Teenager Who Try To Sabotage Blended Families

Gaining a new parent when you're a teenager is pretty rough. In many cases your mother gets custody, and you are soon faced with a man taking your Father's place in your Mom's life. It's not a pretty picture. You're no longer a child, but a young adult who is used to living your life a certain way. Since your Dad has been out of the picture for awhile, you've also assumed the role of man of the house. Mom has let you sort of take command on some things and has given you an elevated position over your siblings. (In my case, a younger brother) When you first met the boyfriend, it was a little uncomfortable, but he seemed like a pretty okay guy. Over the months of your Mom and his dating he would joke around with you and wrestle. He'd tell some good stories about his war days and take you fishing. He'd even slip you a few bucks now and then. You felt he treated you like a friend.

One day Mom and Friend call you in and make the announcement that they're getting married. They hope you will be happy for them. They know there will be some adjustments to be made, especially because Friend also has children, one of whom is 16 years old and I haven't met yet. He will be sharing my room when he visits, by the way.

I try to act happy for Mom and future Step-Dad, although deep inside I feel disappointed and confused. Sure, I want Mom to be happy, but I've just gotten comfortable with our new family situation and now we're going to have to go through another major change in our lives. Mom and future Step-Dad tell me that life without change doesn't exist, and we have to go with the flow and keep the lines of communication open. They ask me to be the best man at their wedding.

I meet my new Step-Brother at the wedding. We have a little ceremony at the house with just family and close friends. He seems pretty cool, although he doesn't seem too comfortable with the situation either. He hasn't forgiven his Father yet for the divorce between his parents, so that makes things a little more difficult for him to accept. In talking with him, I found that him and his Dad used to be really close. Since his parents split up they had become even tighter. They used to do quite a bit of activities together, like fishing, hunting, baseball and working on his car. Since his Dad met my Mom these activities had decreased drastically, and he didn't feel as important in his Dad's life anymore. I understood this guy! We were on the same wavelength. We decided that although we liked the other's parent pretty well, that things were just fine the way they were before the marriage, and maybe there was something we could do to return things to the way we liked them.

We decided to sabotage the marriage. We took every opportunity to use anything said by one parent as a weapon against the other. We let our feelings be hurt or our tempers flare at the slightest provocation. We let it be known that we were not happy with the new situation and made their first few months a living hell. We would even plan some of these ways to rock the boat together. We would argue with each other over everything. We would question every new rule and refuse to cooperate on family outings. We would sulk in our room and not talk to the parents for a day or two.

We hadn't counted on Mom and Step-Dad's love for each other, or their understanding of the situation. They had figured out what was going on and were determined to make things work. We were all scheduled to go to family counseling.

The first couple sessions me and step-brother sat in the therapist's office close mouthed and sullen. Mom and Step-Dad did most of the talking, and the therapist just shook his head at times and asked a couple of questions. The third session he asked to see one of us at a time. It was an eye opening experience for me. I admitted that I resented my Step-Father and Step-Brother for the attention my Mother gave them. I also resented being what I felt was demoted in the family after they came into our lives. I went from Man of the House to middle child. In talking with my 16 year old Step-Brother, he realized he resented his Father being taken from his daily life activities, not being able to have his Father available anytime he wanted, to talk with him and do things with him. He resented sharing him with another family. He had always been his Dad's special boy.

The therapist called us all in together once again. We talked openly and told each other about our feelings. We realized that our feelings were all based on insecurity. We were afraid of losing the love of our parent. After several sessions we realized that we not only did not lose the love of our parent, but we gained the love of a new person/persons in our lives. Instead of something being taken from us, we were gaining a new dimension to our family. We had become a blended family.

Here are some resources to help teens through becoming a member of a blended family:

http://stepparenting.about.com/parenting...

http://www.ach.uams.edu/parenting/spring...

http://www.stepfam.org/

http://www.ps.vt.edu/ofs/resources/paren...