Turning Points in Becoming a Family

We don’t often think about how our family of origin came to be—our family roles, rules, and expectations have always just been there. However, for those who have experienced major changes in the family, for instance, due to divorce, the death of a parent, marrying into a family, or becoming a stepfamily, it is critical to understand becoming a family.

How does communication function in becoming and changing a family? How do we know our roles or what we should say or do (or not) to help a new family become closer? Often people experience becoming a family as a process of trial and error as we figure things out and then adapt as things change.

My research teams and I have sought to understand the process of becoming a family in one type of family—a stepfamily. We have studied interaction with new people and how they become, live, and change as a family. We are working to understand what we do or say to become an overall positive family when that is possible.

I will share what we’ve learned about turning points in developing overall positive stepfamily relationships. You may find this information useful if you become part of a stepfamily, or it may be useful for other family types as well.

Turning Points in Stepfamily Life

My research teams asked stepchildren over the age of 25 years to tell us about their stepfamily turning points (Braithwaite et al., 2018). Relational turning points are important events that result in either positive or negative relationship changes over time.

Collecting stories of different turning points helped us understand communication patterns and processes stepfamily members experienced. We chose older stepchildren as they had the opportunity to mature and think back on what happened in their stepfamily, especially how they adjusted to having a stepparent and sometimes stepsiblings in their lives.

We asked the adult stepchildren to identify their turning points over time, such as the stepparent moving into their home, their first holiday together, or the stepparent standing in for the nonresidential parent. For each turning point, they identified how much they “felt like a family” from 0-100%.

In what follows, I share the seven most common turning points of the 15 turning point types we found. While these turning points are geared toward stepfamily life, you may find ways to apply some of these turning points to other family types.

Top Turning Points in Stepfamilies

1. Prosocial Actions accounted for 18.2% of the turning points and reflected acts of kindness and friendship, for example giving gifts, offering compliments, or treating to a meal. These actions stood out from everyday incidents and affected the family relationship in a positive way. A stepdaughter shared:

I wanted to paint my room red when I was 16…My stepdad is extremely thoughtful and never judged me…My real dad and stepmom said, “No you can’t paint a room red. Dan [stepdad] said, “It is just a wall.” He told me I would probably hate it in a year, but we could always repaint it.

2. Quality time accounted for 16.7% of the turning points and reflected spending time together in shared activities, such as watching football, listening to the child’s concerns, or having a special talk. A 32-year-old stepson asked his stepfather to teach him to drive when he turned 16:

“I think my stepdad was more present, or the one I trusted more to do that…my stepdad was the one who I chose and took the time out to do this kind of important thing with.”

3. Conflict/disagreement accounted for 10% of the turning points and reflected a struggle between stepchild and stepparent. These turning points were negative 66% of the time and sometimes opened the door to greater understanding and positivity at a later point. A stepdaughter described a conflict with her stepmother who had talked about some private information involving the stepdaughter, Brenda:

“I just lashed out on her…I called her the‘b-word’ and I was like, ‘You’re so disrespectful. This is my family, not yours, and you’re sharing my private stories’...It was a good month until we started talking again…she felt horrible…she was crying and [said]…’Brenda, I didn’t mean to be so harsh, and I didn’t mean to be the way I was.’”

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4. Changes in household/family composition accounted for 7.4% of the turning points and reflected changes of who was residing with the stepfamily, for instance, after a child moved in or out of the stepfamily home. Adapting to change was positive about half the time or became so later. For example, this stepchild moved back in with her mother and stepfather at age 23:

“I talked to my mom and asked her if I could move in with her and Rob [stepfather…And he made a place for me to stay in his home for a second time…he accommodated me very graciously without saying anything about it.”

5. Rituals accounted for 7.4% of the turning points and reflected traditions, such as holidays or family celebrations. For example, a 41-year-old stepdaughter discussed her mother and stepfather paying for her sister’s wedding:

“It was just clear that both my mother and Emmett [stepfather] were sharing the costs… We just all felt like a real family that day.”

6. Adult relational change accounted for 7% of the turning points and reflected changes for the adults, such as seeing an improved relationship develop between the parent and stepparent or an understanding between the nonresidential parent and stepparent. One stepdaughter described:

“I realized how happy he made my mom…That took me from ornery teenager to ‘maybe this guy isn’t so bad.'”

7. Family crisis accounted for 7% of the turning points and reflected emergencies such as serious illness, accident, or job loss in the stepfamily. We might anticipate crises as negative events, but they had mostly positive impacts over time. One stepchild recalled feeling more positive about his stepfather after his biological dad died:

“At that point I really started to look at my stepdad for who he was and not take him for granted. Especially as he has been so wonderful to me for such an extended period of time.”

Actions to Build Positive Relationships

We come to understand and appreciate the role of communication as we experience different turning points in families, looking to actions and messages that help a positive and healthy family grow. The good news is that there are multiple ways to bring about positive (and negative) changes in families. We can appreciate that even seemingly negative turning points, such as conflict and crisis, can lead to positive outcomes in the short or long term.

Certainly, turning points can be grand gestures that are costly in resources, such as time and money. However, the first two turning points, prosocial actions and quality time, demonstrate that modest actions, such as offering to repaint a child’s bedroom or walking a child down the aisle at their wedding, help show a person they are valued. Likely all of us can find things to do or say that have the potential to be meaningful to the recipient and may help the relationship grow.