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This is one of a series of lesson-7 articles
on how to evolve a high-nurturance stepfamily. This ser-ies extends
the concepts in Lessons 1-6, so study them first.
These articles augment, vs. replace, other
qualified
professional help.
The "/" in re/marriage and re/divorce
notes that it may be a stepparent's first union. "Co-parents" means both
bioparents, or any of the
three or more
related stepparents and bioparents co-managing a multi-home nuclear
stepfamily.
While every family is unique in composition, ancestry, and circumstances,
all
persons and fami-lies pass through common developmental stages or phases over time.
Gradually or suddenly, each stage may cause significant life-style, role,
and relationship changes; and reevaluations, losses, gains, and con-flicts.
These may strengthen or weaken family bonds, loyalties, and
nurturance levels.
In addition, families have random health, financial, relationship, or other crises (by their standards)
as these phases unfold - e.g. natural disasters, severe
illnesses, accidents or death, loss of income, or di-vorce.
Census estimates
suggest that over half of typical U.S. families experience
psychological or legal divorce. These times of forced change usually affect the
family's current and future life-cycle
phases in unique ways.
The generic summary below shows that a typical
nuclear stepfamily's life cycle has many more phases to negotiate as members age and develop
personally. Stepfamilies' extra life-cycle events and phases are highlighted.
Key
intact-biofamily life-cycle
events
Key
nuclear-stepfamily life-cycle
events
Every
child negotiates a series
of developmental tasks - or doesn't;
Each child develops a unique
personality, shaped
by the wholistic health, knowledge,
and resources of their caregivers. Children...
go to school/s and learn how to learn
(usually) leave home > live
independently
start work and a career
acquire and maintain a dwelling, assets, and debts, over time
form friendships
and trial relationships
court > commit > wed
and/or cohabit
(often)
bear children and adapt to many lifestyle adjustments
evolve and stabilize
family goals, roles, rules, rituals, and boundaries
form and stabilize a social network
marital problem-solving
over time
> pos-sible counseling and/or breaking denials of childhood
neglect and psychological
wounds
> begin personal
recovery (uncom-mon
before mid-life)
middle-age shifts in
goals,
priorities,
and
activities; death becomes more real; possibly plan for retirement
kids leave for college or independent living > many "empty-nest"
losses (broken bonds) and adjustments which stress
or relieve the
marriage
adult kids experiment with
relationships, work, careers (ongoing)
adult kids court > commit > wed > cohabit
adult kids conceive and give birth to
grandkids; all members evolve new roles, rules, and
rituals and adjust, over some
years
each mate's
parents retire > may relocate > become infirm , and > die somewhere in
mid-cycle; > adult children and grandkids grieve, accept, and stabilize - or
they don't
old-age stresses, losses > grieving or
repression > many adjustments
one mate dies, and surviving
family members grieve
and adjust (or don't)
the other mate becomes infirm and/or
dies, and the surviving members grieve and adjust (or don't), and continue their
life cycles...
each committed partner
(mate) goes through a version of
the events to the left. Exception:
one partner's first marriage may be to
a divorced or widowed bioparent.
marital problem-solving
over time >
pos-sible counseling and/or breaking adult de-nials of childhood neglect
and psychological wounds > begin personal recovery (uncom-mon before
mid-life)
psychological > legal
divorce
> many child and adult losses, adjustments, and conflicts
(maybe)
begin
grieving
divorce losses
relationships > courtship/s (one or both ex
mates
re/commitment > re/wedding > cohabiting
co-parents
merge, negotiate, and stabilize new
roles,
rules, boundaries, and routines with ex mates,
kids, and relatives
co-parents help each other grieve re/mar-riage and cohabiting losses,
or repress and deny them over several years;
middle-age shifts in goals,
priorities, and activities; death becomes more real, possibly plan for
retirement
co-parents try to resolve
stepfamily con-flicts, barriers, frustrations, and
disillusion-ments - or they repress,
avoid, and deny these over some years;
possible:
partners get in/effective
support.
re/marriage
stabilizes and grows, or decays - the children are affected either way
kids leave for college or independent living > many "empty-nest" losses
(broken bonds) and adjustments which stress or relieve
the re/marriage
adult kids experiment with
relationships, work, and careers (ongoing)
adult kids court > commit > marry >
cohabit
adult kids conceive and give birth to
grandkids > all members evolve new roles, rules, and rituals, and adjust over some
years
possible: one or more ex mates
re/weds, with or without stepkids > many adjustment tasks take four or
more years to stabilize
possible:
re/marital or stepfamily counsel-ing: effective or not > family
relationships and bonding improves or weakens, over time.
probable: psychological or legal
separation and re/divorce> grieve many new losses and
adjust roles, rules, and rituals.
each mate's
and ex-mate's parents retire > may relocate > become infirm , and
> die somewhere in
mid-cycle; > adult children and grandkids grieve and stabilize - or
they don't.
old-age stresses, losses > grieving or
repression > many adjustments
one
or more ex mates die, and surviving family members grieve and adjust (or
don't)
one mate dies, and surviving family members grieve and adjust (or
don't)
the other mate becomes infirm and/or
dies, and the surviving members grieve, adjust, and continue their life
cycles...
The order of some events varies between families,
but the events are common to all families. Cease-less personal and
environmental change throughout each cycle
requires each family adult and child, and the whole
family system,
to adjust and restabilize its interactive
goals, roles, rules, rituals,
membership, identity, and boundaries. Another theme common to both cycles is the
ceaseless challenge of family members helping each other identify and fill a dynamic
array of local and long-term personal and family needs..
The degree to which your family's leaders succeed at that over time
determines your family's
nurtur-ance level. That (a) affects how well your kids fill their
developmental needs and grieve their
many losses (broken bonds) over time, which (b)
depends on
whether your co-parents are guided by their
true or false selves
across the years + their
awarenesses
+ how
effectively
you all
think, communicate, and
problem- solve
together.
Pause and notice how your subselves are
reacting
to this comparison. Have they ever seen anything like this before? Has
your partner? Your kids? Your parents?
So What?
This comparison shows that typical
stepfamily adults and children
have many more life-cycle events to negotiate than peers in average intact
biofamilies. Though every family and generation is unique, some universal
implications are that average stepfamily members...
Have more
changes to adapt to in
their life spans. Change promotes local or prolonged stress (anxiety,
confusion, frustration, and often grief) in persons and groups - specially
if many changes occur close together, and/or people are unable to grieve
and adapt well. And typical step-people...
have a higher need to
communicate effectively
to help each other negotiate their extra devel-opment tasks and stages
effectively over time. That's why co-parent
Lesson 2 exists here, though
all adults and kids need these
seven relationship skills!
need to
grieve more losses
(broken bonds) more
often than typical intact-biofamily mem-bers. American society tends to
minimize the importance of grieving, which is why incom-plete grief is
one of five common stepfamily stressors. That's why
self-study
Lesson 3 exists in this site; And also...
typical minor
stepkids may have a harder time filling their normal
developmental needs, be-cause
several sets of concurrent family-adjustment
needs are imposed on them. That raises the odds that without
informed
adult and professional help, they may (a) grow up to make un-wise marital and
child-conception choices and (b) spread their
ancestral
cycle of low family nurturance and
psychological wounding. And...
because these many
life-cycle events affect more people (three or more biofamilies linked by
co-parent cohabiting and/or re/marriage/s),
average stepfamilies have a higher need than intact biofamilies to develop...
effective, informed leadership with...
coherent,
consensual long-term family
goals, and...
effective
teamwork among all adults and their supporters.
This usually requires all co-parents
wanting to make (a)
recovery from significant false-self
wounds
and
(b) reducing several
divorce-related
barriers
high shared priorities.
Lesson 7 provide
perspective, options, and resources to do this together.
Collectively, these implications mean at least two more things:
It's essential that
stepfamily
co-parents, relatives, and supporters
(a) acknowledge that they are a
stepfamily, and
then (b) learn what that identity means (do and discuss Lesson 7). Otherwise they risk
trying to negotiate these complex extra life-cycle events using unrealistic
(biofamily-based) role and relationship expectations. Whether co-parents do this or not,
the overarching
implication of all the above is...
...typical
mates in average stepfamilies and their dependent kids
are at higher risk of
eventual psy-chological or legal re/divorce
and
passing on ancestral unawareness and
wounds than first-married
mates.
Recap
This article exists because of the common misconception that average
stepfamilies are "pretty much like" intact biofamilies. In some ways,
they are. This article summarizes 35 structural differences, which
promote ~30 unique adjustment tasks in new stepfamilies. Ignorance of
these differences and tasks causes significant frustration,
disappointment, hurt, and anger among typical stepfamily members and
their unaware supporters.
Self-study Lesson 7 in this Web site aims to convert ignorance into
knowledge and realistic expec-tations, and reduce epidemic U.S.
re/divorce.
+ + +
Pause, breathe, and note your
reactions
to what you just read. Then recall why you read this article. Did you get
what you
needed?
If not, what
do
you need? Is there anyone you
want to discuss this article and its implications with? Who's
answering
these questions - your wise
true Self
(capital "S") or
''someone else'?'
For more
awareness, study this companion article about how typical
stepfamilies evolve toward one of three
possible outcomes. Then continue work on Lesson 7.
The Web address of this article is
http://sfhelp.org/sf/basics/devel_bf-sf.htm
So What?
For more
awareness, study