Dating and the Single Parent Essay Example for Free

Dating and the Single Parent EssaySummaryIn the defend Dating and the Single Parent Ron administrate walks the single promote through the process of dating again. This book is broken into three sections. Section one has five chapters and is titled Getting Past the Butterflies and Warm Fuzzes. In the beginning charter starts with Dating in a Crowd Dating with Purpose. (29) With this in mind the reader begins to understand you go out be dating the entire family. speak describes incompatible types of daters, and warns the reader against the Consumer daters who want guarantees (44) slightly the dates. These consumer daters want the dates to be their all in all and meet their every need. incubate also describes the thought of Mirror, Mirror on the Wall Am I Ready to Date? (47) This section describes the impact bolshy has on you, and your leave behindingness to surrender to Gods direction regarding divorce and remarriage. (58) tour determining if you are ready to date Dea l lists the readiness factors can you handle being alone, verifying in God, smell at past issues, and enquire the questions like, What in my past can I not shake? This is getting yourself and kids ready for dating.While thinking of fear as the main hurdle in beginning to date, Deal suggests you not sidestep (83) your fear but acknowledge it. (83) Not only your fear but how to handle the kids fears and concerns in the dating world. Deal explains When a parent dates, kids feel the shift in direction away from them and the family this ignites their fear of more loss. (98) The second section of the book is called freeing Fishing (115) and negotiation most finding love. Finding love in all the right places and in all the wrong ways (117) talks well-nigh defining the hu composition relationship or the DTR there are three ways to look at relationships we need to learn when to yield, stop or run with yellow, red and green lights. Going deeper (163) reminds us to think of where we are i n life.Deal states Single people need that perspective so that wont overvalue getting wed, and get married people need that perspective so they wont lose sight of their purpose in being together. (165) Marital Commitment and Stepfamily Preparation (181) is the radical of the third section of the book. It is about getting re-engaged and making decisions about getting married. Guidelines are entertainn about what things to look for such as commitment and trust issues, how to be open with the children (young and adult).Some key steps in how to become a blended family are listed. Deal suggests exercises on how to be introduced, recognize loss in your child, planning the wedding and including the children, and ensureing the ex. This book takes you through the processes of wanting to date again, dating, and choosing the right type of somebody to date. The next steps are about the engagement, telling families and children youre getting married and creating a happily blended family.Pod ecadetial Use for Christian jibesThe chapter on Yellow Light. Red Light. Green Light. (141) is a chapter that most pastors need to share with their clients in the premarital counseling. This chapter and the concepts to be taught and learned can save couples from a lot of pain down the road and give additional skills for making a marriage more compatible. Yellow lights saying slow down (143) warm that things are great for now, however when you get married and the honeymoon is over rough times are coming. When you are turn outing to carefully blend families you need to make sure no one has on rose-colored glasses (145) or is ignoring the bumps in the road that will turn in to mountains later on if not dealt with before the couple gets married. A counsel needs to advise a couple to slow down if loneliness or desperation (146) are detected in the counseling sessions. This could indicate an central problem that will come out later in the marriage.The person with one of these disorder s may demand that the other person in the relationship try to be their all in all, and no one can be everything to someone. Counselors should consider a postponement of a marriage if one of the clients comes in with whatsoever character traits like quick temper, intimidating, angerreactions, chemical or physical abuse, cant say no, constantly blaming others, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, problems staying calm, financial problems, disengagement with family, hiding introductory relationships, or diagnosed personality disorder. (147-148) If a person has experienced or is experiencing one of these challenges, this counsellor will strongly suggest that it is dealt with before the marriage takes place. One of these problems will cause too much stress for most marriages to overcome. Deal suggests there are red stoplights. If you have extreme differences in parenting styles (151) you need to stop dating. This advocate would agree.Raising children is a very hard job when you agree however, wh en you disagree children tend to play one parent off the other causing fighting between the parents. You need to remember you are not only marrying the person, but also the children. Another red light could be the ex-spouse. If he/she causes constant trouble, you will be in constant turmoil in the new marriage and will need to consider canceling your plans to marry. Deal suggests other red flags such as cohabitation. This counselor-at-law would agree with Deal that cohabitation leans toward persons who have negative attitudes toward marriage, increase their divorce risk by 50%, are less sexually trustworthy, have turn away religious commitment, and are tempted to slide into marriage. (154) Cohabitation is not biblical, in Genesis 224 gives us the standard for all marriages and in Matthew 195 messiah tells us marriage is a legal and binding relationship.The green light (159) means everything is good and you can proceed with the dating or marriage plans. In the green light stage y ou can define your relationship. At this point Deal suggests you can share your relationship with your children. This also is the stage during which it is suggested you take the Couple Checkup (169). There are two advantages to doing it in this stage first it provides you and your partner an objective X ray of your relationship health. (169) Second learning about your weaknesses protagonists you as a couple target specific ways to improve. (169) This counselor will encourage couples in the red light zone to take a break and consider not dating any longer. If they are in the yellow light zone this counselor will encourage them to consider looking deeply at what the problems are and working through them before proceeding with the relationship.In the green light zone this counselor will encourage them to be willing to talk about issues when they arise, to be willing totalk about them, and to work on a compromise. Deal states Confidence calms the heart and reduces anxiety. (194) This c ounselor could not agree more, and knowing where you stand in a relationship is the most important element. Solidifying the relationship so both persons know how each other feels and what to expect keeps the green light going. Telling the children if you have children will be important. A plan needs to be made about how to tell them and expect the unexpected. One needs to expect them to be happy and for them to be angry about the decision. Letting the children know what will happen will help them through the fear and anger.Deal does not go into depth about what to do if the families do not want this marriage. What if the families do not like the person you want to marry? This counselor agrees the spouse that was married to the ex ought to tell him/her before the wedding day. Once the wedding day has taken place frequently times the children are going to be stressed out by this and misbehave. Deal suggests often times when things settle down from the wedding the child parent relatio nship will work itself out. This is a relationship neither party has had to handle before and it will be new challenges to both the parent and the child. Deal encourages parents to have a united front with the children. (206) If they do not have a unified team everything will begin to crumble. (207)CritiqueDeal speaks about commitment and trust (187) issues with couples. He explains that marriage is complicated and requires a couple to not be selfish. God in his infinite wisdom ask each person to make a covenant that binds them together throughout life, (187) or until death do us part. (187) Elwell states in the time of Christ a man could divorce his wife for the most trivial of reasons (347) from the Hillelite Pharisees. (347) This would suggest that if you take the side of the Hillelite Pharisees, our no fault divorce laws have been around for centuries. It is a delicate bound to get someone to commit to marriage to you when you are ready to commit to marriage and they will not.D eal gives several ideas Patiently continue dating, wrestle with your impatience, make out any specific concerns, give time for the hesitant person to find resolution, and at some point, the higher desire person will grow frighten away of waiting. (188) Deal does later in the book suggest a time line of five historic period is a reasonable time to wait onsomeone. If you have waited for five years and they still have not made a decision but you love them and cannot imagine life without that person do you walk away? Would it not be like a divorce? This counselor would not suggest anyone stay with someone for more than the five years unless they can make a decision to marry or not to marry.Deal speaks about crockpots and blenders in the chapter about Preparing for a Good Blend. The crockpots are those couples who dissemble slowly with low heat, (208) while the blender couples are those who move quickly with high velocity. (208) Deal states It is far wiser to adopt the crockpot cooki ng style. (208) Otherwise slow and believe is a much better way to blend a family than trying to quickly trying to force them to be a blended family. In this chapter he gives ideas about how to create stepfamilies. He says Younger children under the age of five may require far less time to soften toward stepparents than those between the ages of ten and fifteen years. Also, on occasion, a stubborn ingredient may resist softening and retain a sour taste. In either case, keep cooking. This counselor would whole heartedly agree with his wisdom. The younger children are when stepparents arrive into their life, the easier it is to accept them.Deal also gives ideas about how to handle situations like getting married, calling a stepfather Daddy, compounding holidays and other special-day traditions, and taking pictures as a family. (209-210) With statistics saying that fifty percent of first marriages fail and sixty percent of second marriages fail (smartmarriages.com) this counselor bel ieves Deal has made great recommendations in his book about how to blend families. Blended families will take work and Deal says that many times in this book. This book is an easy read with thought provoking topics. Some of the topics have a different way of looking at them than traditional thoughts. This book is a essential read if you are thinking of remarrying or marrying someone who has been married before.ReferencesDeal, R. (2012). Dating and the single parent. Bloomington, MN Bethany House Publishing. Eller, W. (2001). Evangelical dictionary of theology. 2n ed. Grand Rapids, MI baker Book House. Marano, H. E., Divorced? Dont even think of remarrying until you read this. www.smartmarriages.com. Accessed November 8, 2014.