Good Parenting Magazine

"I think the biggest mistake that step parents make are trying to make the step family just like a carbon copy of a nuclear family.

Stepfamilies are not the same as nuclear families. They are very different. The biggest mistake people make is having a preset notion of what a step family is and forcing it to fit into a mould which very often it cannot fit into."

MUMS should be cautious about receiving some types of parenting advice from family and friends because they risk receiving outdated information.

Parenting author Jodie Benveniste says advice such as what position babies should sleep in, the value of breast milk over formula and disciplining strategies like smacking have all been modified in recent years and listening to outdated suggestions could be a problem.

"One of the biggest problems for new mums is juggling the information overload and receiving out-of-date advice, sometimes about how someone remembered something 30 years ago," Mrs Benveniste says.

Family psychologist Renee Mill says advice about specific situations is best sought from professionals, but grandparents still had valuable insights to share.

UNDER all those long lopsided fringes, a hidden danger is lurking.

A leading optometrist has warned children and teenagers are risking their eyesight for the sake of fashion. Favoured by celebrities including Reece Mastin and Justin Bieber, the current zeal for haircuts with fringes that flop over one eye could result in a generation of young people with lazy eyes.

Optometrists Association national executive member Andrew Hogan warned amblyopia - the medical term for lazy eye - could result from obstructed vision caused by hair.

"If a young emo chap has a fringe covering one eye all the time, that eye won't see a lot of detail," Mr Hogan said.

Question

i met my wife as i was leaving a 16 year relationship long story short she has 2 kids 10- 14 3 years into this i can stand being around them i never had children its a daily struggle just to get up i avoid the stepson wait for him to leave for school before i get up he has add ocd etc....hes 10 i cant stand being around him...im at the point i hate these kids and there really not that bad...i never had kids i feel suffocated i wish they'd dissapear i have a wife with very low self esteme and i have to play daddy to all 3 of them...its become bullshit im still attracted to my wife and if were alone for a few days we are fine unfortunatly this is life...and im ready to leave...i have no interest in children and i know i made a major mistake what should i do....i chain smoke from constant anxiety they drive me up the wall its not healthy for me or them i know this...

Do you ever find yourself asking . . .

• How can you get your children to do their homework without meltdowns, threats or bribes?

• How can you have a drama-free morning where the kids actually get out the door in time for school?

• How can you better manage your kids’ screen time without making them want to hide what they’re doing from you?

Family therapist Susan Stiffelman is here to help. While most parenting programs are designed to coerce kids to change, Parenting Without Power Struggles does something innovative, showing you how to come alongside your children to awaken their natural instincts to cooperate, rather than at them with threats or bribes, which inevitably fuels their resistance.

By staying calm and being the confident “Captain of the ship” your child needs, you will learn how to parent from a place of strong, durable connection, and you’ll be better able to help your kids navigate the challenging moments of growing up.

Drawing upon her successful practice and packed with real-life stories, Parenting Without Power Struggles is an extraordinary guidebook for transforming the day-to-day lives of busy parents—and the children they love.

CHILDREN are the victims of alcohol-related harm in more than one-fifth of Australian households, a study has found, adding weight to calls for the price of alcohol sold in bottle shops to be increased to discourage large quantities being consumed in homes.

Most were harmed by family members or by other relatives, and the rest by the drinking of family friends, neighbours, coaches, religious leaders or others, according to the study published in the latest edition of the international journal Addiction.

The lead author of the study, Anne-Marie Laslett, said children were commonly exposed to heavy drinking by their parents and others at social occasions, and that younger parents tended to drink heavily more often than those who became parents later in life.

TREASURER Wayne Swan will face tough questioning when he speaks to 200 heads of welfare and community groups in Melbourne tomorrow.

While his Budget proved generous for families with schoolchildren, single-parent families feel they got a raw deal with the requirement that they move off parenting payments and onto the lower paying Newstart Allowance once their children reach the age of eight.

The Government is making cuts to parenting payments to save $700 million. ACOSS chief Dr Cassandra Goldie estimates that 100,000 families will be $60 a week worse off and fall deeper into poverty with the move.

Last week Mr Swan announced the Government will spread the benefits of the mining boom with a boost to the Family Tax Benefit Part A from July next year.

Mother's Day. As if divorced moms and stepmoms needed yet one more reason to feel at odds with each other. For moms (whether divorced or not), Mother's Day might mean blackened toast and watery coffee delivered on a tray in bed, with a dandelion plucked from the backyard.

We overlook the explosion in the kitchen and choose instead to bask in the glow of love and attention on this one special day, excusing ourselves from chores and life as a housemaid.

We all have our own memories of how we honored our mothers as children and there's something miraculous about seeing life come full circle.

EXTENDED breastfeeders have a message for those shocked by Time magazine's cover of a mother breastfeeding her three-year-old - it's not weird, it's healthy, and it's happening in Australia.

Los Angeles mum Jamie Lynne Grumet, 26, is on the Time cover breastfeeding son Aram, 3.

An interview on attachment parenting also covers breastfeeding her adopted son, Samuel, now 5.

Jenna Korf is a certified Stepfamily Foundation coach at www.stepmomhelp.com and the stepmom voice on the popular blog No One's the Bitch.

She writes a feature column in Stepmom Magazine and has been featured on CNN.com as a stepfamily expert. Jenna offers workshops to stepmoms and is a mental health continuing education provider offering educational classes to therapists.

Jenna lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, is a kick-ass wife to the man who makes it all worth it, a pretty awesome stepmom to two teenage boys and a mom to one lovable pup named Astro.

GRANDPARENTS who have been denied access to their grandchildren are advised to "tread carefully" and stay as positive as possible.

The advice is offered in a new edition of the Grandparents' Family Law Information Guide, published by the Sutherland-based Family Law Reform Association NSW. Researched and compiled by Coral Slattery, it is the fourth edition of the guide, which was first published in 2008.

Lawyer Andrew Corish, an accredited family law specialist, summarised recent court cases and concluded that many grandparents had succeeded in being given time with their grandchildren. He listed a number of principles that could be taken from these cases.

Ever feel as if you don’t have enough time? Is your ‘To Do’ list so long that if you stayed up for a week you couldn’t get it all done?

Did you ever just not know what to do? Today’s blog offers a practical solution: bag it, barter it or better it. As many of you are aware, I am a certified coach with Dr. Martha Beck.

As such, I get to learn from her and this technique called the 3 Bs is straight from Dr. Beck. When you are faced with something that you really do not want to do or just do not like doing, you always have these three options to bag it, barter it or better it.

COFFEE entrepreneur Phillip Di Bella has been embroiled in a child labour scandal after admitting children as young as 12 work on farms his company buys from.

But the multimillionaire said the children were put to work in some developing countries to keep them away from illegal drugs.

Mr Di Bella, who founded the Bowen Hills-based Di Bella Coffee in 2002, told The Courier-Mail the company sourced coffee beans from some farms that use child labour, with the children not paid directly, in countries including Brazil, Peru and Cuba.

The admission came after Mr Di Bella brushed off an anonymous complaint made to the Swiss-based International Labour Organisation, a United Nations agency, which accused the company of using the ILO name and logo without permission in a 2009 YouTube advertising video.

Want to find a health service in Victoria? Or do you need easy-to-understand and medically verified first aid information? Then download the free Better Health Channel mobile app today!!

Conveniently locate health services wherever you are in Victoria, learn more about medical conditions and treatments on the go, and get first aid essentials and important health advice anywhere, anytime – all from the most trusted brand in health information.

Being a parent can be one of the most difficult (and rewarding!) jobs around. It’s not something that you can be perfect at.

Most parents are doing the best they can for their kids while juggling work, friends, managing a house, and lots more. But it’s worth trying to improve the relationships you share with your child and other family members. Good family relationships are more than just enjoyable for their own sake.

They: make children feel secure and loved, which helps their brains develop can help to overcome difficulties with children’s eating, sleeping, learning and behaviour.

Even for the busiest of parents, there are plenty of easy things you can do to develop good family relationships.

The number of international adoptions has fallen to its lowest point in 15 years, a steep decline attributed largely to crackdowns against baby-selling, a sputtering world economy and efforts by countries to place more children with domestic families.

Globally, the number of orphans being adopted by foreign parents dropped from a high of 45,000 in 2004 to an estimated 25,000 last year, according to annual statistics compiled by Peter Selman, an expert on international adoptions at Britain's Newcastle University.

A parent's reaction to stress affects the way a child reacts to stress. If a parent reacts negatively, a child will learn to react negatively as well.

In addition, negative reactions to stress, such as yelling and lashing out, can scare a child. Children can learn to shut themselves down and may even think that they are the cause of the stress.

By utilizing The Parental Toolkit, parental stress can be handled positively and it helps children see that their parents' love for them never changes, even when they are stressed out.

The Parental Toolkit helps address the issue of STRESS and how to deal with it effectively. Learn how to build long lasting, productive relationships with your family members.

Abrasion is a broad term given to an injury such as a graze, scratch or cut. These injuries are very common throughout childhood and can generally be treated at home.

Founded: 7th October 2010. Welcome single mums and dads of Australia...Feel free to chat with other single Parents :)WARNING: Please dont leave personal details of your phone numbers or address on this page as admin will not be responsiable.

A $1.1 BILLION cost-of-living allowance worth $210 for singles and $350 for couples will be paid every year to welfare recipients over the next four years, in a handout to those on the dole and single mothers to deal with increases in costs of living.

The government says the twice-yearly payments will be a permanent part of the budget. Wayne Swan has unveiled the new supplementary allowance for income support recipients -- including the unemployed, students and parents with young children -- in an attempt to help the most needy.

It is the "carrot" element of a budget that cuts single mothers off the single pension, penalising them by close to $60 a week. "We will also invest $1.1bn in a supplement of up to $210 a year for students, jobseekers and parents with young children and on income support," the Treasurer said in his speech.

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SINGLE parents on welfare will lose access to their more generous parenting payment when their youngest child turns eight, or six if they have a partner, under a tough measure the government hopes will save the budget close to $685.8 million.

In a radical change to the welfare regime, from January 1 all parenting payment recipients who were on the payment when John Howard changed the rules in 2006 but stayed on the payment as the change was "grandfathered" will be assessed under the new rules.

The rules, which were leaked before the budget's release, have been judged as too harsh by Labor Left MPs.

When asked the question, “Is Mother’s Day a challenge for stepmoms?” I would say yes, Mother’s Day has been a huge challenge for me from time to time.

In the 16 years that I have been married to my husband, I have more often than not focused on what I didn’t have instead of what I did have – causing my own unnecessary grief and anguish. Before I explore that premise more, allow me to share a little background.

The Stepfamily Systems Co-Parenting Center in Riverside is running an Otis Spunkmeyer cookie dough fundraiser through May 29 to complete the group's nonprofit status and to prepare for its grand opening June 25.

The group is offering a $3 - $3 earnings split per tub of cookie dough to other nonprofits commensurate to their portion of earned funds.

Checks collected should be made payable to you or your organization and then one check is payable for amount due to Stepfamily Systems.

Blended Family Advantages & Disadvantages. A blended family is the active merging of stepfamily members into the family unit. In other words, when a stepfamily enters into another family unit, there is a desire from the parents or grandparents to bring the families together socially. Even if the head of the families has a positive attitude in...