The Smart Stepmom

Practical Steps to Help You Thrive

Ron L. Deal, Laura Petherbridge

• Publisher: Bethany House Publishers
• Year: 2009
• Print ISBN: 9780764234484
• eBook ISBN: 9781441210999

The stepmother's role often is ambiguous and underappreciated, and frequently it carries unrealistic expectations. The book answers women's concerns and questions, including: How can I be a caretaker and a key emotional connector in the family if the children don't accept my influence? How shoud I cope with children who are confused about their family and torn between loyalty to their biological mother and me? When should I step back in conflicts and when should I insist that my husband stand up for me? In addition it addresses the spiritual and emotional climate of the home, providing perspective and guidelines to help stepmothers and their families thrive.

Section Two
Getting Smart: The
Stepparenting Team

It’s time to get practical. Getting smart in your role as stepmom involves the following:

• teamwork with your husband

• constructive ambassadorship with the other home

• wisdom to comprehend the motivating factors for stepchildren

• practical parenting how-to’s.

This section will walk you through each of these topics.

Stepparenting is a team sport, but not all the teammates have equal influence. Your success is heavily dependent upon your husband’s help, support, and partnership in parenting. We have included two chapters to help him understand. Invite your husband to read chapters 7 and 8 along with you. Doing your job pivots upon him doing his. Let’s start there.

Chapter 7

Dad Smart (Part 1): She
Can’t Do It Without You

She can’t do it without you.

You’ve married an incredible woman. She makes you smile, supports your work, laughs at your jokes, and has agreed to help you raise your children. How awesome is that?! The child rearing part, by the way, probably lines her up for a medal.

However, her ability to fulfill the role of stepmom is dependent upon you. If you neglect your role, she has no foundation upon which to stand. Stepparenting is a team sport. If you want your marriage to succeed, you must be her teammate and stick by her side.

FROM GOOD TO GREAT

Part of being teammates involves having similar parenting philosophies. You can’t operate from two different parenting viewpoints and expect to end up on the same team. Parenting in a stepfamily functions differently than parenting in a biological family. Following our basic principles will put you on a winning team. We’ve included sidebars throughout this chapter that speak to different stepmom situations. These are designed to help your parenting team go from good to great.

Principle 1: Declare Loyalty to Your Wife

“I am so hurt. My husband has another woman in his life . . . and it is his daughter.” To a dad this may seem ridiculous. But because a natural bond between a stepmother and daughter is absent, even a daughter may feel like the other woman. Nothing deflates a woman’s heart more than feeling disposable to her husband. Furthermore, nothing will destroy your home more quickly than communicating a loyalty to your children that is greater than your loyalty to your wife. This is first on our list because the others are dependent upon this principle. In other words, united you stand, divided you fall. Declaring your loyalty has two aspects.

Cohabitation and Smart Dating

Many couples who cohabit do so for financial reasons and because they believe it is a trial marriage. Far from the safety of a committed marriage, a cohabiting relationship actually facilitates relationship decline. Research shows that cohabiting couples are less happy, more depressed, less financially supportive of each other, less sexually committed, more negative about marriage, have lower levels of premarital relationship satisfaction and, if they marry after cohabiting, have a higher divorce rate than couples who do not. This is true of those who have never been married as well as couples considering remarriage. God’s boundaries around sexuality are meant to protect us from these and other damaging outcomes.1

1. Tell your kids. Children need to hear you repeatedly share throughout their lifetime that you and your wife will always be together. This is not a statement of preference (your wife over your children), but a statement of permanence. If your children believe there’s a chance that she won’t be around at some point, their motivation to include her and respect her role in their lives diminishes tremendously.

2. Show your kids. Actions speak louder than words. If you say you are committed to your wife but undercut her when she disciplines the children, your actions contradict your words.

If you typically let a child’s opinion or mood sway your decisions more so than your wife’s opinion, your actions will sabotage your wife’s role in the family. You must make her a full-fledged member of the parenting team by using actions to back up your stated loyalty.

Principle 2: Trust Your Wife’s Heart

Do you wonder if your wife loves your kids as much as you do? Perhaps a fight occurred or you noticed the way your wife expressed criticism about one of your children and it bothered you. You begin thinking, Can I really trust that she cares for the well-being of my kids, or do I have to look out for them? If you have ever had such a fear, you are not alone.

One of the givens of a biological family is that both parents feel a deep bond with their children. After all, they are flesh and blood, your little miracle of life. Biological parents love their children from their core; it’s a given.

Why is understanding this important? Because this blood bond between parent and child results in a natural trust by one parent in the goodwill of the other parent toward the child. When biological parents disagree, rarely if ever do you find them accusing each other of not loving the child. You don’t hear one parent judging the other by saying, “You raised your voice to Kristin because you don’t love her.” No, the assumption is always that the other parent loves the child and has good intentions for the child’s benefit.

This dynamic works differently in stepfamilies. It is very easy for a biological parent to question the motive of a stepparent. That’s because the bond between stepparents and stepchildren is different— it isn’t automatic. The relationship develops over time.

Strongly guard yourself against a harsh judgment of your wife’s motives. You may not agree with her expectations or how she handles a situation, but be careful not to assume that she doesn’t care about them. That accusation sets your heart against hers.

It is our experience that the vast majority of stepmothers have tremendous goodwill toward their stepchildren. Sometimes they do not feel the same love for stepchildren as they do their own children, and that’s perfectly natural. However, it doesn’t mean your wife isn’t lovingly trying to do what is best for your kids. In a sense, her bond with your children can never equal yours, but her goodwill can.

Joanne kept complaining that Rob’s kids didn’t contribute to mowing the lawn or taking care of daily tasks in the home. Rob agreed they should do more, but when it came time for follow-through, he was a no-show. Joanne continued to complain. “Why can’t you let this go?” Rob countered. “There are more important things in the world to worry about.” In talking with their counselor, Rob finally discovered that his resistance was rooted in a lack of trust in Joanne’s heart. He perceived Joanne as coldhearted and picking on his kids when, in fact, she was trying to equip them for independent living. Before Rob could hear her point of view and objectively consider it, he first had to trust her motives toward his kids.

If Your Children’s Mother Is Deceased

You may find that it is a little more difficult to make room for shared parenting with your wife if your children’s biological mother is deceased. After her death, the mantle of caretaking became your sole responsibility. Making space at this point might feel like letting go. Guilt will certainly be close by. Wrestle with your feelings and realize that allowing someone else to share the load of parenting does not mean you are neglecting or abandoning your children. It’s a new season of life; embrace it.

Make Room for Shared Parenting. Matt was the only parent his children knew for several years. Even before their divorce, his ex-wife abandoned her role as mother. He lived a good distance from extended family; therefore, Matt was totally responsible for his children. Making space for his new bride, Paula, to join the parenting process was extremely difficult for him. He had never consulted anyone about parenting decisions. On one occasion Matt’s teenage son asked for permission to go to a movie. Paula tried to interrupt the conversation in order to ask Matt to discuss this privately with her before giving his son an answer. But Matt made a quick decision, as he had done for years, and told his son he could go. In the process Paula’s feelings were wounded, but he wasn’t sure why. She explained, “It’s like I don’t matter at all.”

It is understandable that Matt struggled to make room for Paula, but when he chose to remarry he needed to learn how to incorporate Paula into the parenting process. Doing so includes letting go of total control of his kids (which doesn’t seem difficult until your wife has a different opinion from yours) and delaying decision-making until they could discuss the situation. It would also mean helping his children to get used to the change.

If Matt’s children are like most, they will think it strange, at best, when their dad begins to take the time to talk through decisions with Paula. At worst, they will be very annoyed by it, especially if they are disappointed with the decision. Some measure of conflict and hurt feelings is predictable at this point. Paula will likely get the blame, and Matt will have to deal with his children when they complain or fuss about how things are changing. When his sixteen-year-old son objected to Paula’s voice in decisions, Matt eventually learned to say things like, “Jared, I can see how difficult this is for you. Before I married Paula I made all the decisions and we went on with life. Paula is now my wife, so I’m going to include her as much as possible. I realize this is hard for you to understand because she’s not your mother. I’m aware that some rules have changed and you can’t do some things that you used to do, and naturally you don’t like that. However, as your father I get to change my mind about some things and do what I think is best. We may have done things differently in the past, but this is how we’re going to do things now. I don’t expect you to be happy about every decision, but I do expect you to respect the decisions we make. We’re doing what we think is best for you. I love you. And no, you can’t stay out till 2:00 am this Friday.”

Getting the approval of the kids is not the goal, but rather developing a shared system of parenting, where you support the input of your wife. Making the shift will be a gradual process; stick with it and prayerfully endure the emotional hiccups.

Principle 3: Take the Primary Parenting Role With Your Kids

Making space for your wife’s participation as an active member of the parenting team is important to her role as stepmother. In addition, your willingness to take the primary role in dealing with your children, especially around matters of nurturance and punishment, is crucial for the stepfamily. The story you just read about Matt and his son Jared is a good example. Taking the primary or “bad guy” role is not always fun, but it is necessary. Until your wife has developed a strong bond with your children, which can take many years, she can’t take on that responsibility. It must fall to you. You have to be an engaged father.

The Engaged Father. An active, engaged father understands that the woman he married can be a wife much sooner than she can be a mother. Being a mother means she has established emotional trust and respect with the children to the degree that they elevate her to a place of authority.2 This is a time-consuming, complicated process that is moderated by several issues, including the ages and personalities of your children, the relationship they have with their biological mother, the number of losses they have experienced, how much time they spend in your home—the list goes on and on. In other words, you are the safest, most well-defined parent figure in the home.

In his excellent manual on fathering, The 7 Secrets of Effective Fathers, Dr. Ken Canfield describes the qualities of extraordinary dads. According to Dr. Canfield’s research, engaged fathers are committed to their children. They spend more time with their children than ordinary fathers, think about how to nurture their children, and are committed to maintaining their influence in the children’s lives over time. They also know their children’s needs, temperaments, and daily activities. They strive to be involved with their children in many contexts, like school, home, and in the community. They know something about child development (what to expect from children at given ages) and how their chil...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Section One: The Smart Stepmom: Who Is She?
• Section Two: Getting Smart: The Stepparenting Team
• Recommended Resources
• Notes
• About The Authors
• Other Books by Ron L. Deal
• Back Ads
• Back Cover