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intact family vs step family


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Which scenario is likely to offer a better outcome for a young child...

 

1) In an intact family with biological parents who are still affectionate and loving, but for whom some resentments and difficulties have damaged the relationship and killed the passion. In essence mum and dad are more like good friends than lovers.

 

2) Mother finds a new man and builds a relationship that restores the passion, the biological father still has some regular contact and the parents remain friendly.

Does modelling a passionate and fully respectful relationship with a stepfather trump biological parents who lost their flame but still stick together?

I see a lot of women dump men through "dissatisfaction" so they can move onto another man. I do get that it's not healthy for a child to grow up with parents who don't fully love each other, but is that worse than a broken family/step dad scenario? All else being equal.

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Interesting question.

 

I live in the Czech Republic, which has a relatively high divorce rate (66%, no less), but everyone goes off and gets a new partner almost immediately. To be honest, I think it depends on the age of the children, how sensitive the children are, how bad the marriage is, and various other factors.

 

I've got a mate who married a right nutter (he was warned). I think he wanted someone strict to stop him drinking himself to death, in which case it can be said that the marriage was successful. Basically they hated each other and he was terrified of her, there was no physical violence though. However, a few years and two kids later, he took his dog to the vet, who asked him what the problem was. He replied  that she seemed to have perked up a bit in the surgery, but at home she was lethargic, off her food, and seemed miserable. The vet told him that it was quite a common problem these days, that his dog was depressed, that his home situation was so stressful that the dog preferred being at the vet to at home. God knows what the kids made out of it all. Nowadays he's got joint custody, a new girlfriend who is actually very nice and who his kids have taken to. The ex-wife got the dog, if you're wondering.

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Why would anyone destroy their child's life for a little more passion?

 

Scenario #1 is the better outcome. No doubt about it. If the parents feel like they're lacking passion, it's a lot easier to get it back, then to divorce and find it with someone else who will probably have another set of problems, not to mention all the problems divorce and blended families cause.

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Why would anyone destroy their child's life for a little more passion?

People with self-knowledge would only get married to and have a child with somebody of similar virtue. This alone would keep the passion higher than either of them could get elsewhere. Add to that the child, and I can only presume that anybody that would think they could get more passion elsewhere lacked self-knowledge.

 

I'm more interested in why would anyone destroy their child's life after only one day of deliberation and without including their partner in the consideration.

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why would this destroy a child's life?

 

how much of this passion is the child experiencing being modeled? like what they are just having sex with the child present, or just PDA?

Passion as in having a happy and enjoyable and appreciative partnership, hugs, fun and yes good sex. Does modelling that relationship trump a stale but intact biological parents relationship?

 

Obviously any family breakdown and loss of parental contact is going to hurt a child, but the argument is that that might be better than modelling a cold relationship to them thereby modelling/normalising acceptance of an unhappy situation.

 

Since I'm assuming some regular contact with the biological father, I'm not sure this could be called destroying a childs life. Although most step families have big issues, some do work out pretty well. Warren Farrell says they take a lot of work and I think he describes them as like a bomb waiting to go off!

 

 

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why would this destroy a child's life?

 

how much of this passion is the child experiencing being modeled? like what they are just having sex with the child present, or just PDA?

 

 

I was wondering this, too. I admit that when my parents displayed moments where they seemed to be really in love it was a healthy feeling for me. I felt safe and hopeful and joy. 

 

Passion can look really boring, I think. In a movie it's portrayed in a very visible way oftentimes but I think passion can be at a high level in people who simply appear happy and peaceful and in step with each other.

 

Passion in a marriage often ebbs and flows with life circumstances and hormone cycles. 

 

I will also admit that my kids seem lighter and happier when they see (non sexual, obviously) signals of passion between my husband and I like loud laughing or doing some goofy dance together or a kiss on the forehead or something. It can be done all the time probably, but I haven't met a couple yet, that can do it. 

 

And then of course, I could have the wrong definition of passion here.

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I would hope a couple's sex life has little to do with their child. (Besides the fact that their sex life created the child.) If appropriate boundaries are intact, the only direct evidence a child would have of parental sex life is mom being pregnant again. 

 

Affectionate touches can be indicative of sexual passion, but one can also be affectionate with close friends and family, which is indicative of fondness, certainly not sex. One can be passionate about their job, gardening, or their favorite song. Passion alone does not translate to sex. 

 

If it is important to model passion to a child, having an active sex life seems the least effective way to do that, because a child isn't privy to that part of his parents' life. 

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in the OP i guess i fixed passion meant a sexual relationship, because i think affection and love are passion, but the op said the birth parents still had that but lacked passion.

 

i figure a woman or man that left a relationship because of lack of passion would not "stick together" having resentments and not working them out seems like avoiding reality instead of a friendship or sticking together.

 

i would think each parent having a full relationship with partner would be a better for the parents, and the children see some of that relationship, that would be better than having people missing something and not fullfilling needs

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