Blended Families

FamilyLife Today® Radio Transcript  

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Marriage Matters

Guests:                      Steve and Misty Arterburn and Ron Deal             

From the series:       Blended Family Tips 

Bob: Children who have experienced the loss of a parent, either because of death or divorce, have experienced some level of trauma as a result of that loss. Steve Arterburn says if those kids become a part of a new blended family, they don’t need a new stepdad to be a drill sergeant. 

Steve: I know all these guys that come in: “These—look, these kids will respect me. I will discipline them. They will obey me.” It’s so much more about trying to build a bond and a connection in the midst of horror that they’ve gone through than getting something from them that they should never have to give, reluctantly. 

Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Friday, April 6th. Our host is Dennis Rainey; I’m Bob Lepine. If you’re in a blended family, have you thought strategically about what your stepchildren need from you? We’re going to spend time talking about that today with our guests, Steve and Misty Arterburn, and with Ron Deal. 

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Stay tuned. 

And welcome to FamilyLife Today. Thanks for joining us. We’re talking about one of those challenging areas in life when a couple starts a new marriage, where both of them have been previously married and they bring children into that relationship. That, for a lot of couples, is an unexpected kind of a blindside: “Oh, I didn’t know this was…” “Oh, I didn’t…” “Oh, oh….” You know, it kind of—

Dennis: I do. 

Bob: —it’s a wakeup call for a lot of couples. 

Dennis: It really is; and joining us in the studio today to give us a perspective about that is Ron Deal. His perspective counts, because he has been in this area for over three decades; right, Ron? 

Ron: Am I that old? [Laughter] 

Bob: Sorry to break it to you, but yes. [Laughter]

Ron: I guess so. 

Dennis: Ron heads up FamilyLife Blended®. He’s also joined by Steve and Misty Arterburn, all the way from Indiana. 

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Thanks for coming down and visiting us. 

Steve: Great to be here. 

Dennis: Glad to have you. 

Steve: Thank you. 

Misty: Thank you. 

Bob: Any radio listeners, who think, “Is this New Life Live!?”—no; it’s FamilyLife Today—at least for the next 30 minutes, and then we might get to New Life Live! later on today; okay? 

Steve: Thank you. 

Bob: Yes. 

Dennis: Steve is a pastor at Northview in Carmel, Indiana. 

Steve: That’s right. 

Dennis: Great ministry at church that has—how many people attending every Sunday? 

Steve: I think around 10,000 and 3 campuses are in prisons. We just love ministering to those prisoners. 

Bob: That’s great. 

 Dennis: That’s great. You and Misty have authored several books together. 

We want to talk about what Bob was mentioning at the outset about how blended families function, especially, around parenting. 

Bob: Yes; it is one thing for a couple, who have met, following—both of you were involved in a divorce / you were both sinned against. Your church got involved—

Steve: Yes.

Bob: —and helped you in the process of all of this. You met a while after you’d had the divorce. You dated for a period of time. 

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 Steve: Right. 

Bob: You fell in love—you said, “We’re going to get married.” You had two kids. Steve, you had a daughter. As you thought about remarriage, were you anticipating this could get tricky with kids? 

Steve: We didn’t think it would be tricky. We knew that, if it wasn’t done well and right / if we didn’t prepare before the marriage, it was just going to end up—it had a good chance that the kids would cause another divorce—or the way we were handling those. 

I was very impressed with her mothering. I just—it was—I was blown away by the way she mothered. She had these little boys. By the time they were seven, they’d gone through The Chronicles of Narnia, and the whole Bible, and all this stuff. They had a foundation. I was just thrilled that that was the kind of mothering she had done in the wake of divorce. 

Bob: Were you worried, Misty, about the blending of families and being parents together? 

Misty: I was terrified. 

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I was terrified. I just don’t take it lightly. Those are my boys, and their well-being was the highest aim. I was trying to make sure that I was healthy and that they could be healthy, and I didn’t want to risk. So, we were—

Dennis: That’s what I wanted to ask you: “Was it hard to trust again?” 

Misty: Yes; very, very hard. You go through a train wreck like that, and there’s debris and carnage. You don’t want to experience that again. It was very sobering to go through that; and I tried to keep my eyes very wide open, walking into a new relationship. 

Dennis: And you wanted to protect your kids because they trusted too; huh? 

Steve: Well, my daughter was kind of everything to me at that point. I was not going to expose her to somebody that would love her for a little while and then we’d break up and it would be over. It was a long time before we got the kids together; but I felt like, if she could mother those boys the way she did, she could sure be a great bonus mother to my daughter.

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Ron: Now, we’re going to talk about parenting and step-parenting here in a minute; but to set that up, we have to continue with what you guys have just talked about. To be able to trust one another, as husband and wife—when you’re also holding so tightly to you...

FamilyLife Today® Radio Transcript  

References to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete.

Step-Grandparenting

Guest:                         Ron Deal                   

From the series:       Step-Grandparenting 

Bob: When two families merge—when they blend—and now there are stepchildren and stepsiblings—one of the forgotten parts of this equation often, is the new step-grandparents. Here is Ron Deal. 

Ron: Sometimes, when somebody else made a choice—and all of the sudden, you’ve got not just one, but maybe you’ve got five step-grandchildren—what if you had a bunch—what if you already thrown yourself relationship with your biological grandchildren, now you’ve got five more? It’s like—“How do I fit all of this in? How do we do the finances?” I’m just saying—I’ve seen and been involved in situations where the step-grandparents just aren’t terribly excited about this. That can be a disappointment to their adult child. 

Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Monday, July 30th. Our host is Dennis Rainey, I’m Bob Lepine. Step-grandparenting can be tricky. We have some thoughts today from Ron Deal—

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—on how to make it work more effectively. Stay with us. 

And welcome to FamilyLife Today. Thanks for joining us. There was a conference back last fall for grandparents. We had some friends who put this together. We helped promote this event—a national conference of grandparenting. 

Dennis: The Legacy Conference. 

Bob: That’s right. One of the speakers at the conference was Ron Deal who joins us in studio today and is the leader of FamilyLife Blended®. Ron, welcome back to FamilyLife Today. 

Ron: Thank you. 

Bob: You got invited to come and speak at this conference about step-grandparenting which, Dennis, I don’t know if I ever even stopped to think about that subject—but that’s an issue that a lot of families that all of the sudden find themselves in with very little preparation and very little coaching. 

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Dennis: I would say most grandparents feel overlooked when it comes to blending a family together; and I can’t imagine what it would be like—to feel like—in some regards, you may be an outsider—

Ron: Yes. 

Dennis: —to get back in with grandkids that—at one point—you were their heros. You’re hearing a lot about this subject as you speak around the country. 

Ron: I am, Dennis. Bob, in preparation for that Legacy Conference, I did some homework. I do this every single day, but I was a little shocked to discover that 40-percent of families in the U.S. have a step-grandparent—40-percent! By the way, that’s stat is 20 years old—it’s old. 

Dennis: So, it’s likely higher. 

Ron: It’s likely much higher. The other thing that I found was that the prediction that demographers have is that by year 2030 in the U.S.—there will be one step-grandchild for every 1.7 biological grandchildren—less than 2 to 1 ratio. It is a very common experience. It’s going to continue to be—

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—a common experience—and of course, it touches all three of the generations. 

Bob: Not just all three generations, but I’m thinking about all of the different permutations of what makes a stepfamily—and then how that expands to the grandparenting. So, if our son and daughter-in-law get a divorce, and now she is the custodial parent, where do we fit into that; right? 

Ron: Exactly. 

Bob: If there’s an estrangement between our son and this daughter-in-law, we may be cut out of the picture—

Ron: Right. 

Bob: —with our grandkids. 

Ron: What that means is that, at Christmastime, when you want time with your grandkids, there’s probably four or five or six other sets of grandparents who, also want time with the grandkids. So, all of the sudden, life just got really complicated fast. 

Bob: Then, I’m thinking about the other situation which is where our son or our daughter marries somebody who has been previously married and brings grandkids in, and we didn’t just become new in-laws—we became new step-grandparents—and it happened in an instant. 

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So, instead of watching these kids be born, we’re now step-grandparents to a 13-year-old and a 15-year-old that we haven’t ever known before. 

Ron: What if you have some real mixed feelings about that new relationship? By the way, this is one of the things we are hearing from people: “Hey, I have step-grandchildren. By the way, I also have some biological grandchildren. I’ve known them their whole lives, and they’ve known us—we have traditions and time together and all sorts of things. Now, I’m trying to figure out: “What do I do, and how do I find time for the step-grandchildren? But that relationship came about because my child”—let’s say—"made some really poor decisions; and we have mixed feelings about those decisions.” 

“Now, those decisions have resulted in them getting married and having stepchildren—that gives us step-grandchildren—we never really wanted this. It kind of feels like if we jump in as step-grandparents and throw ourselves into those relationships, that somehow, we’re saying what my son or daughter did is okay.” 

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“We don’t feel like it’s okay. We’re kind of stuck between, not wanting to give approval—but at the same time—the grandchildren shouldn’t be the ones that suffer.” 

That’s the kind of difficulties that grandparents are finding themselves in—trying to wade through these waters and figure out what to do. 

Dennis: You outline three different kinds of step-grandparents. There are step-grandparents who step into the life of a child and actually, are in a long-term relationship helping to raise that child to maturity. 

Ron: Right. They’ve been in a long-term—we call them long-term step-grandparents, meaning maybe, they were a stepparent at a younger age; and they raised a stepchild, and that stepchild is now an adult, now married, now has children of their own. Technically, those are step-grandchildren to the grandparent; right? But you’ve been in their life since day-one. 

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That long-term step-grandparent, probably, has more of a relationship with their step-grandchildren like a biological ...

FamilyLife Today® Radio Transcript  

References to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete.

Putting Your Spouse in the Front Seat

Guest:                         Ron Deal                               

From the series:       Putting Your Spouse in the Front Seat 

Bob: In a single parent family, it’s not uncommon for a child to sit in the passenger seat while mom or dad are driving. When mom or dad get remarried, and now there’s someone new in the family, that child may not like the idea that their seat in the car has been taken over. Ron Deal says we need to be aware of that and help those kids adjust to the new normal.

Ron: Why would they react harshly to this idea of putting your spouse in the front seat? What’s going on for a kid? Well, sometimes they just want to ride in the front and they want what they want, but also there is: “I’ve been through some really rough stuff. I’ve lost connection with somebody. My family has gone through major transitions,”—a tragedy of some sort: a death or a divorce—“I don’t want to go through another one of those things.”  They are hypersensitive to the idea of being pushed aside, because they’ve seen it happen already in their home.

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Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Monday, August 27th. Our host is Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine. We’re going to talk today about strategies to help step-parents help their children adjust to the new normal of a stepfamily. Stay with us.

And welcome to FamilyLife Today. Thanks for joining us. One of the key principles that we try to drive home in FamilyLife’s Art of Parenting™ video series, and something that you and Barbara wrote about in your book, The Art of Parenting, is that, in a family, the marriage relationship has got to be the priority relationship. For the sake of the kids— 

Dennis: Right.

Bob: —it’s got to be the priority relationship. That’s true in an intact family. That has some unique challenges that come along with it if you’re dealing with a blended family.

Dennis: Yes. One of the biggest arguments we used to have with our kids, on our way to school, was who sat in the front seat—[Laughter]—

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—who got the front seat with daddy. You know, when mom is in the car with me—

Ron: Is there any debate at that point?

Dennis: —there is—there was never a debate; because they knew that next to daddy’s heart was mama. [Laughter]

Bob: And by the way, that is our friend, Ron Deal, who joins us today on FamilyLife Today. Ron gives leadership to FamilyLife Blended® and appears here, from time to time, when we’re talking about blended family relationships. Glad to have you here.

Ron: Thank you.

Dennis: And it’s different in blended families.

Bob: Yes.

Ron: Think about your scenario—when mom gets in the car, there’s no question—mom’s in the front seat; everybody knows it. Now, one of your kids may go, “Ah, it’s my turn; but okay, I kind of understand mom rightly belongs in the front seat.”

Dennis: There is no discussion!

Ron: There’s no discussion; there’s no debate. 

But what if the storyline had been—they take their turns riding in the front seat, and there is no mother in the picture; you’re a single dad. The kids ride in the front; everybody has their turn—they belong there. 

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Then you go and marry somebody, and now it’s her that rides in the front seat. How do your kids react to that?

Bob: What had been their territory/their spot—they’ve just been displaced. We may think, “Well, that’s not a big deal”; but that represents something. I mean, we’re using it as a big deal about where mom sits in the car. This represents something about the order of the family that can be very threatening to stepkids.

Ron: I have to say—one of our most popular articles on FamilyLife.com, in the blended family section, is an article that is exactly about riding in the front seat. In fact, it’s called “Putting Your Spouse in the Front Seat.” I write about this, at length, in two of my books: The Smart Stepfamily and The Smart Stepfamily Marriage. Why?—because we have learned this is such a critical dynamic to get right for your blended family to do well.

Bob: Ron, I was just recently at a Weekend to Remember® marriage getaway, talking to a couple in crisis. They weren’t sure they could make their marriage work—blended situation. 

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She brought kids into the marriage; he didn’t have any kids from any previous relationships. We were having this conversation.

I said to her: “I understand that you feel guilt and shame. You feel responsible for the loss you’re kids have experienced. You want to do anything you can to try to make sure you’re making up for what you brought into your children’s lives. So, at times, you prioritize them ahead of your husband just because, emotionally, you’re thinking, ‘I’ve put them through so much. I’ve got to sacrifice him for their sake.’” 

That’s the impulse a parent feels. Explain why that’s a wrong impulse—not a wrong impulse—but why giving into it is a wrong response.

Ron: That’s a very well-worded question, and it’s important to the answer. The impulse is understandable. 

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Of course, you’re concerned about your children—as I would say to this woman: “Your mom heart is very deeply concerned about their well-being. They have been through a lot. You do see the pain in their eyes from the past. You don’t want to see more pain in the present, so you want to take care of them and diminish that; so that means putting them in the front seat and asking your husband to ride in the back seat, in which he feels, in that moment, like he’s in the trunk.”

That is a marital issue, immediately, for the new spouse. That’s why you can’t put him in the back seat, because you are risking the stability of your marriage. Even though your marriage followed the children, you still have to have it in the front seat, so to speak, in order for your relationship to lead the home. 

If you’re going to lead from a position of unity, this is both a parenting issue and a marriage issue all at the same moment. If you’re going to position the new stepdad, in this case, beside you so that...