and church annulment), you may also have hopeful expectations about entering a new marriage free of the negative dynamics of the former marriage. Yet, you may be carrying some psychological wounds that could hinder your ability to be fully open and trusting in a new marriage.

The point is, any previous significant relationship or marriage is likely to add additional influences. While the death of a spouse or civil divorce may "end" a previous marriage, the relationship experiences ~ both healthy and unhealthy ~ are likely to "carry over" into your new marriage. If you have been married before, and it was a difficult/unhealthy marriage, in times of stress, you may find yourself unconsciously reverting to coping patterns that you developed during your former marriage, even when you and your future spouse have worked hard to develop healthy and effective relationship skills. This can be frustrating for both of you. The best way to deal with this is to accept the reality and power of this dynamic and learn to talk with one another about these experiences. A good principle to remember is: If we can talk about it, we ~ with the help of God’s grace ~ can work it out together! It is what you cannot or will not talk about that is likely to create problems for you.

If you have never been married before and are preparing to marry a person who has been married, you can easily assume that his/her previous marriage (especially if there were no children born of the previous marriage) will have little impact in how you will relate to one another as husband and wife. This could be a serious mistake. The previous marriage may play a much larger role that you think. That is why it is important to share the positive and negative dynamics of this past relationship with one another.

Before you marry is the best time to intentionally sift through the positive and negatives of any former relationship and "pan for the gold" you want to keep as you join your lives and create something brand new together. This will help you to get off to the healthiest beginning possible for your new marriage. Often it is useful to do this with the guidance of a therapist or sponsor/mentor couple. It is a sign of strength, not a weakness to be willing to do this. If you are willing to look back you can learn and grow from what happened to you. You can develop better coping and communication skills so that you can move forward both as healthier individuals, and as a couple.

PART TWO: ESTABLISHING A STEPFAMILY

A "stepfamily" refers to any situation where we bring one or more children into a marriage. There are many kinds of stepfamilies.

Gloria is the 31-year-old widow of a firefighter who died because of injuries he incurred in the line of duty. She has a seven-year-old son, Frankie, who was two years old when his father died. Gloria has been dating Michael for nearly eleven months. Michael is an architect who is 29 and has never been married before. They are both active Catholics who met at a neighborhood meeting for getting better fire protection for their area. Gloria and Michael are planning for a summer wedding when both sets of parents will be visiting from distant areas of the country. Michael thinks he can care for the needs of their new family on his own income. Gloria, however, intends to continue working at least part time for the U.S. Postal Service where she has been working for the past five years.

What do you think of their future as a stepfamily?

Juan is 35 years old. When he was 20, the woman he was dating became pregnant. Though they had not discussed marriage, he believed it was important to "do the right thing" and ask her to marry him. After two years, the marriage fell apart. She asked for the divorce and custody of their son. He has been paying child support for this son. At age 26, Juan married Janie, who was the mother of two young children, though she had never been married. After seven years of marriage, during which Juan and Janie had two children of their own, Janie decided that she no longer loved Juan and filed for divorce. This was a bitter process. They fought many court battles over the custody of the two children who were Juan’s natural children. Eventually they agreed to a situation of joint custody, Juan has them for about six months of the year, but it has been difficult on everybody.

Recently Juan began attending a parish "support group" for divorced and widowed persons. That is where he met Rosa. Rosa is 31 and has four children, the oldest of whom is twelve years old. Rosa’s husband left her and filed for divorce two years ago. She last saw him in the court room when they awarded her custody of her children. Rosa and Juan have become good friends and are very supportive of each other. At first, both said they were not interested in marriage. Now they are admitting that they really love each other and are considering marriage.

What do you think of their future as a stepfamily?

The point is that some situations ~ like Gloria and Michael ~ are "simple" enough that their step family would have about as much chance of being successful as two single people who enter a marriage with no children to deal with. Other situations ~ such as Juan and Rosa ~ may be far more complicated. Children of a former marriage may create many challenges for themselves, their parents, their parents’ new spouses, and their stepbrothers and stepsisters.

Consider the following:

POINT ONE: TAKE YOUR TIME, THINK CAREFULLY.

This may seem really obvious, but it is easy to assume that "things will work out" because we really love and care about each other. You and your partner may be quite willing to work at the project of establishing a healthy stepfamily. However, acknowledging that many other people (e.g., in-laws, children, ex-spouses) may have very different agendas is critical. This does not mean other people are "against you." More likely they are fearing that they will have less importance in this new "stepfamily." If you think that you are going to solve the problems in your current situation by establishing a "stepfamily," you are probably setting yourself up for some major disappointments and heartaches. You may succeed in establishing a healthy blended family. However, it is likely to happen only if you are above average in your ability to deal with all the challenges that will surface in such a marriage.

POINT TWO: THE FAMILY SYSTEM.

If you are wise, you will learn all you can about the theory of the "family as a system."¹ The basic insight is that a family is never just a group of individuals with some connections to each other. Every family is a network of persons who are powerfully interconnected to each other. Even if a person "leaves the family," that person may continue to have powerful effects on all the members of the family!

The decision to establish a "stepfamily," therefore, is not merely a challenge of finding a house for everyone to live in. More challenging is the fact that you are attempting to radically change at least two family systems (yours and your partner’s) by attempting to create a new and more complex family system that includes the previous two.

When two single people (who have no children and have never been married) decide to marry, the time of courtship and engagement allows for each of them to get to know and establish beneficial relationships with their future in-laws. The better and more completely this is done, the better things will be for the new marriage. A newly married couple can benefit from the support of both families. When they poorly accomplish this task, the newly married couple is likely to struggle ~ perhaps forever ~ with "in-law problems."

The same principle is involved when two people establish a stepfamily. Ideally, each person and each child and each in-law and each ex-spouse would go through a process of getting to know each other and take personal responsibility for doing his or her part to support the new marriage and the stepfamily that this will establish. In the real world, this kind of attention to all the relationships is probably impossible. First, it is rarely possible for all the different people to meet; second, it is a reasonable assumption to expect that some people will NOT want to establish a constructive relationship with some other people.

Thus, it is simply good sense to assume that most every effort to establish a stepfamily will struggle with resistance and even "sabotage," because this is a NORMAL way that people react to important changes that they did not initiate. If you can understand the resistance as normal behavior, you are more likely to keep your level of anxiety to a minimum. The lower your level of anxiety, the more effective you will be in your ability to deal with the issues and concerns of others.

POINT THREE: CLARITY IS HELPFUL.

The more that Juan and Rosa think about the things that could be a problem for their future marriage, the more they are likely to become fearful and frustrated. Then, they are likely to either give up on the idea of getting married, because it seems hopeless, or go ahead and get into the marriage and assume they can struggle with the details once they are married. However, there may be a better way.

The more that Juan and Rosa can be CLEAR in what they are doing and SHARE THIS INFORMATION with everyone involved, there is a better chance that others will be LESS RESISTANT to their plan. It is much like coaching a basketball team. The more clearly the coach explains to all the players his plan of action and is consistent in his coaching methods, the more likely the players will believe in the leadership of the coach and support his plan for success. If the coach is unsure, unclear and/or inconsistent, then the players are likely to follow their own ideas and the result is usually NOT a successful team effort.

This strategy of being clear and consistent with everyone involved will mean, of course, that Juan and Rosa will need to be very good at their own communications skills. In one sense, the task of Juan and Rosa to do careful planning together and then to communicate clearly with everyone in their families is not so different from the situation of any couple planning to marry. It is just that achieving a successful stepfamily will be the result, not only of the efforts of Juan and Rosa, but also the good efforts of many others in the new stepfamily system.

POINT FOUR: THE ROLE OF CHILDREN IN BUILDING A STEPFAMILY.

Consider the following:

1 - Presume that the efforts to build a stepfamily will be difficult for children.

Looking at your situation from the viewpoint of the children is useful. You are planning to marry again with the hope that you can create a new family that will be good for you, your future spouse, and the children that the two of you are bringing into this new family. You are going through a time of major changes, and you are willing to do this because you have hope that the changes will make things better for everybody.

The children are also going through major changes, but they may be fearful about how things will turn out. They may be fearful or resentful about their relationship to your new spouse. They have to deal with new in-laws and perhaps stepbrothers and stepsisters with whom they may feel very uncomfortable. They may have to move to a new city and/or a new school where they must start all over in making friends. Also, remember that, while you are planning to marry someone you dearly love, the children are often required to leave their best friends behind. It is likely to be a very difficult time for the children.

2 - Understand that it is normal for children to resist, and even resent, the remarriage of a parent.

You may have come to terms with your divorce or the death of your spouse and are ready to establish a healthy commitment to a new spouse and his/her children and in-laws. Yet your readiness to let go of the past and move into new commitments does not mean that your children are equally prepared to go along with your plans.

Believing they are "responsible" for the divorce of their parents is typical for children. This is not true, of course. This perception, buried deep within children, often creates a never-ending hope that their parents will reconcile. They hope their original family will get back together again, and then they will no longer feel guilty for causing the divorce! The resistance of children is often based on the fear that this new marriage will destroy forever the possibility of the reconciliation of their parents.

Children whose father or mother has died may sincerely wish for their surviving parent to be happily married again, but they are not necessarily prepared to let go of the often closer-than-usual relationship they have developed with their "single" parent. It is common for children to have become confidants ~ almost peers ~ with a single parent and will sense that a new marriage will "demote" them to a place of less importance and less freedom. Even very young children are aware that they are no longer getting as much attention from a parent who is planning to marry again. They will notice, and probably resent, any attention their parent gives to stepbrothers and stepsisters.

You will be wise to presume that ~ even if the children seem to favor your new marriage ~ there are important reasons for them to resist this change which will affect them in ways that are often deeper than their ability to understand or talk about. You would be wise to consider professional family therapy for everyone who is going to be a member of your stepfamily. You can give special attention to what the children are going through. Professional therapy may seem like an expensive luxury, but it is much less expensive than the heartaches of dealing with children who are unable to cope with their fears and feelings and are likely to express themselves in negative and even destructive ways. More than one couple’s efforts to build a stepfamily has been destroyed by children whose feeling and fears were not adequately dealt with.

3 - Be very careful about deciding a "title" for a stepparent.

Some children may prefer to call a stepparent the "title" of a natural parent, such as "Mommy." Other children will only be comfortable relating to a stepparent as someone who is clearly not their natural parent.

Remember to speak about the deceased parent(s) of children and help them keep memories of their parent(s) alive. Pictures, memorabilia, visits to in-laws and relatives can help.

4 - Plan with your partner how to include children in the process of constructing the stepfamily.

The amount of "say" that you give to children in this process will, of course, vary greatly according to the age and maturity of the children. While clarifying limits and boundaries with children is important, it is equally important to realize that teenagers are going to need very special attention. Putting extra time and effort (perhaps with the help of a professional therapist) into making sure teenagers and older children are finding ways to take an active role in the creation of a stepfamily is probably the best way to assist them. In this way you can help them deal with their fears about losing a position of importance and influence with their single parent. This can give them "permission" to let go of what "might have been," i.e., the reconciliation of their parents. And begin to discover their own special place within the stepfamily.

For more resources for constructing a healthy stepfamily, see > Stepfamily resources

Or write or phone:

Stepfamily Association of America, Inc.
650 J Street, Suite 205
Lincoln NE 68508

Phone: (800) 735-0329

Questions for Reflection and Dialogue

Part One: REALITY CHECK. Give some serious thought to these questions and try to write your answers as thoroughly as possible. It is hard enough to deal with things you know about; it is harder to be effective in dealing with things you are trying to avoid, ignore or deny. What you "don’t know" or "don’t know how to deal with" is likely to create the biggest problems in your future marriage or stepfamily.

1 - What are the key relationships (including any previous marriage) of the past that are important for me to share with my partner? How do I see this past history affecting ~ for better and/or for worse ~ now?
2 - What are all the benefits I see to marrying again and ~ if there are children ~ creating a stepfamily?
3 - What do I think that we are doing that will adequately prepare us for our new marriage? (This might include taking a pre-marital inventory and thoughtfully and honestly discussing the results; completing annulments and owning and understanding what happened in my former marriage(s) and how I contributed to the problems; adequate grief work for divorce issues or the death of a former spouse.) What have we done that has helped us discuss and clarify potential or current issues or concerns I have about our relationship and the marriage and stepfamily we are planning for ?
4 - Whom do I think we can count on to support our decision to marry and our efforts to establish a stepfamily? Why?
5 - Whom do I think we can expect to resist our decision to marry or to establish a blended family? What impact do I think this will have and what do I think we need to do about this?
6 - How are various people going to be involved in the planning process? (Children, in-laws, ex-spouses, etc.) If you opt to leave people out of the planning process they are more likely to feel discounted and will be more resistant to your plan. Be especially attentive to the way you and your partner include children in the process. If they can find positive ways to contribute to the process, they are less likely to make their presence felt in negative ways.

Whom will we include in the planning process and how will we include them?

PART TWO: WRITING OUR PLANS. The goal is clarity. You can always change what you write because nothing is "written in stone." Writing these plans will help you and your partner clarify your own thinking, so that you can be clear and consistent with everyone else you need to deal with. The more specific details you put into these plans, the more you can be sure you are on the "same page," and it will be easier to determine what parts of the plans may need to be changed. (NOTE: Use a blank sheet of paper. There are no lines provided for writing your plans here because it is assumed you will need more space than one or two lines for each plan.)

! What is our current plan to help us clarify or address any issues or concerns that have come up or "unfinished business" I think we still need to discuss or work out about our relationship? It is very important to write such a plan and begin using it at this point.

! What is our plan for where we will live? Is there adequate space for meeting each of our respective needs, including accommodating our stepfamily needs?

! What is our plan for dealing with ex-spouses and the relationship of children to their other parent (including visiting times with ex-spouses and in-laws)?

! What is our plan for dealing with in-laws?

! What is our plan for tending to our finances ? Have we clarified how money will be handled (including allowances/jobs for children)? Debts or obligations each of us brings to the marriage? How we will handle any beneficiary changes and plans for retirement?

! What is our plan for career management (including education plans for children)?

! ??? Other plans that you think will be important.

! If we struggle with any of these, where can we go for assistance?

3 MONTHS INTO CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE.

1 - How am I adjusting to our new marriage and stepfamily at this point?

2 - How is my relationship with my spouse at this point?

3 - How are the other members of the family (including ex-spouses and in-laws) doing at this point?

6 MONTHS INTO CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE.

1 - How is our new marriage and stepfamily doing at this point? Is this easier or harder than I thought it would be? 2 - How are my spouse and I doing? How is our relationship proving to be a key to how our new marriage and family functions?

3 - If there are children, are you or your spouse experiencing parenting difficulties, stress, abuse or potential abuse of a child, or the realization of a lack of skills or preparation for parenting? (See Appendix A, page 178, for assistance)