In today’s society, with the majority of marriages now resulting in divorce and most divorcees remarrying or cohabiting with a new partner, the traditional, nuclear family is becoming increasingly less common than it used to be. However, the influx of stepparents in today’s society is still left with few automatic rights to their stepchildren after marriage and divorce. With the exception of legal adoption of a child by a stepparent, stepparents have no right to make medical, educational, or placement decisions about the child. Furthermore, in the event of a divorce, stepparents must request visitation rights to a child even if they have been parenting them since infancy (Garrison, 2015). Lawmakers hesitate to make changes to policies regarding
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However, the roles of many stepparents have proven to be active and crucial in a child’s life, and the fact that these relationships are systematically isolated can result in negative outcomes including personal stress or weakened relationships within the family due to conflict or lack of support from outside sources. The institutionalization of stepfamilies has never been completed due to the fact that society has historically treated stepfamilies as traditional, nuclear ones. However, as the dynamic of and reasons for blended families have evolved over the decades, so have their need to be supported and represented in way that is different from traditional …show more content…
This becomes a particularly heated debate among stepparents who have parented a child throughout almost the entirety of his or her life. In many cases, divorce between a biological parent and stepparent results in severed ties between the stepparent and child due to the hoops they must jump through in order to earn visitation rights, and the handful of states that refuse to allow stepparents any visitation rights post-divorce (Mukherji, 2013). Despite the fact that legislation has made little movement towards changing some of these laws, researchers are becoming increasingly aware of how important some of these extended family or third party relationships can be to a child and how necessary it is to preserve those relationships after a divorce in order to maintain the child’s well-being (Dullea, 1987). This in mind, it is crucial that the court take into account the possibly detrimental effects that a sudden lack of parental presence by a stepparent and making changes within the law accordingly. At least, the stepparent-child relationship needs to be carefully examined in order to figure in the level of psychological attachment the child has to the stepparent, keeping the child’s best interest at highest
However, the roles of many stepparents have proven to be active and crucial in a child’s life, and the fact that these relationships are systematically isolated can result in negative outcomes including personal stress or weakened relationships within the family due to conflict or lack of support from outside sources. The institutionalization of stepfamilies has never been completed due to the fact that society has historically treated stepfamilies as traditional, nuclear ones. However, as the dynamic of and reasons for blended families have evolved over the decades, so have their need to be supported and represented in way that is different from traditional …show more content…
This becomes a particularly heated debate among stepparents who have parented a child throughout almost the entirety of his or her life. In many cases, divorce between a biological parent and stepparent results in severed ties between the stepparent and child due to the hoops they must jump through in order to earn visitation rights, and the handful of states that refuse to allow stepparents any visitation rights post-divorce (Mukherji, 2013). Despite the fact that legislation has made little movement towards changing some of these laws, researchers are becoming increasingly aware of how important some of these extended family or third party relationships can be to a child and how necessary it is to preserve those relationships after a divorce in order to maintain the child’s well-being (Dullea, 1987). This in mind, it is crucial that the court take into account the possibly detrimental effects that a sudden lack of parental presence by a stepparent and making changes within the law accordingly. At least, the stepparent-child relationship needs to be carefully examined in order to figure in the level of psychological attachment the child has to the stepparent, keeping the child’s best interest at highest