A Stepping Out With Step Moms Moment: Celebrations of Life

As Mrs. Peach Blossom, one of the things I do to help promote my platform is Stepping Out With Step Moms. The idea behind this was to provide a forum for step moms or recently single mothers to come together one-on-one or as a group to talk about some of the challenges we face as step parents. Today I talked with a mom and we discussed how blended families should celebrate marker events in the lives of their children, even though they may have to share those events between two households. This was very timely in that my husband and I have had to deal with this recently.

Today I talked with a mom and we discussed how blended families should celebrate marker events in the lives of their children, even though they may have to share those events between two households. This was very timely in that my husband and I have had to deal with this recently.

My advice to the mom was that sometimes you have to be the one to extend the olive branch and really focus on coming together for the benefit of the child or children involved. This may be extremely challenging in that sometimes celebrations can be a prime opportunity for competition to arise and you know how some people tend to be when they are in competition-mode; the claws come out and sometimes you are relentless in your effort to come out on top.

This is definitely not the attitude to take when it comes to celebrations of life centered on our children.

I suggest that as a step parent that you have a long-term plan for working towards celebrating marker life events together. Realistically, you can’t expect someone that you have been divorced from or someone that you are no longer in relationship with to be excited and totally willing to work jointly with you, but with time, direct communication and focus on your child, it is possible to work together to plan events that celebrate the wonderful gift you share…your child.

Here are some tips:
(1) Know you boundaries - know what you can and can’t expect the other parent to do or compromise on

(2) Take it slow – if you share the smaller events in your child’s life it makes celebrate the larger events easier.

(3) Stay calm and rational - it may take time for the other person to agree, and the other person may be resistant, feeling that you have ulterior motives for wanting to plan a celebration together.

(4) Make yourself available – always be open to communication…especially about your child(ren).

(5) Step back – give yourself and the other person time to think.

Nothing is fail-proof, but if you make every effort to communicate effectively and to be transparent, a world of difference can be made and your child’s life will be much richer because of it.