My Family Dynamic is Unconventional (And Why I Wouldn’t Trade It For The World)

I don’t remember much about my parents’ divorce. All I know is that it happened in the early 2000s, and that my dad fed my older brother and I a lot of pasta and takeout from the local pizza shop on the nights we stayed with him. I couldn’t have been much older than three or four, which is surely much too young to have fully understood what was going on.

Growing up, I always thought that my parents had the perfect divorce. Luckily, when my mom moved out she lived not even five minutes down the road from my dad’s house, and my brother and I never went too long without seeing either parent. For every softball game, school play, or dance recital, I could look out into the crowd and see my mom and dad — while sitting separately — both watching proudly in support. And for that, I’ll forever be thankful.

During the first few years of their separation, I lived comfortably among the trios that existed on either side: my mom, brother, and I shared our own special bond, as did my dad, brother, and I. At my dad’s, I’d play monkey in the middle as the boys threw a plush football around the living room (single Dad life, I guess), and while at my mom’s, I’d do her makeup for make-believe dates with Brett Favre as my brother sat unamused on the couch. Back then, it seemed like this dynamic was perfectly normal and easy, even.

It didn't take me long, though, to fear that those trios would be torn apart when my parents started dating other people. My dad was becoming more and more serious with his girlfriend at the time, and he had asked my brother and I how we felt about welcoming her into the family as our future step-mom. This proposal meant that we’d also be gaining another sibling: her daughter from a previous marriage who was three years my junior. Given that I was still only around six, I was stoked to finally have someone to play Barbies with, but I was still scared to make the adjustment.

Our new blended family outgrew the house that my parents’ had built together — the one that my dad continued to live in after the separation — and we moved into a new house in a different development. For the most part, my brother and I continued to split equal time between my dad’s new house and where my mom lived, which was still conveniently only a few minutes away.

In the midst of all these changes, I have to stop and give both of my parents credit where credit is due; they never failed to prioritize the needs of their children, and always put our thoughts and feelings above their own in any of the decisions they made. I had only assumed that the split had been easy for the two of them, because they hardly ever showed any resentment toward each other.

But as I've gotten older, I’ve realized that there’s no such thing as a perfect divorce.

I’ve only had my heart broken one time in my life so far, and given how unbearable I thought the experience was, I can’t even imagine the sheer havoc that divorce wreaks — especially when kids are involved. It took me several years to recognize the strength and maturity it must’ve taken (at least initially) for my parents to maintain a semblance of normalcy for my brother and I; whether it was driving back and forth to each other’s houses, attending parent-teacher conferences, meanwhile having to cope, too, with the fact that the other had started to create a new family of their own.

I went on to bicker with my step-sister for essentially my entire childhood, but still we shared many special moments in between all of the fights. My brother never would’ve agreed to make music videos with me or construct a neighborhood lemonade stand. This side of the family continued to grow, and I became an older sister, once again, to two more siblings in 2009: twin baby girls!

In the meantime, my mom started hanging out with the new neighbor next door who happened to be not only a single father with two daughters of his own, but one of her oldest friends from childhood. This very same man — who I now call my step-dad — still talks about the day that I met him; fully dressed in my softball uniform, I hid shyly behind my mom and said a quick hello.

There’s really nothing unconventional about divorce, step family, or even having half-siblings. Many of my friends and other relatives have experienced abrupt changes to their family structure: sometimes occurring as a devastating shock, and other times as a necessarily release of years of built-up tension. While I now know better than to categorize my parents’ divorce as ideal, I remain grateful for the way that they’ve interacted with each other over the past 15 years or so.

It just so happens that these interactions are what makes my particular circumstances so unusual.

For several years, there wasn’t much about my parents’ lives post-divorce that was intertwined. As civil of a relationship they had, the two separate families they created were kept mainly as that: separate. I don’t remember an exact moment where this all changed, but somehow and for some reason, it did.

Now thinking about my family’s dynamic, to an outsider, it’d almost seem like my parents were close friends with each other. When my mom and step-dad bought a house together a few years back, my dad was their realtor. When there’s electrical or other technical problems around the house, my dad often consults with my step-dad, an electrician. When there’s a home Penn State football game, I beg both of my parents to bring their campers to tailgate.

In my late teenage years and throughout my time in college, my two sets of parents and step-parents have shared many drinks, laughs, and conversations. On my 21st birthday, we celebrated COVID-style and threw a party at my mom’s house given the bars’ limited hours. It wasn’t hard for me to decide that the occasion was simply too monumental to not have all of my immediate family there. I didn’t want anyone to worry about drinking and driving, though, so we created a solution that might’ve been a bit over-the-top, but proved effective: my dad, step-mom, and sisters parked their camper in my mom’s yard overnight. As awkward of a plan as it might sound, my dad, step-dad, and uncle seemed to be having the time of their lives huddled around the keg (escaping a bunch of chaotic, drunken 20-something-year-olds) all night.

I recognize that this type of relationship and mentality behind it wouldn’t work for everyone. Perhaps there are some children of divorced parents that wouldn’t even hope for a dynamic like this. But frankly — and selfishly — it’s tiring to split time between two sides. When it’s possible to have everyone in the same place, at the same time, and my brother and I have to do less back-and-forth, I’m here for it.

Another thing to point out is that I’ll never know the full extent of my parents’ divorce, and truthfully, I would never want to. I’m sure that a lot has gone on behind the scenes, and probably still does, but as long as their relationship continues to be friendly and lighthearted, why fix something that isn’t broken?

Thanks, Mom and Dad, for being so awesome over the years even when times were hard. Without even realizing it, you’ve instilled so many great values within Collin and me, and I hope that one day I’ll be able to demonstrate these to my future kids. Thank you, also to my step-family for being so incredible and for being the greatest extensions of family that a kid could ever wish for. I haven’t always been the easiest child to care for, but the combined guidance and love that I’ve received from all of you is something that I’ll always appreciate.

My family might be weird, but if this is what makes us close, I wouldn’t change a single thing.