Siblings

10 Ways to Parent Siblings

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Siblings can play wonderful roles throughout each other’s lives though there can be challenges along the way. Here are some of our tips to help nurture those important relationships.

10 Ways to Parent Siblings

  1. Prepare early: talk to older children and prepare them early on about the importance and role of an older sibling as a source of guidance and care. Do be careful that you do not give an older child too much responsibility for a younger one.
  2. Let children express how they feel: if a child is experiencing negative emotions about their brother or sister, allow the child to talk about it. Often a child just needs to be listened to.
  3. Don’t play favourite: never show a special preference for one of your children.
  4. Never compare your children: they are their own individual persons, so celebrate their differences and let them know they are special for who they are.
  5. Respect personal space: make sure each child has enough time and space of their own. Children need opportunities to do their own thing, and to play with their own friends without their sibling.
  6. Positive Communication: teach your children how to positively get attention from each other rather than picking a fight.
  7. Foster co-operation rather than competition: set tasks up that require co-operation among your children, such as having them race the clock to pick up toys instead of racing each other.
  8. Develop ground rules together: have family discussions about what rules to establish and receive feedback from your children. Listening to what they need from you and each other may reduce future conflicts.
  9. Do not shout or lecture: it does not help the situation if you get frustrated too. Your children will learn and imitate the way you handle resolving problems.
  10. Hold children equally responsible: keep in mind that when rules are broken or conflicts arise, it does not matter who started it because it always takes more than one person to cause an argument or fight.

This week’s ’10 Ways to …’ is adapted by One Family’s Director of Children and Parenting Services, Geraldine Kelly, from our Family Communications training programme.

Coming soon: 10 Ways to Positively Maintaining Contact, 10 Ways to Effective Toilet Training and 10 Ways to Run Family Meetings.

One Family offers a suite of training opportunities for parents and for professionals on an on-going basis. To find out more, click here or call 01 662 9212.

(Photo credit: FreeDigitalPhotos.net/imagerymajestic)

Houses

Housing a Major Concern for One-Parent Families

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Kitty Holland writes in the Irish Times today about the distressing case of Sabrina McMahon, a lone parent who has been spending nights with her three young children in their car. Housing concerns and worries are the cause of continuous stress for many of the parents One Family works with, with many telling us they are ‘on the edge’.

Good secure housing enhances children’s well-being and helps provide stability for family relationships, schools and development. The housing crisis is a challenge for Minister Burton that she has to resolve for Budget 2015.

Every month, we invite responses to our anonymous, 3 question survey. Last month’s was on Housing Supports. Comments made by some of those who took the survey included:

I’m from Dublin and still have family there but I was forced to move to Wicklow in 2007 where I have no family or supports.

I can’t do a Masters in Education as I was planning, as I live over 45 km from the college I would have had to attend and I would not be able to afford the journeys.

Having to move constantly due to rent increases takes up time, money and creates instability. A constant home is essential in maintaining positive routine.

Security of place is very important for emotional stability of the children.

Longer leases, RAS (Rent Allowance Supplement) to be more attractive for landlords and to be extended beyond a once off, and more social housing is key with rent to buy schemes in place. 

The Housing Supports survey results can be read here. This will be a key topic of One Family’s Budget 2015 submission.

This month’s survey is on Housing and Rent Supplement Limits and can be taken here.

 

Hands Daisy

10 Ways to Sensitive Integration of a Stepparent

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Introducing a new partner who may be potential stepparent to your children requires great care and patience with the focus on helping children to adapt. As part of our weekly ’10 Ways to …’ series, here are our tips on managing this situation so that, in time, all members of the family can enjoy positive and supportive relationships.

10 Ways to Sensitive Integration of a Stepparent

  1. Be friends: Introduce your child to your new partner gently and slowly. Plan a fun activity for the family and bring your new partner along. Your partner may not love the child on first meeting, this is natural. Allow the relationship to develop and for both parties to become comfortable with each other.
  2. Talk with your child: Involve your child in your life. Tell them you have made a new special friend and that you would like them to get to know your child.
  3. Moving in: It is usually once a new partner moves in that they become a stepparent (not always through marriage as legally recognised). Involve children in this process. Talk in advance about what this will look like and how it may change current family life – be clear about the positives and the negatives.
  4. Talk about behaviour: When there are young children involved, the stepparent must be allowed to manage behaviour if they are being asked to care for the children. It is important to discuss your views on managing behaviour in advance and agree how to handle issues. Work with each other. Discuss parenting styles and how you were parented as a child. What do you want for your child and how can the stepparent support you to parent?
  5. 3 parents: Your child has two parents usually and may not feel they have room for a third. Be gentle in your approach. Don’t get into a situation whereby the child feels the biological parent is being replaced. Always respect the child’s feelings.
  6. Respect: Always respect the biological parent of the child and respect the role the child’s biological parent plays in their life. Do not encourage or permit the child to call a stepparent Dad or Mum. You are just creating confusion and disrespecting the other parent. Make sure to talk with the other biological parent about this new important person in your child’s life.
  7. Couple time: Remember you are a couple and not just parents. Take time out as a couple and also take time to talk about the challenges of parenting with another adult who is not the parent. It is hard for both of you. The stepparent may have to learn how to share you with your child and that you have to juggle meeting their needs and those of your child.
  8. Acknowledge: Both parties need to acknowledge that this may be hard for the child. They may find it hard to adapt to sharing their parent. Maybe they have been hurt in the past. Involve them. Talk about things in the home and plan changes together. Explore issues as they arise and find solutions together.
  9. Have fun: Do fun things together! Also allow both the parent and stepparent have one-to-one time with the child. This will help build the relationship for both parents and child.
  10. Trust: Trust each other. If you cannot trust your partner with your child then you need to think about what is happening. Take everything your child says seriously. They are not out to hurt you or break up a relationship. Hear them.

If you would like to talk about the issues above or have any other concerns or questions, our askonefamily lo-call helpline is available on 1890 662 212 and by emailing support@onefamily.ie.

This week’s ’10 Ways to …’ is compiled by One Family’s Director of Children and Parenting Services, Geraldine Kelly.

Coming soon: 10 Ways to Positively Maintaining Contact and 10 Ways to Effective Toilet Training.

The One Family parenting skills courses Positive Parenting and Family Communications are enrolling now for Summer. Click here for information.

Modern Family on Today FM featuring One Family

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Modern Family is a new Today FM four-part documentary series on family diversity in Ireland, funded by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland and narrated by Ray D’Arcy and produced by Mary Carroll.

The series aims to explore the changing face of modern families. Part 4 is a focus on one-parent families and separated parents sharing parenting. It features interviews with one of our founders, Evelyn Forde, and other One Family friends and colleagues.

The four episodes will be first broadcast over this Easter Weekend as below:

  1. Modern Family Ep1: Same-sex parents | Friday 18 April 10.30am (Listen back here)
  2. Modern Family Ep2: Families with disabilities | Saturday 19 April 10.30am (Listen back here)
  3. Modern Family Ep3: Immigrant families | Sunday 20 April 9.30am (Listen back here)
  4. Modern Family Ep4: One-parent families | Monday 21 April 10.30am (Listen back here)

Note that we will update this post with links to listen back to each episode as they become available.

Further details:

Episode 1 – Same-sex parents More than two decades ago, when Bernadette and Ann decided to start a family as a lesbian couple, they were ahead of their time. Together they raised their two sons, Conor and Darragh in a society where they sometimes felt isolated and stigmatised as same-sex parents. Clare and Aishling met when they were in school. When Clare hit her 30s the pair started talking about having children. They decided to use donor sperm for artificial insemination and they now have a son, Darragh. Glenn and Adriano became the first gay couple in the state to have their civil partnership formally recognised back in January 2011. Glenn has a nine year-old daughter and shares her parenting duties with her mother.

Episode 2 – Families with disabilities Until the age of 18 Julie lived in institutions – residential centres for children with disabilities. She was one of the first children from the hospital to attend the local secondary school and was the first person in a wheelchair to be recruited in the Civil Service. She is married to Mick and has three children. She talks about the challenges she faced in 1970s Ireland, a society where disabled people were invisible. Cerebral Palsy sufferer Ken Kelly is engaged to Gillian Murray, who has Spina Bifida. They want to move in together but there is a lot that has to be considered. Kieran Coppinger is from Mervue in Galway and has Down Syndrome and he talks about his desire to find a girlfriend and his burgeoning acting career.

Episode 3 – Immigrant families Dr Moosajee Bhamjee was Ireland’s first black, Muslim TD. Originally from South Africa (born to Indian parents), he came to Dublin in 1965 where he studied medicine at the Royal College of Surgeons. He tells us how Irish society has evolved since he arrived over forty years ago. Born in Italy and raised in Sri Lanka, broadcaster and social justice activist Dil Wickremasinghe feels thoroughly Irish. She moved here fourteen years ago and as a gay woman she felt immediately welcome. Tomasz Kostienko and his family came to Ireland in 2007. Tomasz felt accepted straight away and his three children now call Ireland home but he dreams of returning to Poland.  Others have not felt so welcome. Refugee Lassane Ouedraogo arrived here from Burkina Faso seven years ago. He has found it difficult to be accepted in and has experienced racism from Irish people.

Episode 4 – One-parent families Today in Ireland, over half a million people live in one-parent families. However, a generation ago, being a lone parent was strongly disapproved of. When Evelyn Forde realised she was pregnant in 1973, she was faced with the heartbreaking dilemma of whether or not to put her child up for adoption. Labour TD Ciara Conway became pregnant in her final year of college. Her daughter Aeva-May is now 11 years old and Ciara speaks about the difficulties of juggling a hectic work and family life. Three years ago Ciara met Gary and they married at Christmas. Aeva-May talks about bringing Gary into their family. Bonnie Brady is raising her son Jayden alone. She speaks about how her life changed dramatically when Jayden arrived and how difficult it is to make ends meet and pursue her career while parenting alone. Paul and his partner separated when their son Eoin was six months old. They share parenting duties now, but spent years fighting over access. It took Paul a long time to learn that every decision he made had to be in Eoin’s best interest, not his.

Family Day Festival Takes Place on 18 May

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Press Release

Family Day Festival celebrates family diversity of today’s Ireland on 18 May

Sunday, 18 May 2014 | www.familyday.ie

(Dublin, 18 April 2014) One Family – Ireland’s leading organisation for one-parent families in Ireland – celebrates the diversity of families in today’s Irish society with the free one-day Family Day Festival in Dublin’s Iveagh Gardens on Sunday, 18 May 2014 from 11am to 5pm.

This is the fourth year of the annual celebration, which attracted almost 10,000 attendees in 2013, and also the 20th anniversary of UN International Year of the Family which encourages a refocus on the role of families and on family policy development, offering the opportunity to share good practices in family policy making and to review challenges faced by families worldwide and recommend solutions. UN International Day of Families, the inspiration for One Family’s founding of the Family Day Festival, takes place on 15 May annually.

Everyone is invited to celebrate their family and all families on Sunday 18 May in acknowledgment of the wonderful diversity and reality of families in today’s Ireland. Families are not all the same and Mother’s Day and Father’s Day exclude many. The Family Day Festival embraces the UN definition of family which refers to two or more people, bound together by mutual consent, birth and/or adoption or placement who together care for each other. It celebrate all types of family – one-parent families, step families, the traditional married family, adoptive and foster families, blended and extended families, those with opposite and same sex parents.

The Festival offers free entertainment and fun for every age. Adults and children can enjoy arts and crafts, performance and storytelling workshops from organisations such as the National Print Museum, The Ark, Imaginosity, Fighting Words and the Gaiety School of Acting; create their own masterpieces to take home; and participate in traditional sports and games.

They will be entertained by performers including MC Brian Daly, magician extraordinaire who can tickle the funny bones of every age, and musicians, dancers and performers. They can avail of the opportunity to engage with organisations providing services for families from advice to family-friendly holidays, and chat with those working towards equality for all families in Ireland. Tasty food from around the world will be on sale or families can bring their own picnics. The Family Day Festival aims to provide a brilliant, packed day out with a great variety of fun activities accessible to all without the need to spend any money.

Karen Kiernan, Director of One Family, commented: “Although our Constitution still does not acknowledge the reality of the diversity of families and this must change, this is a landmark time with the new Children and Family Relationships Bill intending to provide legal clarity on parental rights in diverse family forms, and Better Outcomes: Brighter Futures, the National Policy Framework for Children and Young People 2014-2020 published this week. The Family Day Festival creates a chance to celebrate all families while having a lot of fun. Everyone around the country can enjoy it with their family members and friends and wish everyone a Happy Family Day!” 

Those who cannot attend the festivities in the Iveagh Gardens are encouraged to host their own Family Day event which can be included on the Family Day site by emailing details to familyday@onefamily.ie.

The Family Day Festival is supported by the Community Foundation of Ireland, the Office of Public Works and Dublin City Council.

Further information is available on www.familyday.ie where the full programme of events will soon be available.

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About One Family

One Family was founded in 1972 as Cherish and is Ireland’s leading organisation for one-parent families, providing services to people parenting alone, sharing parenting and going through family transitions. Its policy work is rooted in its extensive family support work over the past four decades. Children are at the centre of this work and the organisation helps all the adults in their lives, including mums, dads, grandparents, step-parents, new partners and other siblings, offering a holistic model of specialist family support services. These services include the lo-call askonefamily national helpline on 1890 622 212, counselling, and provision of training courses for parents and for professionals. For further information, visit www.onefamily.ie.

Listings

Family Day Festival | A celebration of the diversity of the family with free entertainment, games, workshops and fun for all ages | Sunday, 18 May 2014 | Iveagh Gardens, Dublin 2 | 11am – 5 pm | Free | 01 662 9212 | www.familyday.ie

For Images or Further Information

Shirley Chance, Director of Communications, One Family | t: 01 662 9212 or 087 414 8511 | e: schance@onefamily.ie