CHAPTER 7

RULES TO LIVE BY

Being a parent is notoriously difficult, even in a traditional family with two biological parents raising a toddler, helping a pre-adolescent navigate the transition from home to the outside world and absorbing the brunt of a teenager’s angst as he or she tries to find a place in society. As this process unfolds, parents must also transition from carefree, irresponsible and invincible young adults to realistic, mature parents, learning to cope with their place in the cycle of life, which at some point will include the death of their own parents.

This process is not easy or smooth for anyone. The ongoing journey, even when both natural parents are still married, can often be painful, tumultuous and overwhelming. Don’t give up. If you were still living full-time with your first spouse and the children you were raising together, then you would be seeing a good deal of the same behavior. For the most part, your children would probably be acting just like your stepchildren, which means they could be driving you and your new spouse equally crazy.

Your own biological children might be thinking and saying the same bad things about you, your parenting and their other parent, be it your old spouse or the new one. If your biological children are sufficiently comfortable with you, they might even call you the same bad names while pointing out the same shortcomings as your stepchildren.

All children behave this way at times, particularly when stressed. Unlike you, the supposed adult, they haven’t yet developed the coping skills that you hopefully possess. Try to be thick-skinned about what they say. It’s often not about you, but more about the parenting role you are playing in their life.

As the adult, you are supposed to understand, set limits and not over react when challenged. You are not your children’s pal; you are their parent. Being a pal implies a peer relationship that is inappropriate in these circumstances.

The growth and development of everyone’s children are usually time limited. And the process of bringing together two groups of people with their own history and way of doing things takes even more time and energy.

Be patient.

“When I was a boy of fourteen,” Mark Twain once said, “my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned.”

EMBRACING DIVERSITY UNDER THE SAME ROOF

Children, biological or step, don’t necessarily have the same tastes, values, goals, abilities, interests, and ways of doing things that their parents do but for some reason, many parents try to force their children into becoming clones of themselves. This need to control and manipulate is often intended to reassure the parents that their own values are the right ones or because they are genuinely convinced that their way is the only way. Most parent-child power struggles are essentially about the need for control and the natural reaction against it.

First of all, parents must listen to their children and do their best to understand where they are coming from, rather than trying to coerce them into a type of behavior that simply makes sense to the parent but not to the child. Because children introduce parents to new ways of looking at things, if you are open and available to accept them, they will not only keep you young; they can earn you a lot of respect from your new stepchildren.

This is not to say that one should be blindly permissive and tolerant. Common sense should dictate what might be harmful or destructive to your child and what needs to be openly discussed. This is true for biological and stepchildren. It makes no difference. Just as you would with your own children, you must make every effort to understand who your stepchildren are, what is important to them, what they like to do, who their friends are and what they do for fun. And you have to do this in a relatively non-judgmental way, just as you would with your own child.

If your stepchildren like to do things that are different from what you or your own children enjoy that doesn’t make them difficult or imply that they have to change. Just because the child’s friends are different from those you might have picked, it doesn’t necessarily make the child a bad kid or mean he or she has bad friends. All of that simply means that you must get bigger and embrace the diversity!

In the context of a new blended family, the interest that a new adult shows in a child can carry enormous weight. The child and his or her parent will appreciate it and your relationships will grow in very positive ways.

When children reach late adolescence these relationships become tested in ways that you may not have anticipated. I had trouble at times connecting with Andrew as he grew older. Then, unexpectedly, he started keeping me company when I walked the dog at night. We got into some very interesting conversations, which helped me understand him better, and I think he got to see what I was like when we were alone and away from any distractions.

Usually, when you abandon your own biases and try to understand someone, you can find qualities you like in that person and improve your relationship. Conversely, when you focus solely on the negative qualities, those traits may be magnified, not just in your eyes, but also in the other person’s, making him or her even more unwilling to change. Once you focus on the negative, your relationship stalls. This is true whether you are dealing with your children, your stepchildren or other people in your life.

Even if a child you are living with and you cannot stand each other, it is mainly up to you as the adult to try and make it all work. Marriage the second time around is a package deal and if you are a serious person you’d better commit to making all of the relationships succeed.

Sometimes, success will show itself in unexpected ways.

I like to collect T-shirts when I travel and enjoy wearing them when I am not working. One fall day, I could not find any of my favorite T-shirts. I looked everywhere, and they simply could not be found. There were too many of them to simply disappear, but eventually I gave up looking.

Then Thanksgiving came and Barry returned from his first semester at college with a large bag of laundry, overflowing with all of my missing T-shirts. I went ballistic, and fortunately Barry was not home at the time.

“How could he take my favorite T-shirts without even saying anything or asking permission?” I asked Donna incredulously. “I’ve been looking for those things for two months. He has his own dad. If he wants to take someone’s T-shirts, why doesn’t he take his, and not mine?”

As usual, Donna had a wise answer immediately ready to calm me down.

“He really likes and admires you,” she said. “That’s why he took them. If he didn’t like and respect you, he wouldn’t have taken your clothes to wear.’

That made sense, and rather than staying angry, I was flattered that Barry thought my T-shirts were neat, and was actually wearing them.

MEETING YOUR NEW STEPCHILDREN ON THEIR SIDE OF THE MIDDLE

None of us appreciates other people intruding on our life, whether it’s to tell us what to do or what we are not doing correctly, particularly when doing something correctly usually means doing it their way. This is even more irksome when they do it on their schedule, rather than ours, or when we did not ask for any input and they provided it anyway.

It should not be surprising then that if you impose yourself on your children, biological or step, they may resent it and let you know about it—by aggressively complaining or by passive-aggressively not doing what you told them to do or doing it slowly. When you intrude at the wrong time, the underlying message is that your children are wrong and what they are doing is not okay, and that you, the adult, will straighten them out, whether they want it or not. That message may only add to a feeling they already have that they are always a little wrong in your eyes, which your criticism, even constructive, can only worsen.

Children will eventually ask for assistance once they realize that they are stuck and know they can ask for help from an available, supportive person who will not rub their nose in what they do not know. It is often better not to jump in and correct them or try to take over by telling your stepchildren what they are doing wrong. Just make yourself available. Let the child know you may have some insight into the problem and that you’re willing to help—if asked. Then leave it. It may be hard to watch a child stumble and wait patiently until he or she asks for assistance. Children must get help on their own terms, not yours. When you wait until you are asked rather than inserting yourself into a situation, a child will be much more appreciative and value your input.

Here’s more proof that a trained professional is not always the best role model outside the office. One day, Donna and I took the kids out into the country to shoot skeet. If you think about it, it’s a rather daunting task to shoot a small clay plate that is rapidly flying away from you when that gun makes a lot of noise and smacks you in the shoulder after you pull the trigger. When it was Barry’s turn, he kept missing the target. I jumped in to tell him what he was doing wrong and how to do it right. Classic bonehead. Rather than appreciating my input and thanking me for it, which I thought at the time he might do, he grew increasingly angry. Clearly he was upset that he was missing the targets, but his anger focused more and more on me, and he complained that I was laughing at him and trying to make him miss. It was a no win deal and I eventually shut up.

The next time we went, Barry asked me what he should do to improve his technique. He realized I had some idea of what I was doing and recognized that my help might afford him more success, but he had to solicit my help when he wanted it, and on his terms, not mine.

DEMOCRACY IN ACTION: BLENDING MULTIPLE STRUCTURES UNDER ONE ROOF

We all need structure in life. Even rebellious children need a structure to rebel against. We are born into structure and live within some form of it through most, if not all of our lives. This structure determines our values—as individuals, families and a society.

When two families join together under one roof, each spouse brings his or her own structure, including rules, roles and family rituals. Integrating all of this can be challenging. While there must be some areas of agreement to get to the marrying stage, it also means that both parties must compromise. This is hard enough when there is just one set of kids in the house but it becomes significantly more difficult when two groups of children begin living together. What was once a familiar sense of structure may be compromised. Some negotiating naturally occurs before the wedding, but no one can anticipate what will happen once everyone is living together under everyday conditions.

Working out a style of structure that everyone can live with means that the new set of parents must be clear, consistent and understandable to each other and their children. That includes a precise explanation of what will occur when children do not follow the new rules of the collective house. Children should be informed why they are being disciplined and it should happen as soon as possible after the inciting event. Punishment should be an incentive not to do things but it should also help children learn to avoid behavior that can become more painful later on, particularly outside the family.

When administered correctly and in appropriate doses, discipline and structure can be fair and consistent, and should show our children that what we do matters and that someone cares about them and their behavior.

It is critically important who does the disciplining, particularly with children because they need to feel that the person doing the punishing cares about them, and is not just doing it to assert authority or physical strength.

A single mother newly divorced cannot say to her son, “Wait until your father comes home.” She has to do it herself, which is harder because in those situations the child may have also become her confidant. After having been “buddies” it is hard for the parent to instill discipline or change the rules. This is particularly true when you add someone new to the mix and then try to explain why there are new rules and what the consequences are if they are not followed.

Because it is difficult to be fair and consistent after a divorce, parental discipline can often fluctuate, especially considering the added stress of taking care of everything—job, home and children. A single parent can become overly permissive or too strict, either ignoring or overreacting to a child’s behavior. If that happens, guilt may cause the punishment to be overturned, which effectively minimizes whatever lesson the children were supposed to learn. Whatever poor behavior the children engaged in gets ignored. Even worse for the single, custodial parent is the fear that the children may say they want to live with the other, less strict parent, who bends to the child’s wishes. The fact that a child is growing up in a home without both biological parents causes a great deal of anxiety among single parents. Guilt is always present, and whenever anything does not go well for your child it is very difficult not to feel as if it’s your fault.

Non-custodial parents in a divorce can also have trouble disciplining the children. They often worry or feel guilty that if they come down too hard on their child, the child won’t like them or want to visit them again. This guilt is multiplied for the post-divorce parent who can’t stop thinking that if they had done something differently they would still be together as an intact family.

Any version of this can lead to shortchanging your children. When everyone does not participate in setting rules—and enforcing them—your children may feel hurt, neglected and angry. Some children act out their feelings with negative behavior like running away, doing poorly in school, using drugs or hanging around with other children who also feel neglected emotionally.

After Donna and I had been together for a short time, Barry began a new school and was not doing well. Donna and his father talked to him about it, but nothing changed. The school’s policy was to send notes home right away about problems, which meant that Donna hated opening the mail for fear of finding out again that Barry was either not prepared for class, had not handed in homework or had done badly on a test. When Barry realized these notes were coming home, he got upset and thought that the whole thing must’ve been my idea, that this sort of thing never happened before his parents’ divorce and I came into the picture. Regardless, for some reason within a short time, Barry’s grades and behavior improved dramatically, but not without some initial clashes.

Developing new rules and discipline in blended families takes time, tolerance, and the process clearly works better when everyone is included. Inclusion means that everyone’s input including the children’s should be heard, even if the end result is not quite, or anywhere near what they wanted. General guidelines and rules are easy to work out because you have probably been living with them for a time, but moving on to specifics, or trying to develop rules as issues come up is harder. That is why it is important for everyone to sit down after a moment of crisis and develop strategies for discipline. The earlier it is done, the better it will be for everyone.

When a new spouse joins a family that has had fluctuating discipline, is somewhat structure-less or has a guilt-ridden parent, it may be tempting for the new person to jump in and take over, trying to save everybody immediately. That can cause the biological parent to either withdraw by passively supporting the new spouse or jump in to defend the children. When a biological parent withdraws, the children resent it and their behavior often gets worse.

A relative outsider can’t effectively discipline someone else’s children unless this person has a relationship with the parent and the children. If the parent or children do not think that the discipliner also cares about them, the situation can escalate. The parent sympathizes with and attempts to protect the children from the stepparent, which causes problems to arise. It antagonizes the stepparent who feels that he or she has no input, and may threaten the future relationships. It ignores the reality that the children may have done something wrong and that their behavior merits a response with consequences.

When a parent reflexively bonds with the children by always taking their side, it lets them think they are running the show, and that nothing they do will have any significant consequences for them. This kind of behavior often then leads to the parent overreacting, which makes things even worse. That is why escalating levels of discipline really work better than ignoring and then overreacting to punish the child with both barrels.

Even worse, threatening a child to go live with the other parent if they don’t do what you tell them gives the impression that your child is unloved, unlovable and expendable, or loved only on a conditional basis, which further adds to the fear of being abandoned again. Children do better when they can flow back and forth between their biological parents, particularly after the divorce. If possible, some effort should be made to have similar rules and consequences at both places, which helps to eliminate the playing off of one parent against the other.

Trying to work out an understanding of all of the rules, and the discipline, as much as you can from the beginning, helps keep everyone from losing control, overreacting, and later regretting what they did.

Try to establish the same rules for your children and your stepchildren when they are living under your roof. Work out with your new spouse a new set of Dos and Don’ts. Because the same situations seem to always reappear, anticipating them ahead of time helps everyone.

Children almost always think that their stepparent will be harder on them than their own parent is. When the biological parent actually does favor their own children though, their kids feel entitled, as if regular rules do not apply to them. The stepchildren feel abused, like the ones in fairy tales, which makes it much more difficult for the new family to bond. The children may then not want to come to visit their biological parent in their stepparent’s home, further adding to the children’s feeling that they have no place of their own, and that their own parent allows this new person to pick on them, which makes their situation even more depressing.

Treating your children and your stepchildren differently is destructive to the relationship between the new couple, and makes the lives of the children more difficult. It becomes an ongoing source of conflict between the adults, and is another factor that can cause a new couple to split up rather than to try to work out their differences.

After you have remarried and your biological children come to visit, they need to know about any new rules, particularly if they were not involved in helping to set them up. This should start on the initial visit by explaining simply the rules in the new house and your new spouse’s preferences. It is worth pointing out again, that while you may have tolerated certain things in the past, such behavior may not be acceptable now that more people are involved and living together. Going over these things in the beginning and reviewing them on a regular basis will often save everyone a lot of time, grief, misunderstandings and hurt feelings. Oh yes, and screaming!

This will help everyone feel they are part of the same team effort. If only I had known this better when I first remarried. At that time, I never really sat down with Frank to tell him that things were going to be a little different, to explain what Donna was like and what the new rules would be. I was so glad to see him that I let him do everything just as he had before.

Donna resented that for a while. She felt like I wasn’t supporting her efforts to get everything to run smoothly, and felt that she was constantly fighting with everyone. It must have seemed like all I wanted was to have everyone happy while I spent time with Frank. Maybe that’s true, but giving Donna a Mary Poppins complex was not exactly the right idea.

When you jump into raising two sets of children with what feels like limited resources of time, money, energy and emotion, it is hard to treat your stepchildren as you do your biological children. This may be exacerbated by having limited time or access to your natural children, and wanting them to have a good time with you so they will like you and want to come back. With your stepchildren living with you on an ongoing basis, you may feel that you don’t have to treat them in the same way because they are there all the time or they are not really yours. But stop right there. Your whole family will quickly realize your mistake and will react accordingly when you treat your natural children and your stepchildren differently. All the kids will notice and talk about the way some of them are treated differently than others. This means that as hard as it may be, everything will go easier for everyone if you can treat everyone the same—from the beginning.

At one point, Donna would get on Frank about not cleaning up after snacking at night with his friends. Barry and Susan finally said something to her about how unfair she was being because when they did the same thing occasionally she didn’t seem to get upset. Donna apologized to Frank and it soon became a non-issue. Once again, kids to the rescue of their parents!

The decision about when, how, and what to discipline your child for is a very difficult one that only you, their parent, can really make. In theory, you have been doing it for some time before your new spouse entered the picture, and you are the one who knows their history, as well as what was done in the past. You are also the one who has the relationship with them, and you are the one they know cares about them. Often when children act out, they want a response from you—just you—and their behavior may be driven by trying to get that reaction out of you. If you ignore them or delegate it to someone else, they miss out on whatever it is they want, and their behavior will often escalate until you do respond.

While you may want to use the stepparent’s input you need to be the actual disciplinarian. Your new spouse may be helpful in pointing out things that you miss, ignore, or have let slide in the past, but only you know if there is a reason why you choose to let something go.

Early on in my new marriage, I would get enormously upset at something Barry would do, something I did not like that he knew would upset me. I felt he often just wanted to provoke me and after a while I realized that if I told him to stop he would not only continue, but it would culminate into a long argument that always came to the same conclusion.

“You’re not my father, who are you to tell me what to do?”

I was not sure that Donna knew what was going on or how I felt about it. Our resolution was for me to tell her what it was that upset me. She would later talk to him and try to get him to change or do what she knew I wanted him to do. Amazingly, it seemed to work most of the time, although usually not in the time frame I would have wanted. In reality though, it happened when it was supposed to.

As a result of that experience and hearing about many others in my practice, I have come to the conclusion that the biological parents are the only ones who can discipline their own children. They know the child’s history and how discipline was taken care of in the past. They need to respect the stepparent because they are living with that person, but that person can’t be the one to do the disciplining without creating more problems for everyone.