Step-Grandparent Relationships

Parents may greet the announcement of a grown child’s re-marriage and the addition of “step-grandchildren” with mixed emotions. The idea of becoming a step-grandparent may generate anxiety about whether you’ll like the children and whether they will like you. You may also wonder what, exactly, are the duties of a step-grandparent?

Family life educators from Kansas State University offer helpful insights on making the transition to step-grandparenting. First, understand that this relationship can’t be created overnight. Relax and let yourself enjoy the process of getting to know and care for each member of the blended family. If you feel the children are slow to warm up to you, remember that his family was likely created out of loss, through divorce or the death of a parent. Your relationship-building may have to work around their feelings of loss and conflict.

As a step-grandparent, you can have an important role in your new family. For example, it’s not uncommon for children to feel as though their newly married parents are too involved with their own lives and each other to find time for the children. Additionally, stepchildren often want to have a relationship with their new grandparents – but may be uncertain about how to get started.

With the gift of time you can offer companionship and a listening ear. You may find you have many things in common. You will need to create your own grandparenting role, one that is comfortable for you and that works for the stepfamily.

Media Influence on Pre-teen Body Image

If you are thinking about talking to your children about their body image when they hit puberty you may be too late. A recent study published in the Family and Consumer Sciences Research Journal showed that children as young as 8 are unhappy with their own bodies.

To better understand how they see themselves, children were shown child body shapes ranging from very thin to obese and were then asked which one look most like them, and which was their ideal figure. Results showed that the “ideal shape” for boys was heavier than their normal healthy weight. Even though some girls were at what is considered the ideal weight for their height, they desired an extremely thin, unhealthy body type. When asked about what they would consider the ideal for the opposite sex, boys chose a much thinner size for girls than what is considered healthy, and girls chose a much heavier body type for boys.

The authors of this study highlight that the media play a critical role in our children’s perception of how they think they should look. Girls who viewed more TV were more dissatisfied with their bodies than girls who viewed less.

How can adults help children develop and maintain a healthy body image? The research suggests that we start talking to children in elementary school about what is healthy compared to what our culture tells us is ideal. Parents and teachers can help children think critically about what they are seeing and reading in the media and discover any negative impacts these messages are having on their self esteem.

Trends in Balancing Work and Family

Today’s young women in college often talk about their plans for work and family as if they are one, seamless word: familyandcareer.

Placing equal importance on these two dimensions of life would have been un-imaginable to previous college-educated women. Up until World War I, female college graduates had to choose family OR career, and jobs were typically in a few professions, such as teaching, social work, and nursing. Later generations chose work, then family, (or family, then work) after children entered school or left home.

Only in more recent generations have women tried to do both. Early baby boomers often delayed marriage and childbirth so they could have a career before starting a family. They were probably the first generation of U.S. women to enter a variety of professions.

Recognizing problems with the biological clock, the most recent group of graduates want to combine career AND family. Those who finished college between 1980 and 2000 tended to stay in the labor force when they married and had children, and a larger percentage (between 21% and 27%) have managed to achieve both family and career by age 40 than any previous generation.

Why did the change take place? Some changes were based on the labor market. There were more professions open to women than in the past, as colleges and employers expanded training and opportunities for women. Also, more than any previous generation, women had more freedom to decide when to start a family. It’s great that women have the opportunity and ability to have both career and family. But let me tell you – as a mom with three children AND a career, it hasn’t been easy!

Learning to Parent

Did you grow up in a warm and nurturing home? Did your parents show they cared, listen and talk things over with you, teach you new things, and respect you? Recent research shows that positive parenting behaviors can be passed down from one generation to the next.

According to an international team of researchers reporting in the Journal of Child Development, mothers who were raised in a positive, nurturing home during childhood and adolescence are more likely to raise their own children that way. This study was based on interviews and observations of more than 200 New Zealanders followed over 20 years, beginning during childhood and as participants in the study became parents themselves.

Researchers found that mothers who were reared in supportive homes tend to support their own children in warm, sensitive and stimulating ways. Those who were raised in a low-conflict household and who had trusting and close relationships with their parents during their early teen years were more likely to engage in such positive parenting with their own young children.

This research suggests that a mother’s own experiences certainly shape her parenting style. We learn to parent from our own parents – good or bad. Parents who want to make a change in their parenting style are encouraged to attend parent education classes, where they learn to create a positive environment for their children. This can start a chain reaction that lasts across generations. For more information on parenting classes: http://hillsboroughfcs.ifas.ufl.edu/ParentingClasses.html

Table Manners

Do you ever find yourself wondering if your children have any table manners at all? Most parents do, especially during an extended family gathering or holiday meal. Some tips to set your child on the road to table etiquette:


• Check your own example. If you burp at the table in the middle of a meal, expect your children to do the same.

• Don’t turn dinner into an unpleasant lecture time about manners. Instead, explain the rules ahead of time. “You may find yourself at an important job interview during a dinner, or on a big dinner date and it’s my job to teach you how to behave so that you’ll impress whoever it is you want to impress. I would hate to see you embarrassed because you have no manners.”

• Point out good behavior in a neutral, practical way, such as; “It’s a good idea to unfold your napkin and put it on your lap so that if food falls, you won’t stain your clothes.”

• Try to have a more formal dinner once a month. Dress up, serve a special meal, use the good plates, invite a guest and expect more formal manners from your children.

• Take your children to a nice restaurant and allow them to order their own food, communicate with the wait staff, figure the tip, etc.

• Of course, let your kids know that bad manners aren’t offensive if there’s no one there to see it. If they want to eat mashed potatoes with their fingers and they’re alone – or with a friend who wants to do the same - it’s not a violation. When was the last time you ate mashed potatoes with your fingers?

Teens "Hooking Up"

Keeping up with teenagers is no easy task. Just trying to decipher their language can be daunting! I have found it especially challenging to interpret how the teens I know define their relationships. When I ask if someone is dating, I might hear, “No Mom . . . they’re just talking.” I’m not sure teens today would understand me either if I were to pose such an old school nation as “going steady.”

In an attempt to better understand teenager sexual relationships, researchers from Bowling Green State University (Woohoo – GO FALCONS!) recently studied the phenomenon teens refer to as “hooking up.” Hooking up is the act of engaging in sexual activity with a partner (or partners) that the teen is not formally dating. According to research reported in the Journal of Adolescent Research, more than half of the sexually active teens the researchers studied had experienced this form of casual or “non-relationship” sex.

Of interest, the teens studied were not engaging in one-night stands or having sex with people they didn’t know. Instead, these teens were sexually involved with friends or ex-boyfriends or girlfriends or what some call “friends with benefits.” Additionally, about one third of these non-dating sexual partnerships are associated with hopes or expectations that the relationship will lead to a more conventional dating relationships.

The researchers in this study, like other family scholars and practitioners before them, expressed concerns that these teens may be taking risks that they are not even aware of. They also point out that what is not known is how these casual sexual relationships will influence the way these teens look at long-term relationships, specifically marriage, later in life.

Helping Children Cope with Divorce

All children feel a strong sense of loss when parents separate or divorce. It is not unusual for children of any age to rebel, misbehave, or become withdrawn. They cannot understand all the issues involved in a divorce, and may feel confused, frightened and worried.

If you are going through a divorce, be aware of your child’s losses and offer them the support they need. Divorce is a transition that usually last one or two years - before, during and after the divorce.

Whether you are the residential or non residential parent, start by reassuring your children that you love them and that they are not to blame for the divorce. Encourage them to share their questions and any feelings they may have about the divorce, listen and be patient. Sometimes it may be difficult to focus on your children as you go through your own transition, but parenting in a loving, attentive way is one of the most important things you can do.

In addition, provide a safe, warm and loving environment in the homes of both parents, if possible. Have children keep clothing and personal items in both places so they feel a sense of belonging and don’t need to pack a suitcase or backpack every time they transfer from one home to another. Find some books at the library that talk about divorce appropriate for your child’s level of understanding and read them together.

Don’t depend on your children for emotional support. Instead, seek out help from friends, family or a professional counselor. Children are counting on their parents to care for themselves as well as they care for their children.