Today, I roped all my kids
into coming over for dinner to discuss Holiday plans. Well, I
threatened to use a rope; but, it ended up being unnecessary. It's a
bit weird, still, for me to have my kids all grown up at the
holidays. It's especially a bit weird since the age gap between my
oldest grandson and my youngest grandson is very close to the age gap
found in between all three of my boys (my own step-son, included).
Seeing my grandchildren around this time of year always reminds me of
when my kids were little...there is an echo there of sorts.
That echo is accompanied with a
bittersweet taste as I realize that those grown men will always be
those little boys to me, even if, in reality, they are adults. Having
a chance to experience it all over again through the eyes of a
grandmother with two ridiculously cute and animated grandchildren?
Well. That's just a blessing. Plain and simple. A reward for the
suffrage of parenthood? Maybe? Whatever it is, I'll take it.
I called my grown kids together because
while I no longer have to wrangle multiple family get-togethers in an
attempt to squeeze in time with Daddy's family and Mommy's family and
the extended of extended family all while wrangling small children,
my oldest son kind of does. It's weird to watch him take his first
attempts at wrangling that. Yet, the fact that he is trying to
wrangle it and wants his children to each spend time with his side of
the DNA pool is very refreshing.
My step-mother was way ahead of the
game in setting forth arrangements this year. She contacted me about
our plans for Thanksgiving about a week before Halloween. Well. You
know my big procrastinating self didn't have any plans that early in.
Smart lady she is, she probably knew that. I'm really lucky to have
good step-parents, in the event I've never mentioned it before.
Both my step-mother and my step-father
hold my relationship with my biological parents at a priority. I
don't know where they learned to wrangle the compassion and
understanding required for that. But, they both are wonderful at it.
I've never experienced any sense of competition or jealousy from
either one of them in regard to how much attention I receive or do
not receive from my parents. They encourage time between my parents
and I. Neither of them have EVER had a foul word to say about my
biological parent in front of me. From what I understand, to have one
step-parent that nurtures and supports such bonds is a phenomenal
thing. I've been blessed with two.
I have struggled being a step-parent
myself. My first instinct is to rush in and just take over being the
Mother, mark out the territorial boundaries around my home like a
protective lioness and...you know, it just wasn't a good initial
approach in the grand scheme of things. I discovered the hard way
that it wasn't really my job to become a surrogate parent to a child
who already had two full-time parents or even just one full-time
parent. My job, as a step-parent, was, at least partially, to be
full-time parent supporter whether those full-time parent support
efforts were directed toward my spouse or my step-child's other
biological parent and family. It was a tough and achy lesson to
learn. I've screwed up a lot. A lot may actually be a huge
understatement. I wish I had an opportunity to undo some of that.
But, all I can really do now is try to be a better example from here
forward. That's all any of us can do once our shortcomings are
brought to our attention.
The first thing I needed to learn (and,
I did...the hard way, of course), was to side step my enormous ego
and overcome my desire to control. I can justify the desire to
control against having been tasked with filling both parental roles
at once while meticulously scheduling my time around what I needed to
do in order to be both an effective Mother, Father and full-time
employee. I've no excuse for my enormous ego other than I was just
kind of born that way and the struggle with it has been a life long
process. At least I'm honest.
I had to understand that the situation
at hand with my step-child didn't call for MY sense of control or the
needs of MY ego. But, it had more to do with giving solicited (as
opposed to offering my opinion when it wasn't sought) advice to the
full-time parent and being supportive of the way THEY wanted to raise
THEIR child...not how I thought it should be done. Tricky, indeed.
I wonder, sometimes, how my own
step-parents seem to have come to these conclusions so effortlessly.
I also wonder, sometimes, why it took me so long to notice how
beneficial it was to have such supporters of my relationship with my
parents. Things tend to look a bit different after the shoe has been
on the other foot for a time. Don't they?
I can tell you, with confidence, that
being a step-parent at holidays and special occasions that involve
step-children and blended families is a challenge. And, it is a
challenge that many people in our current culture must learn to meet.
On top of that, nobody seems to want to open dialogue about it almost
as if it is taboo topic. I don't understand that, really. It only
makes sense to me to talk about the realities and challenges of the
situation honestly in an effort to share and gather information
rather than continually falling on one's face trying to figure it
out. But, that's just me. I have spent a lot of time asking questions
and found very few honest answers. Most of what I got was a response
of denial that it was even an issue. Some people are more than happy
to pretend that everything is hunky dorey and even more seem to enjoy
feeding off the potential drama of the situation making it worse for
the most vulnerable in the mix, the child.
Instead of working together to make the
experience the best for the children involved people can fall prey to
the overwhelming needs of their own ego...much like I did and
sometimes still struggle with. It's a real thing and not addressing
it is like inviting the elephant in the room to sit down at your
holiday table which really takes away from the potential enjoyment of
the season for everyone. Power struggles ensue. Children are used as
bargaining chips and all too often, guilting and shaming are involved
on some level, too, whether that be directed toward ourselves or sent
out as a manipulation tool toward the other parent or even directed
at the children involved.
The truth is, a child deserves to be
surrounded by as many people that love and care for them that exists.
This is the situation of their life that was decided by the adults
that are currently in charge of managing it. Most of the time the
child had no choice in the matter; but, they up end being the ones
who bear the brunt of the crap that comes along with the situation
even if the adults involved are the only one's chronically
complaining about it.
There is no reason for the people who
truly share love for a child to fight and quibble over scheduling or
to allow feelings of jealousy toward the absent parent or the child's
affinity for them to increase the potential discomfort that can
accompany trying to pull together a family gathering. It's just
unnecessary-- a distraction from the true purpose of the gathering to
begin with.
Still yet, this is not an easy
conclusion to come to; and. it's more difficult to pull off than what
my rose-colored picture of the potentials paint it to be. There are
often hurt feelings and resentment involved. We are, after all, human
each with our own insecurities and individual quirks that sometimes
operate subconsciously and off their leash. Of course, it is our job
as adults to come to terms with that instead of casting that burden
on our kids or someone else's.
Are you a step-parent or a step-child?
What insight can you give to the rest of us about how to handle such
things (holidays/special occasions) effectively within that type of
family dynamic? I'm all ears at missuscase@yahoo.com.
I'd love to receive enough feedback to share the cumulative advice
before Christmas settles in. If you are so generously inclined to
share, good and bad experiences are welcome as each can be used as
valuable learning tools. Of course, your identifying information will
only be used with your permission. Otherwise, I'll give you a super
secret “pen name” for the purposes of that write-up. And, while
I'm at it, THANK YOU to my own step-parents, Roxanne and Jim, for
providing such a wonderful example of how to do the job right.
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