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As parents, we can be very excited when we begin raising our children. We can also dread the concept of parenting as for any parent reading this blog you know some days can be difficult in unconditionally loving your child. Now, enter a new relationship and you become an insta-parent with a step child that could be any age and you may have had no input in their life…until now.

Let’s take a look at ways to develop Building a Relationship with Your Step Kids.

Building a Relationship with Your Step Kids | Couples Counselling Calgary Step 1: Unconditional Love

A parent can go a long way to build a relationship by unconditionally loving your step child. This means fully accepting them for who they are in their entirety, even on the bad days. One way of looking at unconditional love is by thinking about how you would feel if someone didn’t accept you for who you were, both inside and out. This is simply known as accepting yourself fully for who you are and our children deserve this same approach, we give to ourselves as human beings.

Sadly, a parent may not fully accept themselves for who they are which can sometimes project onto the step child making it more difficult to build an unconditional relationship with their step child.

Building a Relationship with Your Step Kids | Couples Counselling Calgary Step 2: Mistakes Happen (on both sides)

We make mistakes and our step kids make mistakes. When we remember that mistakes happen, it can be easier to not go into a situation with a judgmental attitude that accuses our stepchild, thereby potentially shaming them. This doesn’t mean that consequences may not still need to happen in raising our stepchildren, however, we do need to remember our stepchildren may be dealing with issues such as separation anxiety from there other biological parent and are always exploring and metaphorically sometimes fall off a cliff when they slip and miss the next crevice to support their exploration.

When we as parents are there to support them when they return from their exploration with bumps and bruises it’s important to be present and support them when they come back from a failed expedition in life.

Building a Relationship with Your Step Kids | Couples Counselling Calgary Step 3: Forgive yourself and your child

Sometimes, at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter who’s fault it is when tensions get to a place where everyone is yelling and screaming their head at each other. The key is to not hold out on love and begin to resent your stepchild and the way parents need to deal with this is to CHOOSE to forgive your stepchild, even if you don’t want to. Then, go to your stepchild and take responsibility for your part in the negative situation and make an apology to your stepchild.

The other area to remember is that parenting is tough, and it’s important to also forgive ourselves for the thoughts and actions we have done to our stepchildren when we blow it as a parent. Without forgiving ourselves as a parent our soul can be eaten away by guilt and condemnation making us less effective as a parent. This can potentially cause us to isolate ourselves from our stepchildren thereby preventing relationships from being developed.

Building a Relationship with Your Step Kids | Couples Counselling Calgary Step 4: Consider a Family Group Conference

A family group conference is a place to establish a safe place to share and grow as a family unit. Sometimes it takes a facilitator, such as a counselling therapist, to support the family unit. Guidelines and boundaries can be set for the facilitator for everyone to feel safe and have a safe place to share what is hurting them in the relationship and find healthy ways to achieve a healthy relationship in the family unit.

Building a Relationship with Your Step Kids | Couples Counselling Calgary Step 5: Be on the same page with your partner.

Your partner is most likely the biological parent to your stepchild so it’s important to make sure both of you are communicating with each other and developing your relationship to be the best relationship possible which will support in decreasing any anxiety with your stepchild. It’s also important to discuss what your boundaries are as a step-parent when it comes to re-directing and potentially disciplining your stepchild. This can also be a struggle when you’re left alone with your stepchild and you need to “step” in a place of parenting authority when normally it would be your partner dealing with their biological child.  

In time, building a relationship with your step kid is possible and can be very rewarding when in a brief moment you realize that everything is going to be okay with yourself, your family, and your step child.

If you are finding it difficult to navigate building a relationship with your step child, it may be time to seek out a qualified counselling therapist, clinical counsellor, or psychotherapist and begin to walk in New Life.