K.L.
Dear K.L.,
First of all, don’t jump into blending families if you’re already fighting over the kids. I promise you that once you’re all living together, this problem will get worse, not better. It is common for kids to fight — but in a dating parents or stepfamily situation, this can cause all sorts of problems. It’s completely natural for a parent to protect his or her biological children. However, this sets up blood-based alliances in stepfamilies. One biological family will align itself against the other.
First of all, make sure you define your roles as stepparents. I suggest you view yourselves as extra adults for your partner’s kids. That means you should not try to be a parent to them. He should let you parent and discipline your kids. And he should be in charge of parenting his kids.
Of course, this gets sticky if you and Jeff have different ideas about how to go about parenting. You may simply have to establish separate rules for his kids and your kids — and then have the biological parents follow through on them. That’s what we did in our family, as we describe in our book ( www.stepfamilyadvice.com ).
Once you’ve established your roles and parenting guidelines, you might consider visiting with a counselor or psychologist to talk about your parenting differences. It’s important to learn how to respectfully address your differences. You might want to read this story to get a few more tips about how to handle sticky dating-single-parent situations, including how to embrace the fine art of silence: http://msn.match.com/msn/article.aspx?articleid=7422&menuid=7&lid=429
I'm sure that communicating your feelings to Jeff under these circumstances is challenging. I'm sure it’s tempting -- but I promise it’s not a good idea -- to criticize his parenting style and his kids. Patricia Papernow, a psychologist in Hudson, Mass., who specializes in stepfamilies, says dating parents and stepparents need to learn how to have difficult conversations. She advocates the soft-hard-soft approach. You can learn about that by clicking on www.stepfamilytalkradio.com/products.htm and listening to her interview.
Again, don't rush into blending families with Jeff.
Good Luck!
Lisa
Lisa Cohn has written for the Christian Science Monitor, Parenting, Mothering, Your Stepfamily Magazine and other publications. She writes an advice column for Philly Women (www.philly.com) and is the co-host of Stepfamily Talk Radio (www.stepfamilytalkradio.com.) Lisa has been quoted about divorce and stepfamilies by the Associated Press, Washington Post, Time Magazine, msn.com and other media outlets. 