Intro to Me

When you’re little all you wanna read about is perfect relationships and happily ever afters. When you’re an adult, perfect doesn’t sell. We wanna hear about turmoil, affairs, and broken homes because that is real life. When other people (fictional or not) have problems, it makes us feel not so alone. My story has it all. I’ve been the jaded mistress. Today, I’m a successful marriage and family therapist.

The journey didn’t happen overnight. There are a lot stories filled with smiles, pain, and self-discovery.

Affairs often tear apart a marriage. Finding out that you have been sharing the most intimate parts of your partner with someone else can be devastating. But what if the other man or woman you met was more than just a one-night fling. It’s not a very popular idea or one we talk about, but what about “the other woman”?

People are not commodities. We cannot buy, sell, and trade them as we please. No one can take someone from you that wasn’t asking to be taken in the first place, so why do we blame the person that our partner cheated with? By remaining hyper focused on the “mistress” we fail to address how a place was made for her in the first place.

There is nothing virtuous about sleeping with someone else’s partner or crossing the line from “friendly” to “flirty”, but there’s no rulebook for falling in love either. The burden of being faithful lies with the partner who is already in a relationship, so when that person steps out on their marriage, why is someone else to blame?

Blended families are like throwing a bunch of puzzle pieces up in the air and hoping they all fit together.

Some people may crave the experience of helping someone else raise their children, but it is certainly not everyone’s dream. For most people that marry a parent, the kids are just part of the deal. No one grows up imagining they’ll ride off into the sunset with a few ponies trailing behind. Those little cowboys and cowgirls also didn’t expect to be watching their mom or dad riding off with someone else, so how does everyone come together and make a life within their new normal?

Can anyone that marries into someone else’s family say that they knew what they were getting into? Conflicting personalities and behavioral nuances become bigger issues as relationships age. The best way to navigate these issues is to tackle them before they begin to fester and you can do so with the help of a licensed therapist.

I find that the people that make up a blended family are either focused on being kind and accommodating, or living in their anger. Either way, everyone is rarely saying what they feel. Navigating within a blended family requires a skill set specific to the unique challenges faced by those affected. Mothers and fathers must share their children with a stranger. Step-parents must find their place in the lives of children that didn’t invite them to be part of it. Children struggle to forgive their parents for turning their lives upside down and forcing them into a life they didn’t ask for.

Empathy is hard to come by when everyone is facing their own challenges and wrapped up in their own pain. It’s hard to ask someone to put their pain aside to comfort someone whom they often cannot relate to. No two experiences are the same and the circumstances for which people get divorced or remarried vary greatly as well, so how can one help the other if everyone is drowning?

If you enter into a blended family with your eyes wide open, with the expectation that you will fail at times, you’re much more likely to seek out and accept help from qualified sources in your community.