STEP-STORIES
Newsletter - Winter 1998
Our STEP-COMMUNITY is growing. We speak to teachers, professional organizations, and church groups frequently. If you are located in the northern New Jersey area we would be happy to talk to YOUR group too. Let us know. We will come!
Young Adults In-Step Many counselors try to help young adults living in stepfamilies to move towards independence as if they had lived in a traditional two-parent family. Our advice to stepfamilies with young adults varies. It depends upon a few specific markers. If a young adult is living in a newly formed stepfamily they should be given a little extra time to move on. The same is true if the emancipating person seems to wish to get to know their new family members and understand how they will all fit together in a reformed stepfamily. This task complicates separation issues for all family members. Learning to accept the need-to-belong vs. the need-to-emancipate will help all parties in this situation. Frequently, the young adult is confused by their wish to return to the family and they need to know that this is an expected development of stepfamily living.
Coming Soon: Send us your e-mail address and we will add you to our e-Iist for free stepfamily information tips and tidbits. E-mail us at: steppingstones@worldnet.att.net Please fax or e-mail us your comments and responses to our Newsletter. Humorous vignettes are especially appreciated. Thanks! Robert Klopfer, L.C.S.W., B.C.D. Susan Brettschneider, M.S. Co-Directors |
Everyone living together in-step faces the two-cultures-in-one home dilemma. Each adult brings along their physical possessions and their view of the way things should be into a new household. Each child has a view of the world that they wish to see fostered in their new home too. This makes for interesting and sometimes difficult adjustments in a new stepfamily home. Many times one family moves into the home of the other family. We immediately have insider (the original resident family) and outsider (the family moving in) roles. These roles are potentially conflicting for both sides. The insiders have had their way of doing things for a long time and resent the new outsiders with their strange stuff and new styles of living. The outsiders are living in foreign territory, not knowing what is seen as appropriate behavior in their new home. Frequent challenges to the right way of doing things are encountered. Minor and major clashes are fought between cultures. Everything from the right way to put dishes away to the right time for children of a certain age to go to bed is discussed and groused over. Blending cultures, like blending people, takes a long time, a lot of patience, and is helped by a good sense of humor. One new stepfamily had a dog from the insider group and two cats from the outsider group. The animals fought like .... The children learned to make a big fuss over the pets from the other family since they loved all of the animals. This helped their bio-pets to overcome some of their adjustment reactions to new surroundings and new people. It also helped the humans in the stepfamily to work together for the common goal of pet-security, a shared sense of their new "us".
S.A.A. Professional Training WorkshopsLast Fall, the Stepfamily Association of America sponsored a two-day Professional Training at Chestnut Hill College in Philadelphia, PA.. Six clinicians from Stepping Stones attended. They received training in step-counseling techniques, shared experiences with other mental health professionals, and gained access to S.A.A. personnel and their large fund of information. Our therapists gave high praise to the seminars. Dana Guererro, LCSW, said it was her "best conference in the past five years". Mental health workers can call the S.A.A. for information about upcoming Training locations and dates
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For more information about Stepping Stones Counseling Center, please call us at (201) 444-3686. |