Your Stepfamily, Standing Strong (Part 1) - Ron Deal

Blended Families

FamilyLife Today® Radio Transcript

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The Myth of the Ideal Stepfamily

Guest: Ron Deal

From the series: Your Stepfamily: Standing Strong

Bob: Regardless of the circumstances, you may find yourself in a Brady Bunch of your own today, one that looks different than the TV family looked. Here is Ron Deal.

Ron: "Blended family" is the most popular term, but the point we like to make about that is that most stepfamilies don't blend. If they do, somebody usually gets creamed in the process. It's really a misnomer to use the term "blended family". To me, it doesn't matter so much what families call themselves. What they need to do is recognize that they have a different kind of family. Learning how it operates, and how it works, and how they can make their family successful—that's what's really important.

Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Monday, April 23rd. Our host is the President of FamilyLife®, Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine. If your special family is facing some special challenges, we’ve got some help for you today. Stay tuned.

And welcome to FamilyLife Today. Thanks for joining us on the Monday edition. A few years ago, I took my three boys—Mary Ann and I—took the boys. We went to LEGOLAND®. Now, you haven't been to LEGOLAND—

Dennis: No, but I remember when you went. You were really impressed.

Bob: We were excited to go to LEGOLAND because our boys really are into—they love Legos®. Well, the most exciting ride at LEGOLAND, which, by the way, when we were there, it was all geared for kids 12 and under.

Dennis: People are wondering where LEGOLAND is, Bob.

Bob: Oh, LEGOLAND is in—it’s just north of San Diego. It's geared for kids who are 12 and under. There aren't a whole lot of scary thrill rides. There is one rollercoaster, and it's moderately exciting as rollercoasters go. My son, John, wasn't sure he wanted to ride on the rollercoaster. We coaxed him and said, "Come on! You'll have fun. You'll like it. It's not that scary."

We all got on the rollercoaster. We got all done; and Jimmy, who is a little older than John, said, "That was cool! Let's do it again." John said, "I am not doing that again." He didn't ride the rollercoaster the rest of the day.

Now, I tell that story because, for a lot of couples, Dennis, who have gone on a marriage rollercoaster and have wound up apart—there's been a divorce—they look at the marital rollercoaster a second time; and they go, "That's scary. Can we really make this thing work better the second time than we did the first time?" A lot of them aren't sure they want to head on that ride again. Then, those who get on it wonder, "How are we going to fix the problems when they come up this time?"

Dennis: That's right. Not everybody, Bob, who ends up on that stepfamily rollercoaster ends up there because of divorce. Some end up there because of the death of a spouse. They now find themselves strapped into a seat with all the turns, and ups, and downs, and they're wondering, "How do you build a successful stepfamily?"

I want you to know, as a listener, we listen to you, too. We listen to you on the internet, when you go to FamilyLife.com, and you tell us what you'd like to hear us talk about, here on the broadcast. We also listen to you when you call into our 800 number. We take notes. One of the areas you've been asking us to do some work in is in the area of stepfamilies.

I want you to know that we have searched across the country; and in our own backyard in Jonesboro, Arkansas—which, yes, it is in the United States—but in Jonesboro, Arkansas, we uncovered a great resource that we want to share with you over the next few days, here on the broadcast. His name is Ron Deal. Ron, I want to welcome you to LEGOLAND and the rollercoaster ride of stepfamilies. Welcome to FamilyLife Today.

Ron: Thank you. It is a great honor to be here.

Dennis: He is on the Advisory Council of the Stepfamily Association of America, and he does seminars all across the country called "Building a Successful Stepfamily". I've got to tell this story on Ron, as I introduce him. I am in the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. Ron comes up to me, and introduces himself, and gives me his card. I ask him to send me some of his stuff because he told me he was working in the area of blended families or stepfamilies.

I said, "Man! There is a tremendous need there. Send it on." He sent it. We've been in dialog, over the past few years, talking about this material and how we can bring it to our listeners. I'm excited to feature Ron this week and talk about how we can equip stepfamilies, not only in helping them make their marriage go the distance, but also be successful as parents.

Now, when we come to the subject of stepfamilies, Ron, I think maybe the majority of us, who are married, underestimate the number of people who presently are in stepfamily relationships. How prevalent is it?

Ron: The numbers are really pretty staggering, especially to people that are unfamiliar with how many stepfamilies are out there. Currently, every day in America, there are 1,300 new stepfamilies. By the way, these statistics that I'm about to give you are anywhere from five to ten years old. We don't have any real recent statistics. So, we've got to keep that in mind. In other words, there are probably more than even what we're saying now.

One out of three Americans right now, in the United States, is either a stepparent, a stepchild, a step-sibling, or somehow related to a stepfamily—one out of three. With the life projections as they seem to be, it looks like one out of two of us will have a step-relationship at some point in our lifetime.

Dennis: You know, we've done a good bit of research at our FamilyLife Marriage Conferences. Bob, you know, you speak at the conferences. Up to 30 percent of those who attend our conferences are in stepfamilies. I think we assume that stepfamilies have the same life expectancy as a regular family. That's not so; is it, Ron?

Ron: No, it's not. In fact, the divorce rate for remarriage is 60 percent. There are some numbers that indicate that it's more than that. By the way, I need to kind of qualify that statistic. We don't have a statistic that tells us what the divorce rate is for stepfamily couples. We only have a rate for remarriage. Now, some remarriages don't involve children. Obviously, the bulk of remarriages do involve children and qual...