Dates, Mates and Babies with the Vallottons
Dates, Mates and Babies with the Vallottons
106. Blending Well: Stories and Strategies for Blended Family Success
Blending a family is both rewarding and challenging, requiring intentionality, patience, and a strong foundation. In this episode of Dates, Mates, and Babies with the Vallottons, Lauren and Jason dive into the key strategies for creating a thriving blended family.
They discuss the importance of building trust with stepchildren, emphasizing that the biological parent should take the lead in discipline while the stepparent focuses on connection. They explore how to find your lane—leaning into natural strengths to foster strong relationships with the kids.
Common challenges in blended families are also addressed, including different parenting styles, loyalty conflicts, and emotional wounds from past relationships. Lauren and Jay break down how to navigate discipline and authority, ensuring unity between spouses without creating resentment.
The conversation highlights the importance of setting realistic expectations, recognizing that blending takes time and requires a united front. They stress that prioritizing the marriage is essential—not only for the couple but for the entire family dynamic. When the marriage is strong, children feel secure and receive the stability they need.
Finally, they tackle the complexities of co-parenting with ex-spouses, offering wisdom on handling interactions with grace and firm boundaries.
Whether you’re newly blending a family or years into the journey, this episode provides practical tools to build trust, navigate challenges, and create a home where everyone can thrive. Tune in for an insightful and encouraging discussion!
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We're the Valetans and we are passionate about people.
Speaker 1:Every human was created for fulfilling relational connection.
Speaker 2:But that's not always what comes easiest.
Speaker 1:We know this because of our wide range of personal experience, as well as our years of working with people.
Speaker 2:So we're going to crack open topics like dating, marriage, family and parenting to encourage, entertain and equip you for a deeply fulfilling life of relational health.
Speaker 1:Welcome back everyone to Dates, mates and Babies. With the Valetins Y'all. We have been all over the East and the West Coast.
Speaker 2:It's been a busy first quarter of the year, honestly. I looked at our calendar in December and I was like, wow. Normally the first quarter is kind of like where you take a deep breath, you get reset, you clean your house Not the Valatons, not our house. No, I don't think our floors have been cleaned since Christmas.
Speaker 1:Honestly, Except for by our pup Pepper yeah.
Speaker 2:Busy times, but good stuff.
Speaker 1:Really great. Went to South Carolina. Our friend got married. Congratulations, Summer and Tyler. Woo-hoo.
Speaker 2:Mr and Mrs Thigpen, joy of our life was to see our bestie get married to the most amazing man.
Speaker 1:Oh man. That was a fun trip. We had a men's retreat this weekend. For all those Braveco men out there that are listening to this podcast.
Speaker 2:Yes, the future is bright, men, it is.
Speaker 1:We had an incredible time, but now we're back. We are. We had an incredible time, but now we're back. We are. We're ready, more ready than we've ever been.
Speaker 2:It's true we're really excited about our topic. We haven't talked about blended families in quite some time, but it's on the mind. We have in our small circle of close friends. We have several people that are either in the early phase of blending a family, having just been married, and or are in the dating phase of exploring do. We want to blend this family and you know, now that we're nearly 14 years into our blended family journey, we're learning new things all the time. It really does feel like a new season in our family.
Speaker 2:We're so enjoying having small children and also adult children at the same time, and we're still a blended family even though our big kids are big Gosh. We're always learning because ultimately, the goal for any family is close connection. But today we thought that we would unpack in honor of some of our dear friends who are on this wild journey. For them and for any of you listening that this pertains to, we wanted to kind of unpack just some real keys to success in those early years of blending a family Right, babe, because it's so easy. So we thought like we might just tell people. It's real simple.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean starting off. There's so many challenges when just getting married, in general, right, you have your differences and all that, but when you're blending a family, starting off in marriage is a little bit more challenging and tricky. Like you have to go into it, being so incredibly intentional and really thinking through how are we going to be a united front for these little kiddos?
Speaker 2:Yeah, big or small really.
Speaker 1:Big or small? Yeah, that's true. And what does our marriage look like? And how do we set our family up for success. Babe, what do you feel like was the hardest part for you?
Speaker 2:Well, no doubt the hardest part for me was making that huge leap from being a single woman who really had the luxury of just thinking primarily about myself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Overnight she went from doing all her makeup alone and sleeping in a bed alone and-.
Speaker 2:Controlling the cleanliness of my room and my house.
Speaker 1:To not right.
Speaker 2:Having four roommates, yeah, but not just four roommates like three, of which did very little to contribute.
Speaker 1:They took they took it, took it, took it.
Speaker 2:They were takers at first.
Speaker 1:I remember in the early years you would break down and start crying and be like I'm just not used to like not having any space, the claustrophobia, the claustrophobia was the biggest thing for me.
Speaker 2:So you know, and that may have been unique to just the season of life our family was in Our kids were 12, nine and six when we got married. Those are young ages. They really require a lot and they're very there, right, like your kids are really around a lot when they're at those ages. And so you know, for me the biggest challenge internally was just the feeling of I didn't know where to go to be alone. I mean, that's when the shower became my like retreat. To this day, if I'm stressed out, it's like I've programmed my body to need a shower.
Speaker 2:If I'm overwhelmed, it's just like where my subconscious knows to go to be alone. So yeah't just my home. This home needs to feel good for everyone and I now don't get to just do the things I want to do in this space. I have to run it past, like all these other people, and primarily you. Obviously, you and I worked hard and we'll talk about this a little bit to be a team, but you know the kids needed to have a say about a lot of things because it's a transition for them as well. So that was that was really hard, I would say last, so that you know, sharing space with a large amount of people was, was adjustment.
Speaker 2:But the other thing that I found profoundly challenging was um, balancing this new found like deep sense of responsibility that I felt very quickly for making sure these kids had what they needed. Like I felt a huge amount of pressure to be what they needed me to be and I was having to figure out what is that role anyways? What do they need me to be? But I felt more responsibility even than I had control, and I felt more responsibility than I had percentage of decision-making power. Does that make sense? So I felt this weight of responsibility and I didn't know what to do with it all the time, because it wasn't fully my say, it was yours partially, it was their biological mothers partially, and figuring out how to do that as a team was very, very, very hard for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you have to reset the expectation and have the right expectation for you, ultimately right Coming in of what is your responsibility and what's not your responsibility. And because, as a person, for you especially like as someone who teeters on over responsibility, oh yeah, I live there really, Teeter, that's kind of you.
Speaker 2:I live in that dark land.
Speaker 1:I have to sleep with you tonight. Yeah, that was a really big piece and I think for a lot of women it is coming into, especially if the guy is the one that has the kids coming in. Is man, the idea that you're going to come in and whip this house into shape and set everyone up for success and then finding out like wow, it doesn't fully work, like that.
Speaker 1:Having to make sure that you don't lose your mind, and it was a big challenge, you know. I think one of the pieces that was so important for us is this is going to sound kind of funny, but teaching you how to parent the kids.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, that was a huge learning curve, yeah.
Speaker 1:You came in not having ever parented. I mean, you've you ran some kids camps before?
Speaker 2:Yeah, spent a good number of hours babysitting.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah, you had a cat growing up, but I did a lot of the decision-making, I did most of the parenting when it came to hard conversations, setting the tone, and you got to be the good one. You got to be the one that was, hey, we're going to make popcorn tonight, hey, we're going to, and then also just logistical stuff and things like that. But any confrontation was all on me while you kind of sat back and watched and learned but also gained permission in the kids' lives to have those conversations.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I want to back up a sec and just provide a little bit of structure for you listeners and just say, okay. So if we're talking about keys for success for early stage blended families, this would be key number one. In the beginning, the biological parent should absolutely be doing the heavy lifting when it comes to discipline and conflict management. The heavy lifting when it comes to discipline and conflict management, the step-parent's role, truly, I think in the beginning stages, should primarily be to build connection and grow in trust with the kids.
Speaker 2:So in that, I think that's what Jason's talking about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean that becomes the. You have this ecosystem. That's already happening in the home, right. So there's an ecosystem and if the new parent comes in and completely disrupts that ecosystem whether it's a perfect ecosystem or not the kids. The kids can't make the adjustment as quickly as parents can.
Speaker 1:And so a big mistake that you make is okay. Now that you have this new relationship in the house, everything changes for the kids and the kids really get left behind. So you have to think through like, how do I get my spouse and my kids caught up to speed with how we want to build this new ecosystem? And, just like any relationship, if I'm a boss, I can make people say yes to me because I pay their paycheck, or I can build a relationship with them in which they want to partner and grow and give me a place in their life.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so that's a really, really big piece when we're talking about how to blend a family and do it really well, honestly, regardless of the age of the kids. If the kids are three or if they're 15, you can't just go in there and rock the boat so much, or you're going to get a bunch of pushback and resentment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think if we're talking, too, about the biological parent doing the heavy lifting when it comes to like conflict or challenge or discipline, it could be worth mentioning some of the real challenges that come up in blended families at the beginning can be things like different parenting styles, loyalty, conflicts, right Kids are dealing with often. Okay, I have my mom or my dad is now married to somebody new. I still have another biological parent out there in the world. How do I care for love, manage my relationship with all these people?
Speaker 1:Can I say something to that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, just let me list them off and then let's deep dive into them a little bit. Obviously there can be a lot of pain or emotional hurt from past relationships or like the breakup of a marriage or the death of a biological parent, things like that. And then you know discipline and authority. Like it's hard to receive discipline from a new authority figure sometimes. So, all of that said, those challenges are things that we'd say like, okay, the biological parent's going to do the heavy lifting when it comes to that. But we also get to determine a new culture in the home of like what is the standard of culture in our home going to be? And we have to come at that as a united front. But let's dive into like some of those hard things for a sec.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think the loyalty conflict is is a real one.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:Our kids definitely felt that in the beginning and that's where it's really important to have conversations like open conversations and just talk through it with the kids and let them know like, um, they, the kids, knew that you weren't replacing their mom and that you could. They could call you whatever they wanted to.
Speaker 1:And um, and I also reinforced that with him- so there wasn't a ton of pressure, but then, as we went on, you built relationship with them and they wanted to give you that place in their life, you know, of calling you Lauren mom and you being a parent in their life, and so that was. That was huge Um for a lot of the emotional wounds. What worked really well for me during that season was laying with the kids in their bed at night. And especially at first, when we first blended the family.
Speaker 1:I was really intentional to make sure that I was talking with the kids and privately, and laying in their beds and how are you and how are you feeling and how's this transition for you and what do you need and just giving the kids space to talk and also letting them know it's okay to feel sad or it's okay for things to feel different. That's really normal. And to assure them that they matter. Their feelings are going to matter.
Speaker 1:We're not just zooming ahead. It's really easy I'm going to keep reiterating this it's really easy for the kids to get left behind and forgotten about, but they have to somehow be our priority. So you are my top priority, but they are our top priority and that's really the key to success, so that these kids get taken care of and they feel loved.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's really good. I feel like one of the things that we did kind of by accident but that really helped us is, I feel like pretty quickly we both found our lane with the kids and in our family. Both found our lane with the kids and in our family and from the very beginning I would say Jay and this lent itself well right to the biological parent doing some of the emotional heavy lifting. But naturally Jason is so good at a lot of the emotional connection piece. He carries a lot of that in our home and always has. I really shine in logistical things. I'm great at organizing and bringing structure and making plans and sticking to a schedule, and those were all things that the kids found really helpful. And so once we realized like ooh, that's a great lane for me to run in pretty uninhibited, like nobody's going to be, like you know, stop getting me to soccer practice on time they were thankful and so and that was a way I found that to be a way it actually helped me build connection with the kids.
Speaker 2:They learned to trust me as I made sure they got what they needed, whether it was a ride to practice or, you know, a new toothbrush or whatever it was in the home or outside of the home at school. It really built a lot of trust between me and the kids when they realized, oh, she's actually taking a lot of time to make her life, about our life, and I I'm naturally good at those things and so it was helpful. So I would say I do think a key to success is like know yourself going into this new family dynamic, know yourself. What are your strengths? What are you really not good at Right, Like, if you're marrying into a family that has kids and you're actually not great at logistics or you don't do well at then, like, don't take that on. Like, do the thing at the beginning that comes naturally and easily to you. Let that be a place like, let your natural gifting be a place where the kids can learn and experience you in a really great way.
Speaker 1:Um, one of the things that helped us a lot was I set the tone with the kids that you and I were at United Front and I did it in very small ways.
Speaker 1:So the kids would be like can we have ice cream tonight? And I'd say, let me ask mom, what are we having for dinner tonight? I don't know. Let's talk to mom about it. Can I go spend the night at my friend's house? Let me talk to mom about it. Can I go spend the night at my friend's house? Let me talk to mom about it. I did that so much the first year to try to help them see that we are. Mom is in on all of these conversations. She may not be doing the discipline with you, she may not be doing the hard conversations, but she's the one that I have now. I'm now prioritizing to help make these decisions. And that was huge because they knew that they couldn't play one parent against the other, but also they saw the power in us leading together, which was really helpful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely yeah. I think along those lines and I find, in talking with other people, we used to lead a pre-marriage class. For years we led a pre-marriage class at our church and so over the years we probably had, I would say, like seven or eight, maybe 10 couples come through that were considering blending a family. I actually don't think many of them did end up marrying, probably for the best. But I do remember some real common questions that would come up and one of the most common things that came up for these couples was was, in their dating life, experiencing how the biological parent is typically so scared to hurt connection with their children that they don't actually know how to bring another adult in in a way that both honors and protects the kids but makes a shift towards prioritizing the marriage.
Speaker 2:And I do think that that can be really tricky, like you know people that reach out over the years who are like I'm in. You know I married a guy he's got kids. Or I married a woman she had children and we're really struggling because we have different parenting styles and different ways of wanting to do things and I have needs, but oftentimes in marriage the biological parent doesn't know how to let the new marriage be the top priority so that the kids get what they need. Instead, they sacrifice marriage connection for fear of how the kids are feeling, for fear of disconnection with the kids, and that is tricky. So let's talk through that a little bit. How do we prioritize our marriage when there's kids involved?
Speaker 1:For starters, we have to agree upon as a couple how we're going to parent and what the ecosystem is going to be, because what I see a lot is that doesn't actually get really established. And then the biological parent is trying to protect the kids.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Consciously or unconsciously. And when you have your own kids, you have this natural bond to them.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because you've had them since birth. They feel like yours, they are yours. When you come into a blended family, that bond has to get built. You don't just naturally have it right away.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:And so it's a lot of times when you blend a family, you have less patience even for the kids acting out for the conflicts and the problems, and it's easy to. It's easy to uh.
Speaker 2:I'm laughing because I'm thinking about all the things that that biological bond helps you with.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:Like it's how. It's how my two-year-old can have a snotty nose and I wipe it with my hands and put it on my pants. And I would never do that for somebody else's child. It's not gross to me.
Speaker 1:I know.
Speaker 2:That's how practical that biological bond is so helpful.
Speaker 1:It really is. What it does is it gives you a ton of empathy. Without that empathy you have very little patience for the kiddos, and then the parent, who is very bonded to the kids, ends up having to play defense and protect the kids. And pretty soon. It's just tons of conflict. So back to even before you're married married you have to get up to speed with how you are parenting and what type of relationship and ecosystem we are creating for the kids, and how the kids are going to be our priority and we had this issue a little bit.
Speaker 1:I remember coming to you and telling you that I had felt like, well, because of how you dealt with conflict in the beginning, where you'd get really dysregulated and really angry. I remember coming to you and telling you like I feel like sometimes I'm having to protect the kids and I don't want to do that. Yeah, and that's part of you just being 26 years old, 25. 25. Yeah, young and all that, but anyways, it's great to be able to talk about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think the other thing that comes up a lot this is the other massive piece, that is just the X factor is what do you do with the X?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because in some, some scenarios they're all different, right, some relationships are really easy um and the x, the spouse or whatever. Ex-spouse is cordial and kind and sometimes it's volatile. Yeah, and that can be very challenging and very stressful. Yeah, this is where having great boundaries. This is where having a counselor in your life to help talk you guys through. How do we deal with this ex-wife?
Speaker 2:it's like relational olympics. You really aren't meant to know how to do that intricate of relationship dynamics alone, Like you're really not. We're not built for that.
Speaker 1:So I've seen this burn a marriage down.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh my gosh. I can't even talk enough about how critical it was for us to actually have a marriage and family therapist in our court through all of those child rearing years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, because the back and forth and there's. There was so much back and forth, even just logistically, about what school we're going to go to and you know what is, what did my ex-wife feel good about and what does she not feel good about?
Speaker 2:And what's happening in her life, what's happening in my life and how are we going to handle certain situations that kids find themselves in Yep?
Speaker 1:Yep, and so really it's like you have to have incredible boundaries, incredible communication skills. And then what helped me was you actually communicated to my ex-wife better than I did. Eventually, um on, especially on certain topics like logistics and things like that, you guys worked better than than I did, and so that became a really big help in the relationship after you got really comfortable and used to the kid's schedules and used to you know her.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So, but I do think, because every one of them is so different, the dynamic is realizing that this is such a massive pressure, you need outside input to make sure that you're handling it the best that you can, without allowing it to destroy your relationship with your husband or wife, destroy your relationship with the kids and then, finally, the absolute rule is you never use the kids to cause the other person pain.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 1:I would say that's what we did. The best was there was an agreement that I had with my ex-wife and she did that really great. She kept that agreement and I kept that agreement. We kept all conversations between us.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so we didn't.
Speaker 2:Never poisoning the kids against.
Speaker 1:No, we didn't throw the kids in between them, and that was very, very helpful. A massive mistake is to make the kids choose sides, to make them pick who's right and wrong, to pull them into a scenario in which they're completely powerless.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's true, and that takes a lot of emotional maturity and a lot of self-control, because when you're in a new blended family dynamic, the easiest leverage to grab for is the children.
Speaker 1:It's true.
Speaker 2:And that is it really has to be off limits. It has to be off limits.
Speaker 1:It's true.
Speaker 2:And I agree, I think we did that well. But, as I think about other blended family situations and, as you've said, like some situations are so much more volatile, that's hard. It'd be really, really hard. So, yeah, outside input wow, like let's put 500 exclamation points behind that.
Speaker 1:I think, kind of in closing, what's so important is to establish a culture in which the kids are excited about and because there's again there's enough challenge and frustration and pain and awkwardness and weirdness. So what? What was awesome for us is we started to establish rhythms and routines that the kids loved.
Speaker 1:So movie nights are awesome and pizza nights and going on some vacations or you know those type of things that the kids can really look forward to in establishing that new culture of what we are and how we're going to benefit their life. That was really massive. And then I'll say lastly, it's very easy to leave your marriage behind. I know that we've already talked about prioritizing your marriage, but it's very easy to forget about sowing into your marriage because you're you're trying to, you're literally doing something that's very hard to do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's reasons why the statistics are how they are.
Speaker 1:And so prioritizing your marriage and prioritizing your kids is massively important. This means you may make less money this year Because you're home early, you're not pushing as hard Because you're building this marriage that takes so much of your effort and energy. This means that you're probably going to do things that you don't want to do.
Speaker 2:You might not have as big of a social life.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:You might have to trim other things, other activities. The kids might actually not be as busy as they've been in past seasons. Your margin you'll have to use that margin to invest into the family bank account, as opposed to all these other things. I think that's a huge. That's a very good piece of advice.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, guys, we hope that this was helpful for you and man, for all those families out there, all those couples that are blending. It's been one of the most incredible gifts that I've ever given to my kids was Lauren, someone that was able to come in and add value and love my kids and care for my kids which are now our kids and just be such an incredible support, and our marriage is so strong and healthy and honestly.
Speaker 1:I'm so thankful for the work that you did, babe, and just for coming in and being such an incredible partner. It's way possible to do? Yeah, it is such an incredible partner, it's way possible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1:Making sure that you are ready and willing to sacrifice is the key to all of this and that you're going to be a learner. So, guys, we really hope that you enjoyed this week's episode. If you know a blended family out there, share this episode.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let it help them, Otherwise we will see you next week.