Helping your Stepfamily over the Holidays – ‘The Survival Guide’

Contemporary Australian families look significantly different to what they did a generation ago.  There are new and old parents and partners and siblings, not to mention different cultures, religions and traditions –step and blended families face unique difficulties over this so called “most wonderful time of the year”.

“More than a million of us are in stepfamilies, and they can be a truly wonderful yet sometimes challenging experience,” notes Stepfamilies Australia Executive, Phoebe Wallish.

Peak organisation STEPFAMILIES AUSTRALIA has released a ‘Stepfamily Survival Guide for the Holidays’, as well as offering a useful free app to help the 1 in 5 of us in step/blended families to harness positive communication.

GUIDE TO STEPPING UP TO A LESS STRESSFUL HOLIDAY SEASON:

1. Be realistic with your expectations – It is the season of giving – so ‘give’ a little, accept that it not always possible to please everyone, including yourself! You may have to divide up your holidays or ‘your time’ with the children.  It doesn’t all have to be on the one day, suggest options and be open to later in the week or even in the New Year, it’s the getting together not the day that counts.
2. Spending time rather than money – Presents are good but children do want happy, fun and calm times with their parents and their families – these are the memories that they store and recall as adults.  Make sure the experiences and memories are good by making the most of the time together.
3. Honour the ‘old’ and Create the ‘new’.  Ensure you keep some traditions from before you blended, as kids hold onto these, but also start to create new traditions as stepfamily. It is as a good opportunity to involved everyone to ‘cherry-pick’ the best of your combined and collective family histories and experiences.
4. Offer time, support and understanding – particularly for stepchildren and stepsiblings, acknowledging at first that they have no shared family histories. Don’t pressure kids to feel or act in certain ways. Make the time special for all whatever it might look like.
5. Remember perfect families don’t exist – Despite manufactured, media images of perfect families – no family (stepfamily or otherwise) is immune from holiday conflicts, divided loyalties, competition. Try to be in the moment and enjoy what you can – All things pass – including the good and the bad – knowing this can help.
6. Long-distance parenting can be hard, particularly at this time of year – Make sure you plan ahead and have something positive for yourself to do on the day.  You may not be able to be there with your children but keep communication open and positive – Kids these days are happy to use phones, texts or email.  It is not the same, but it is the next best thing and you will have something to share when you next see one another.

Using our FREE family-based app such as MyMob allows family members to communicate – share photos, messages and information like you might do across the family table, but in a safe, online application.

If it is already seeming to be all too hard reach out and get some advice early – it can be the most positive thing you can do for yourself and your children.  Head to Stepfamilies Australia website. We also have an interactive Facebook page and can help connect you with others in the same situation for support! Or if you need activities to help engage the kids try our boredom busters for primary school aged kids.

INTERVIEWS:

For all media enquires please contact Phoebe Wallish on 0411 484 879 or phoebe.wallish@ds.org.au

Stats you might find helpful:

• 76% of homeless teens come from step and sole parent families (Chamberlain and MacKenzie)
• 1 in 5 children and young people will grow up in stepfamilies (survey of family research by Pryor and Rodgers, Children in Changing Families: Life after parental separation, Blackwell, 2001)
• One in 3 marriages is now a remarriage and half of stepfamily couples do not marry (ABS)
• Family breakdown costs the community $3 billion per year (Commonwealth Parliament Committee report 1998)
• Stepfamily breakdown rates are twice those of first families – (AIFS research)
• If parents are not coping with relationship breakdown then they don’t parent well, leading to issues for their children including: higher incidence of mental health issues, drug and alcohol abuse, early teen pregnancy and school leaving, homelessness, antisocial behaviour, crime and suicide

KEEPING OURSELVES WELL DURING THE NEXT STEPS ON THE ROAD TO EQUALITY

A YES vote is for equality and love.  It is also a resounding NO to institutional and legal discrimination, divisiveness and invalidating LGBTIQ experiences, relationships and who we are. The ‘YES’ vote brings some relief and elation.  It is an important milestone for the Australian community. It finally acknowledges and recognises the equal value and status of relationships.  We are now a little bit further down the road, via a route we were forced to travel. What are the next steps?  Not just for LGBTIQ communities, but for all, including our elected representatives?

During this postal survey there has been much love and support shown to the LGBTIQ community.  There has also been a sanctioned diatribe of cruel, hurtful and hateful speech, as part of a sustained campaign of vilification and misinformation.  The Australian community is rightly concerned about youth mental health, which for LGBTIQ young people shamefully remains at 47%.  The mental health impacts have been distressingly clear throughout this process.   At queerspace, we see every day the hurt and marginalisation of children, young people and adults and their families.   This hopefully will abate depending on the actions of the parliament.

Despite a YES vote today, there will be the expected opining for the freedom to discriminate, according to selective religious doctrine.  In excruciating and insensitive details the cherished principles of equality and freedom will be further undermined and repositioned to protect an antiquated, narrow vision of Australian life and families. Followed by appeasements and work-rounds to delay and ultimately impede the decision of the Australian people.

Karen Field, CEO, drummond street services, says, “This survey throughout the debate confirms what many LGBTIQ organisations have attested for two years. The LGBTIQ community have experienced sustained attacks, lies and vilification since this idea of a plebiscite was exhorted and led by Abbott.  It was quashed by the Australian Senate, only to morph into a postal survey.  This is after the aggressive attacks and dismantling of the Safe School program…This has not been just about this survey and the mental health mobs are playing catch up with what we have seen for two years, It’s time to do the right thing”.

This vote shows that equality is our collective vision.  It is now up to our parliamentarians who represent US to make good of what they had in fact failed to do from the outset.

At queerspace we will continue to provide much needed support and safe spaces. It will continue to be delivered by highly skilled mental health practitioners, despite many enduring their own personal impacts during this survey.

queerspace has proudly advocated throughout the Marriage Equality campaign to ensure the experiences of LGBTIQ people are heard, seen and affirmed. Now as we progress, and hopefully this final phase, in enshrining and enacting of equality, only then will we know that ‘advance Australia fair’ is a 21^st century nation that extends its ‘fair go’ ethos to all.

queerspace has released a video outlining self-care tips for the LGBTIQ communities during this time:

https://ds.org.au/queerspace-self-care-tips/

PROTRACTED CAMPAIGN WILL TAKE MENTAL HEALTH TOLL ON VULNERABLE AUSTRALIANS

drummond street services, a family support agency that provides counselling and support to LGBTIQ people and their families, warns that the rolling Canberra leadership fail – which instead of action offers a compromised plebiscite in the form of a costly postal survey – will trigger months of mental anguish, and pose a potential suicide risk, to many already vulnerable Australians, leaving the community to bear the costs and the impacts.

Throughout the protracted marriage equality debate/s the agency has continued to see high demand in distress counselling as the same-sex marriage debate degenerates into an emotive and unresolved political brawl, where gamesmanship has overridden leadership for the people. The toll it takes on individuals and their families is stark.    From social media to the street, incidents of bullying increase dramatically and (far from being democracy in action) the plebiscite becomes a damaging battering ram for vested interests – now to extend across many excruciating months.

drummond street services CEO Karen Field says, “Once again a plebiscite is put forward without any real consideration or understanding of the impacts.   It encourages hate, vilification, on-line bullying and sanctioned hate speech.”

“Imagine what $120 million could do if it was allocated to youth mental health, recognising that suicide rates are on the rise and LGBTIQ young people and their families carry this burden in disproportionate numbers.”

“Wait lists continue to extend for months, with our practitioners having to respond to young people in immediate danger of self-harm or suicide.”

“When politicians weigh in to this debate, or when articles appear in the paper, we experience a spike in calls – as well as posts on our social media – from distressed young people and their worried families” says Field.

“Politicians rightly exhort evidence-based practice.  Well LGBTIQ people tell us, as does research from around the world and by drummond street services itself, that individuals in the LGBTIQ community are at a greater risk on a range of health indicators, including mental health. As a group they are also less likely to seek help from mainstream services.

Anxiety and depression are particularly common, and many of drummond street’s clients fear hearing the next round of debate in the media and being exposed to insulting, demeaning or ignorant comments.

Parents of young clients have said that they are suddenly finding themselves confronted by public hurtful commentary about their children which, in the words of one parent “feels exactly as though my child is being bullied by the whole country”. 

Field says, “Young LGBTIQ people are listening to politicians and social commentators and it is causing immeasurable distress to them. Our leaders have a responsibility to these vulnerable young people and, like all adults, they need to think carefully about where their words land, and what damage they can do.”

drummond street services implores politicians, and others in the media, to take responsibility for the impact of their comments on young and vulnerable members of the LGBTIQ community. These are times when greater compassion and acceptance is needed and could save lives.

drummond street services calls on all federal parliamentarians to ‘stop the delaying tactics and consider the impacts on LGBTIQ families and young people and their allies’.  ‘Leadership is needed – and this means our elected representatives need to use the parliament to change the law, not further impede through costly administrative processes wrongly touted as direct democracy’

Politicians may have ‘gone postal’ but let us speak up and out and stop this hurt and hate by letting our Australian parliament do its job, and stop the costs on the Australian public and, worse still, the costs of the wellbeing and health of LGBTIQ people, their families and their children.

Mental Health Support Service Deeply Concerned About the Impact of the Marriage Equality Plebiscite – Continues to experience two-fold increase in LGBTIQ Clients and their Families

drummond street services, a Victorian-based family support agency that provides specialist counselling and support to LGBTIQ people and their families, continues to experience an increase in demand for mental health support.

Karen Field, CEO says, “we are deeply concerned about the impact of the planned Plebiscite, and as the Parliament debates and plays their political manoeuvres this week, the real impacts and distress of LGBTIQ people goes on.  I spent the recent weekend at a Rainbow Families forum where LGBTIQ community members; mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, friends and family members, shared their distress or that of their children who are experiencing increased bullying and assaults; in the school grounds, on the street and on Facebook.  This Plebisicite touted as democracy in action is a platform for prejudice and judgement, essentially giving permission to insult and offend – which the parallel debate on Section 18C contributes to a community and political discourse which is saying it is still OK to discriminate”.

drummond street services is also experiencing increased presentations of Sex and Gender Diverse young people, (as young as 4 years of age) seeking support, who are depressed,anxious, self-harming and suicidal.   Our clients are also conveying stories of verbal and physical attacks in public, workplaces and via social media.

The very public social commentary over the past 12 months is likely to worsen, giving license for not only the small but negative homophobic and transphobic elements within the broader community; the ‘usual suspects’, but more alarming is the possibility of government-funded discrimination and endorsement from those who are expected to lead, represent and embody the best of community standards.

LGBTIQ clients are telling us of discrimination where shops, taxis and even health care providers are refusing to provide services.  The Plebsicite and its ensuing debate is like entering a time machine taking us back to an era that many Australians thought had been finally resigned to history.

In the previous year drummond street services’ queerspace mental health clinical program saw 470 LGBTIQ clients, with this figure rising to approximately 700 clients in 2016. We are also seeing increasing levels of trauma in an already vulnerable community.  It is important to emphasise that the LGBTIQ community experience some of the highest rates of mental ill health, self-harm and suicide, high levels of family and community violence, homelessness, disrupted schooling and poor health. Our clinical data from the past 12 months shows we supported:

• 687 LGBTIQ clients
• 91 clients  trans or gender diverse
• 144 cases were sex and gender diverse children and young people (under 25 years) and their families
• 62% of all LGBTIQ cases involved previous histories of family and or community violence and a range of co-occurring health risk issues.

“Our waitlists extend for months, though often our staff are having to dispense with waitlists in order to respond to LGBTIQ young people and adults in immediate danger of self-harm or suicide.” When social commentators, politicians and media cover the Plebiscite debate, we experience a spike in calls and posts to our social media from distressed LGBTIQ people and their worried families – it becomes very personal” says Field.

“As a mental health provider to this vulnerable community we implore our political leaders to stop this damaging Plebiscite when we have significant evidence that it will cause irreparable further harm to the LGBTIQ community and their families. We fear that if it does go ahead, our service will not be able to meet the already increased demand for mental health services for this community and thought must be given to providing increased support to respond to its obvious impact.

Instead of funding an expensive Plebiscite, how about funding for mental health support?”

Karen Field

Chief Executive Officer

drummond street services – based on its long-held values and mission of inclusiveness and social justices recognises the right of our lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex employees, volunteers, clients and families, children and communities to live, work, love and be who they are; free of prejudice and discrimination.

We also know through our relationship and mental health work – how important and protective a loving relationship and home environment is for individuals and children’s mental health.  This is irrespective of their gender, sexual or cultural identity.

We also recognise that enshrining human rights in law and addressing discrimination and prejudice are essential to promoting positive mental health.

This includes the right to marry the partner of their choice.

Through our mental health and family, children and community support work, we too often see the negative impacts that bullying, racism, homophobia and transphobia and exclusion has on children, young people and adults wellbeing.   Our own research and broader evidence confirms the corrosive, damaging and dangerous consequences for people on their sense of self, their safety and their ability to participate and contribute fully and sometime on their willingness to live.

drummond street services takes seriously its role as a community resource, support and advocate and its positive contribution to the mental health and wellbeing of people and as well to broader community discourse.

• Our service delivery role – Our commitment to social justice and our support to those who are the most disadvantaged and marginalised or at times in their lives when they are vulnerable.
• Our community role – Supporting the expression of the collective interests, strengths and resources within communities and to address issues of concerns, needs and aspirations.
• Our political role – As an advocate and representative of those often not always visible in public policy and service design and to ensure public policy and programs are citizenfocused and as an active and positive contributor to social policy discourse.

It is in this context we are deeply concerned about the mental health impacts on the LGBTIQ communities and their families, their children and allies as part of the marriage equality and safe schools debate.  It is important to emphasise and reiterate that many in the LGBTIQ community experience some of the highest rates of mental ill health, self-harm and suicide, high levels of family and community violence, homelessness, disrupted schooling, poor employment and welfare dependency.

It is not only a matter of good and just public policy that preventative efforts start with all of us and the treatment of one another but also to invest in support to ensure people – no matter their age, income, origin, faith, culture, orientation, gender or sexual identities – have the opportunity to contribute and live and love their lives and those of their significant others and their families without shame, discrimination and judgement.

#fundsupportnothate

Karen Field

Chief Executive Officer

 “But God I feel so glad … When he calls me Dad.”

-Weddings Parties Anything –

Father’s Day

Too many “men” have been in the news for all the wrong reasons in recent times, especially with the scourge of domestic violence being rightly exposed and discussed more openly than ever before.   But this Father’s Day (Sept 4) gives all of us the chance to acknowledge the many great Australian men who make their families a far better place.

Stepfamilies Australia says Father’s Day is a time to celebrate great Dads (and their many great deeds) in all shapes and forms – including StepDads and Separated and Divorced Dads.

“Being a great Dad can be something that goes without much fanfare, especially in Australia, and especially in a world where many families are blended and ongoing worksin-progress,” notes Stepfamilies Australia CEO Karen Field.

“From our point of view, we particularly note the pressures and challenges of men who find themselves as a Step-Father, or a biological Dad adjusting to his children and expartner being in new circumstances.”

“It can be tough and it can be rough, but many Aussie men are not part of ‘those’ headlines.  They are getting on with life as best they can, and making a difference through the love of their children.  And they are certainly worth applauding this Father’s Day.”

OUR DIVERSE DADS MAKING A DIFFERENCE

Being a Dad can mean many different things to many different men in Australia. Click here to see what the ‘Fatherhood Factor’ means to our diverse Dads

With one-in-five families now a stepfamily, representing some 300,000 children, Father’s Day also means many different emotions and challenges for many men – and a time to acknowledge those Australians making a positive difference to the children in their lives.

For those Dads no longer living with their children, and for StepDads trying to build bridges within their new families, Stepfamilies Australia has created a smartphone app called MyMob to allow people to communicate on their own terms and in their own time.

MyMob is free and available on iPhone, iPad and Android devices.  It allows family members to share messages, photos and information – just as you might do across the kitchen table, but in a safe, online environment.

At the Stepfamilies Australia website www.stepfamily.org.au you can find further information for tips, resources and links to advice and support that promote the best outcomes for Dads, Mums and young people.

Extended … Blended … Mended … Fended … Tendered … Remembered… Suspended … Intended …

For an increasing number of Australians, including an estimated 300,000 children, stepfamilies are the new normal.  But it can seem anything but normal.  The experience can be both wonderful for children and parents alike, or brutally challenging and a vital work in progress.
 
Monday July 25 is National Stepfamilies Awareness Day and peak organisation, Stepfamilies Australia, is asking all Australians to both celebrate and support those people making their way forward in stepfamilies.   

“One in five of our families is now a stepfamily, notes Stepfamilies Australia CEO Karen Field.  “So it’s a reality for a great many Australians and worth recognising, thinking about and talking about.”

“Certainly stepfamilies can be a wonderful place, but it would be wrong to think that the blending of strangers, along with possible emotional hurt and baggage, will deliver an instant ‘Brady Bunch’ outcome.

“Stepfamilies can be tough, tough places for many people, including kids.   It’s something we’ve long acknowledged here at Stepfamilies Australia, and that’s why we’ve broken ground in producing the MyMob phone App, which creates channels for people to connect and build on their relationships.”

NEW BEGINNINGS AND BUILDING BETTER FUTURES

Using family-based apps such as MyMob allows family members to communicate; share photos, messages and information, like you might do across the family table, but in a safe, online environment.  MyMob is a free app available on IPhone, IPAD and Android devices.  It allows people to connect on their own terms, and take things from there.

Taking on the care of somebody’s children is always something that deserves our acknowledgement, respect, appreciation and celebration.  National Stepfamilies Awareness Day is also a time to give thanks to those parents who are not only building a new relationship with their partner, but their partner’s children.

At the Stepfamilies Australia website www.stepfamily.org.au you can find further information for tips, resources and links to advice and support that promote the best outcomes for children, young people, parents and stepparents.

Recognising Stepmothers on Mother’s Day – May 8th

There are an estimated 300,000 children who live with a stepparent in Australia.  Most stepparents start off as strangers and with care, patience, persistence, love and time build strong, supportive relationships can develop between a stepparent and the children within these families.

How can we acknowledge the tens of thousands of Australians who care for children, despite not having the biological and legal recognitions that parents have, or when the two primary parents are not living together?

The work we do through Stepfamilies Australia (www.stepfamily.org.au) brings us in contact with many stepparents, including stepmothers,  Every year, as  Mother’s Day approaches, they ask for advice on how they should behave or the expectations they should have on Mother’s Day? How their family and the broader community recognise their contributions in their care for children on this day and every day?

Mother’s Day is just one day of 365 days to recognise and acknowledge the role of all women and all female carers; mothers, stepmothers, grandmothers, guardians, carers in their often unsung and unpaid roles as carers of Australian children.  Biology is not the only determinant of family relationships, with contemporary Australian families coming in many different forms, histories and origins and they give their all, do their best as many Australians parents strive to deal with the changes and transitions that are normal as part of contemporary family life.

On Mother’s Day or any other day a child should not be coerced to thank their stepparent. However, encouragement from their biological or primary parents to offer some thanks and acknowledgement of their mothers, and their stepmothers, as well as the role of women in their caring roles on this designated Mother’s Day.

When getting your kids to write up a Mother’s Day card whether at home or school – it is important that we acknowledge ‘other’ families as well.

Mother’s Day cards could include;

“We have our own special step relationship and for that you deserve a (Step) Mother’s Day card”;

“Many women can be mothers, but it is just as special to be a stepmother”;

“Dear Stepmum, it hasn’t always been easy, but I thank you for being there for us even when things were hard”.

“I know you’re not ‘technically’ my mother but without you I wouldn’t be who I am today and for that I thank you. Happy (Step) Mother’s Day!”

If children and young people cannot thank their Stepmothers on Mother’s Day, there are other ways that parents can do to ensure the day does not go without being acknowledged.  This includes use of technology such as smartphones or a family-based phone app such as My Mob (www.mymob.com) a positive communication tool developed by Stepfamilies Australia for children, parents, stepparents and carers to connect and communicate with children and one another no matter where they are.

Taking on the care of somebody’s children is always something that deserves our acknowledgement, respect, appreciation and celebration.

At the Stepfamilies Australia website www.stepfamily.org.au you can find further information for tips, resources and links to advice and support that promote the best outcomes for children, young people, parents and stepparents.

Using family-based apps such as MyMob (www.mymob.com) allows family members to communicate; share photos, messages and information, like you might do across the family table, but in a safe, online environment.  Get your kids to show how to use technology to help better communicate.  MyMob is a free app available on IPhone, IPAD and Android devices

drummond street services, a family support agency that provides counselling and support to LGBTIQ people and their families, is experiencing a spike in calls from anxious and distressed youth.

drummond street services CEO Karen Field says, “Since the plebiscite became a regular topic in the media we have doubled our number of clinical cases. Young people are presenting in increasing numbers with anxiety, self-harming behaviours, and thoughts of suicide.”

“Our waiting lists extend for months, though often our staff are having to dispense with the waiting list in order to respond to young people in immediate danger of selfharm or suicide.”

“When politicians weigh in to this debate, or when articles appear in the paper, we experience a spike in calls – as well as posts on our social media – from distressed young people and their worried families” says Field. “And when there are attacks on the very structures created to support them, such as Safe Schools Coalition, it becomes very personal.”

This is a particularly vulnerable group of people. Research from around the world, and by drummond street services itself, finds that individuals in the LGBTIQ community are at a greater risk on a range of health indicators, including mental health, and physical health issues such as diabetes and cancer. As a group they are also less likely to seek help than the mainstream.

Anxiety and depression are particularly common, and many of drummond street’s clients report heightened fear of hearing the next round of debate in the media and being exposed to insulting, demeaning or ignorant comments.

Parents of young clients have said that they are suddenly finding themselves confronted by public hurtful commentary about their children which, in the words of one parent. “feels exactly as though my child is being bullied”.

Field says, “Young LGBTIQ people are listening to politicians and social commentators and it is causing immeasurable distress to them. Our leaders have a responsibility to these vulnerable young people and, like all adults, they need to think carefully about where their words land, and what damage they can do.”

drummond street implores politicians, and others in the media, to take responsibility for the impact of their comments on young and vulnerable members of the LGBTIQ community. This is a time when compassion could save a life.

Tens-of-thousands of Australians are currently filled with dread, contemplating the social minefield known as the Xmas Holidays.  They are among the 1-in-5 Australians who are part of a stepfamily.   For many of them, the interaction that comes with this season is an emotional battle with their past, their identity and their future.

Peak organisation STEPFAMILIES AUSTRALIA www.stepfamily.org.au has released a ‘Stepfamily Survival Guide for the Holidays’, as well as offering useful new apps to help people communicate on their own terms.

“More than a million of us are in stepfamilies, and they can be a truly wonderful experience,” notes Stepfamilies Australia CEO Karen Field.

“But blended doesn’t always mean mended, and emotions can be particularly raw at this time of year – especially when dealing with new and old parents and partners and siblings, not to mention different cultures, religions and traditions.”

GUIDE TO STEPPING UP TO A LESS STRESSFUL CHRISTMAS SEASON

It is the season of giving – so ‘give’ a little and be realistic about your expectations. Welcome the season of Christmas compromise by accepting that it not always possible to please everyone, including yourself. You may have to divide up your holidays or ‘your time’ with the children.  It doesn’t all have to be on the one day, suggest options and be open to later in the week or even in the New Year, it’s the getting together not the day that counts.

Spending time rather than spending money is more important – It is a self-evident statement but at this time of year can be easily forgotten.  Presents are good but children do want happy, fun and calm times with their parents and their families – Remember children’s experience of this time and their summer holidays is the very thing they commit to memory and recall as adults.  Make sure they are good memories and make the most of the time together.

Honour the ‘old’ and Create the ‘new’.  Keep hold of some of the traditions or ways, particularly those that some family members hold important to them, but also start to create new traditions as stepfamily.  See it is as a good opportunity to ‘cherry-pick’ the best of your combined and collective family histories and experiences.

Offer time, support and understanding, particularly for stepchildren and stepsiblings, acknowledging at first that they have no shared family histories. Don’t pressure kids to feel or act in certain ways. Make the time special for all whatever it might look like.

Perfect families don’t exist.  Despite manufactured, media images of perfect families – no family (stepfamily or otherwise) is immune from holiday conflicts, divided loyalties, competition.  So try to relax and enjoy what you can – All things pass – including the good and the bad – knowing this can help to be more in the moment or future-focused.

Long-distance parenting can be hard, particularly at this time of year.  Make sure you plan ahead and have something positive for yourself to do on the day.  You may not be able to be there with your children but plan your arrangements early and use technology to keep communication open and positive.  Kids these days are happy to use phones, texts or email.  It is not the same, but it is the next best thing and you will have something to share when you next see one another.

Using family-based apps such as MyMob www.mymob.com allows family members to communicate – share photos, messages and information like you might do across the family table but in a safe, online application.  Get your kids to show how to use technology to help better communicate.

Know that it is normal for the early days and indeed years of stepfamily life to be tough; wrangling expectations, arrangements, schedules, with clashing traditions and other people’s expectations.  If it is getting all too hard or a little bit of stress is becoming a lot of distress – It is important to seek help or get some advice early – it can be the most positive thing you can do for yourself and your children.