How to Actually Blend: The Missing Instruction Manual for Stepcouples

Learn the 9 critical basics you and your partner need to get on the same page and blend your family with less friction and stress.

Hi we’re glad you’re here!

A former single parent myself who transitioned into stepparenthood as awkwardly as possible, I’ve spent the past several years helping countless stepparents figure out their places in their blended families. And my husband Dan has spent those same years feeling chagrined about how hard that transition was for me, and all the ways he unknowingly contributed to that.

It wasn't Dan's fault, though. And it wasn't mine either.

Turns out that blending a family was just WAY more complicated than either of us could’ve imagined. We got bulldozed flat by all kinds of complications we didn't consider and had no idea even existed. In short, our respective heads were jammed so far up our respective asses that we found ourselves stuck arguing in circles constantly, unable to progress our family forward in any kind of real way.

Forming a stepfamily takes place on a steep and slippery learning curve. This is true for both parents and stepparents. And yet, there’s mystifyingly little help out there for either partner in a relationship when there are kids involved. Most applicable resources out there are geared toward stepparents, which leads a lot of stepparents to (incorrectly!) believe that the job of blending their family falls mainly on them. And a lot of single parents believe the same thing, expecting that their partners will magically melt in with their existing family with no effort needed on anyone else's part. These common misconceptions set your stepfamily up for a hard road ahead.

The problem is, neither of you has done this before. No one knows how to start the important conversations that could save you from literal years of frustration. Heck, no one even knows which conversations need to take place!

That's why Dan & I created this guide, which covers 9 critical basics to — and we mean this in the most loving way — help both of you pull your heads out of your butts, get on the same page about your relationship and the kids, and blend your stepfamily with less friction and stress along the way. 🙌🏼

Please keep in mind that this guide presents a broad overview of these topics, each of which really deserves a whole lot of in-depth discussion in its own right. To get you started, we've included a few questions in each section for you to discuss over morning coffee. You know, sometime when everyone's calm and nothing huge is immediately at stake.

A note on language: As far as this guide is concerned, "stepparent" applies to anyone who's in a relationship with someone with kids, whether you're married, living together, or still in the dating phases.

Also for the purposes of this guide, "single/primary parent" refers to whichever partner relates most to that role and that title. And same for "stepparent." I might've been a single mom when I met Dan, but the role I struggled with was the stepparenting role. And he became a stepparent to my kid too, but the role he struggled with was that of a primary parent. So if you're both a parent and a stepparent, just take whatever info is most relevant to your situation.

WHAT WE’RE GONNA LEARN:

1. THERE'S NO ONE "RIGHT" WAY TO DO ANY OF THIS

2. A BLENDED FAMILY DOESN'T WORK THE SAME WAY AS A TRADITIONAL FAMILY... AND THAT'S OKAY!

3. WHY A "LOVE ME, LOVE MY KIDS" APPROACH ISN'T FAIR TO EITHER THE KIDS OR THE STEPPARENT

4. DISCUSS YOUR EXPECTATIONS EARLY ON

5. WHY IT'S ACTUALLY BETTER FOR THE KIDS IF THEY *DON'T* COME FIRST

6. THE EX DOESN'T GET A VOTE IN YOUR NEW LIFE

7. YOU’RE BUILDING A NEW FAMILY *TOGETHER*

8. BLENDING A FAMILY TAKES YEARS

9. THE 2 KEYS YOU NEED TO SUCCESSFULLY BLEND YOUR FAMILY