Let me ask you this. Have you ever noticed that some people get into their profession because of the pain from their childhood? Well, you know what my answer is going to be. Yeah, I think we're sitting here right now in marriage and family ministry in a lot of ways because of the pain of my family breaking up.
And I mean, think about this. We're hosting a podcast because of our 10-year anniversary pain where we almost lost our marriage and it's the foundation of everything we do. And I think that happens often. Like if I talk to doctors or someone in any kind of field like, oh, what got you into this vocation?
And many times it's like, well, I had someone that I loved that was sick or you actually you were going to go into medicine because of your knee injury. Yeah. So why are you asking me this? Because we're going to look at that today. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Shelby Abbott and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson. You can find us at familylifetoday.com.
This is Family Life Today. Yeah, some of our listeners know that Ron Deal directs our family life blended ministry and hosts our podcast for blended families. And today we're listening to a portion of an episode that Ron did with Jim Ramos, founder of Men in the Arena. And Jim's a friend of ours and endorsed his last book. I love all the stuff he does. And I didn't know a lot of the details of his life until we heard this interview.
Me neither. And even if you're not a stepchild or live in a blended family, please listen, because someone you know and love is. And maybe this will help to encourage them. So Jim Ramos and his wife Shanna founded the men's ministry Men in the Arena.
And today that ministry reaches hundreds of thousands of men in nearly 100 countries. In fact, Jim just spoke at the church we founded in Michigan a couple months ago. And he's a speaker, author, podcaster, has written at least 10 books and he's still writing even more. OK, so before the clip, we're going to hear Jim was actually describing the day he and his two siblings got the news that their parents were divorcing. Jim was only 13 years old and he was actually just a little relieved that they were divorcing because all of the pressure and conflict in the home would not be there anymore. So let's pick up the conversation with Ron summarizing what Jim said so far.
OK, so we got the picture 8 to 13. You heard the conflict. Life was kind of tough between you and your dad. Finally, they say we're divorcing.
You feel some relief. Do you have a sense of what your two siblings felt? I think they were fairly insulated and oblivious.
They seemed I have to go back and say this. My brother was younger. He was weaker. He was smaller. My mom had the German measles when she was pregnant with him. And so he was born normal, but with some learning and physical weaknesses. And my sister was substantially younger. And so I feel like they were very insulated.
My dad was never hard on them. He always told me, you are the protector. You are the defender. Don't ever fight unless somebody messes with your brother and sister. Then you go to war. So I was always this incredible defender of the week and I still am to this day.
So they were very insulated. And I remember when my dad and mom got divorced, my dad moved out and my dad was one of the was and still is the most engaged father I've ever been. And the guy is so good about being engaged with his kids.
So when my parents divorced, he moved about 10 miles away and we saw him all the time. But I saw this breach in his morality as an opportunity for me to attack because all of my 13 years of life, he attacked me when I had a failure. And ironically, he had told you to defend other people against injustice.
And this time it was against him. Yeah, it really was. I remember going fishing one time.
We're all sitting on the shore, fishing steelhead in Cambria, California. And he started talking and I just erupted on him and I made him walk away crying. My brother and sister were yelling at me because they had no idea. But I just called out his adultery and man, it felt good, you know, but to watch your father cry. I'll tell you this, Ron, my dad's divorce broke him and his failure broke him and he became a different man after the divorce. And so I went from 13 years of being raised with a overbearing, aggressive, oftentimes cruel man to a broken, humble man who just wanted a relationship with kids. And that was a hard bridge for me to cross, to be honest with you, because he was married about nine months, a year later. So now I went from a broken dad to a married dad to a stepbrother and step-sister who my dad had in his home now. But that was an interesting bridge to cross when you have a dad who goes from a cruel dictator to a broken, humble guy. It was interesting.
Yeah, absolutely. Okay, I want our listener to pay attention because we're going to jump into the shoes of a kid who feels that great sadness about his family coming apart. And at the same time, maybe justified in being angry towards dad. And let's just explore what impact that had on you and your blended family. Let's just start with your dad for a second. Divorce broke him. First of all, I want to say hallelujah and thank God we all have that same opportunity in life, right?
Yeah. Through Jesus, we can recover from who we were to being who he makes us to be. So glad to hear that. But I hear in what you're saying, it was hard to forgive. It was hard to restore trust. Just because it broke him and began a process of changing him didn't mean you could let him off the hook.
Am I saying that right? Yeah, because at 13 years of age, certain things had been deeply solidified in my life. One, the performance equals validation was deeply, deeply ingrained.
And two, your father is not a safe place, but he's a place that's safe when you perform. So those two things were deeply, deeply ingrained in me. And so even though I saw it broken, I realized I was not raised in a Christian family.
So I want to really add that caveat. So for me watching this brokenness, but it didn't lead him back anywhere except to his kids. His kids became everything. And in his second marriage, his kids became the center of the family relationship, not the marriage.
Okay. So the second wife, my stepmom, she became the my kids are first and if you don't like it, you can leave type of program, which it swung the other way. Yeah. So she was on the outs even with your father.
Is that what you're saying? Like she knew his kids came first and she was going to have to honor that or else. Yeah, which is the problem I think in second marriages, because even in a second marriage, the marriage comes before the kids. But people enter that second marriage broken and wounded for the first marriage and guarded.
And this concept of kids come first is a way to ruin the second marriage. And so my mom or my stepmom and my dad have been married for 45 years, but it's been a struggle for them. And most of their struggles have revolved around her handling of her children. And my dad's, she's great with us. She's a phenomenal stepmother. But a lot of their relationship struggles revolved around the kids because they came before the marriage.
So going back to 13, 14, dad's now married. How did you view her? Was she the enemy? Was she, what was that like and how did bonding go in the early phases? Yeah, she, again, I was the oldest, so I was the slowest to accept her. She was, quote, the other woman.
She was the one who I heard mentioned in arguments. My dad says that they never had any kind of physical adulterous affair, but it was definitely an emotional affair looking back on it. And so I was bitter and angry. And even though I realized the cruel nature of my dad as a father, I viewed her in some ways as the villain in the story that broke my parents up.
So which is not true, as I learned later, it wasn't true. But so it took longer for me to accept her, even though she's a wonderful woman and she was a wonderful stepmother. But she entered the marriage realizing that I was going to be the problem for her. That was evident on the front end, right? Yeah.
I could tell early on she was trying to win me. Yeah. Yeah.
Okay. To our listener, if you've ever heard me say, and if you've heard any of my podcasts, you've probably heard me say at some point or another, loss gets in the way of bonding. Loss in the past gets in the way of bonding and new blended relationships. And you just heard that from Jim, the loss of his family, even though, by the way, I'll just throw in this observation, even though it was a relief for you that mom and dad broke up, still there was a sense of injustice about it and pain and disruption and it was still wrong. And so the object of your pain quickly becomes your stepmom. She's the one to blame. It's got to go somewhere. And dad carried some of that blame and she carried some of that blame for you.
And so that pain of the loss gets in the way of you being able to move toward her. You're listening to Family Life Today, and we're listening to a portion of the Family Life blended podcast with Ron Deal and Jim Ramos. And we think blended families obviously can be redemptive homes. I grew up in one, but it does take the Spirit's help and a lot of practical life wisdom, and that's what our Family Life blended ministry offers.
So be sure to check them out at familylife.com slash blended. So let's get back to Ron's conversation with Jim Ramos. Moving between households. So one household was very boundary-less, your mom and stepdad's household. Dad was trying to keep the reins on everything, it sounds like. By the way, was that motivated by any spiritual value in his life at that point?
Nothing. He was born and raised Catholic, but at that point had just abandoned it. So I think that moral code was there.
Got it. So the moral code he was pursuing. So how, if I can use the word loosely, schizophrenic, is that for you? You know, one household, boy, dad's tracking me down because he heard that I might be with so-and-so or having it, whatever. And at mom and stepdad's house, there's no boundaries, no limits. In fact, they're encouraging lascivious sort of behavior.
So where do you live in that space? It just wasn't the new normal. It just wasn't the new normal for us. I just knew that when I was at my mom's, I could exhale. And when I was at my dad's, I had to just be aware of what was going on. Now, my dad is a big-time hunter and fisherman, sportsman. And I love that.
My brother loved that. So we spent a lot of time with dad hunting and fishing and doing that. So we spent, when we were doing that with him, that was really our sweet spot.
And that's really what has held us together all these years. But it was outside of that, you know, sports. He would be what you would call a helicopter parent, I would think, back then. He coached me in every team in high school. On the football team, he was always my football coach.
He was my head varsity baseball coach. And there was a lot of clashing because he wanted me to live at this value. And I always would kind of, in my mind, travel back to when I was 13 and go, wait, but you did these things, so you're not living to the value set for me. There was a gap, a moral gap there, and we would go at it a lot, a lot of arguing. Now, I am Italian and Portuguese, so that's pretty normal for our culture.
But we would have these things. My mom's house, it was very peaceful. I already was an overachiever. So for me, you didn't need to give me rules. I was going to play by the rules because the rules gave me trophies and caused me to perform. So I naturally was able to do that.
But my mom's the mom. When I was 18, I went to the high school. I wrote a note.
She wrote a note that says Jimmy can ditch school whenever he wants. And I did. I did whatever I wanted.
I could write my own notes. And she just didn't care. And my dad never knew. Okay, dude, I got to fast forward a little bit because having grown up with those two spiritual climates, how did you ever come to put your faith and trust in Christ? So I actually had a freshman basketball coach. He was a campus life director, campus life youth for Christ. And he roped all of us kids in all the guys on the team to, you know, go to different games. And he just he they really the two guys that are coaches were our campus life directors. And we didn't know what that meant, but that meant they were Christians.
So they're always trying to tell us about Jesus. Right. So it got a little annoying. But we got through that year. We had a good season. And my senior year, he shows up again as my one of my football coaches. And he said, hey, I want to I want to help you guys win football games. I want to do this group on Tuesday, on Thursday mornings. And you're the team captain.
Will you get this thing going? I go, hey, I'll do anything to win football games. So we would meet once once a week on Thursdays and he would start preaching to us about Jesus. And we're all sitting there with Friday, guys. But I remember he was the first guy I was born and raised Catholic. But I remember one time he and I talking about my parents divorce saying, hey, when I told him and I told him, I remember exactly where I was at. I was I know exactly where we were driving. I remember I was holding an Aerosmith toys in the attic cassette because I just had a birthday.
It was basically the third year anniversary for my parents divorce. And I remember telling him, hey, Gary, I have no problem with God, but I will never go to church again. And he said something to me that rocked my world. He said, Christianity is not about a religion.
It's about a relationship with God. And that rocked my world. And by the end of my senior year, outside of a pizza place, he led me to Jesus. He led me to Christ. And that was that was really where I for the first time understood what it meant to be a Christian.
And he's the vice president of Men in the Arena, the organization to this day. They were very close. I told him, you led me to the Lord, so you got me into this.
So you're coming on my board. I love that. That is, you know, yeah, they say that there's like six degrees of separation to Kevin Bacon.
We say there's three, three degrees of separation with Gary McCusker. Man, you shared with me when I was on your podcast, we were talking, you were just telling some of this story. I've learned so much more today.
But I'll never forget. You mentioned that you never told your stepdad or your stepmom that you loved him. I think that's the way you said it.
Yeah. But that you have been able to say that to your biological parents. Take us inside that just for somebody who's listening right now who just doesn't quite get why that child or that stepchild just can't let him in. What was that about for you?
Yeah, I don't know if I'd use the phrase let them in, because I would let them into a lot of areas. But for me, to say I love you, I didn't start saying I love you to my dad until like the last couple years. Okay. So my dad and I, he never could articulate that. My mom says it until it's boring. And so for me, saying I love you was really a deep and special position. It was a position in my life. And I was not going to bring my stepparents into that. I would say I love my stepmom and I love my stepdad, but it was more of a filet-o love. It was not a agape love. It was a different love.
I think the big takeaway for listeners is Gary Chapman and I in our book Building Love Together and Blended Families talk about different love associations, the nature of different relationships. Love means different things about different people. I love my mother-in-law, but it's not the same as how I love my mom. I love one sibling differently than I love another sibling. You loved your stepparents, but not in the sense like you love your biological parents. And so the words I love you just weren't appropriate in those relationships.
That makes total sense to me. And the other observation I have is that, and we say this all the time in our ministry, blended families are a process and you're still in process. So even now those relationships for you are developing and evolving over time as the relationships mature. So one of the big problems that biological parent and step parent have is why doesn't everybody love each other to the same degree? And I think you're just hearing this narrative from a child's point of view. It's just difficult. People fit in different categories in your heart and those expressions of love will take the shape that it needs to take for the child at that particular time. So don't fret that.
It's not exactly the way you want it. Rest in what is and keep hoping and trusting for more, but just keep walking as Christ and that makes it more likely that the relationships will grow. I would also add, Ron, that I've got a library of about 2000 books and I read about 40 books a year. And I just want to tell your listeners that your book, the book you wrote with Gary Chapman is by far and away the best book I've ever read on blended families and how to deal with divorce. And I, anybody listening, if you are from a blended family, that book has to be in your library. It will help you and guide you. It'll be your compass in so many ways. You just need to get that book.
So that's my own opinion. I appreciate it, man. I really do. I got one last question for you. Yep.
We started our conversation pretty quickly. We kind of happened on some of those, we'll call them bruises and coping styles that you picked up as a young teenager that still sort of linger today. Do you have a sense of when any other bruises on your heart kind of flare up when they get activated?
The little pieces that are left over from those days of instability and uncertainty? Yeah, two come to mind. I don't know if these fit your question, but I have a very high maintenance marriage. It's been a high maintenance marriage since 1992 and I love this woman. I mean, I love her and we have a wonderful marriage. Last week I ranked our marriage an eight and then I went and asked her and she gave me a seven because we can do better.
And so she's my best friend. But I know early on and this still creeps up because we have a high maintenance marriage. Divorce for us is not an option. I will not marry couples who have divorce on the table as an option. So whenever a couple asks me to marry them, I ask them this question. If divorce is an option under any circumstance, I won't do your wedding. And the reason for that is because I've been scarred by divorce.
Now I'm healed, but I have the scars to show for it. And so for me, I'm passionate about making a marriage work. I think people throw words around that don't exist just to get out of a marriage because they're weak or lazy or selfish. And I just am committed to marriage. I'm committed. And so the second thing is for me personally, I want my kids and my three sons, their wives and my grandchildren to hear until it is boring the words. I love you. I just think that is so important that they hear those. And I think that a step parent can use those words. Don't expect it to be reciprocated, but it's OK to use those words. One of my sons has a girlfriend who we tell her we love her.
And every time we do, she melts her arms because you can tell she just really needs to hear it. And so for us telling our kids we love them until it's actually boring. I've got these manly 26, 24 year old kids saying, I love you. And people look at them and it's just like, I think it's so important that we remind our kids that we just really love them no matter what. And there's what can happen when one generation decides to turn the tide, that they are not going to live the same way that they were brought up and that they're going to do better and they're going to bring the Lord with them.
And in one generation, it changes the course of your family. We've been listening to a portion of the Family Life Blended podcast with Jim Ramos and an interview with Ron Deal, the host of the podcast. And Ron joins us now in the studio. Welcome, Ron.
Hey, it's good to be with you guys. So Ron, let me ask you this. It seems like at least part of Jim's whole motivation to be in men's ministry is related to his childhood. Would you agree with that?
And that's kind of where we started today. Yeah, exactly. You know, his dad was very pressuring and demanding and emotionally distant while his stepdad, who there's a big section of the story that you guys didn't get to hear.
He didn't have any boundaries at all. And so neither of those men in Jim's life really demonstrated what a healthy father or husband should do. So here you have Jim rising up and going, nope, we're going to be a better model.
I'm going to help men be better for their families. Yeah, you know, we only listen to a little bit of the interview. So if our listeners tune into the rest of the story, what is the rest of the story they're going to hear? Yeah, well, it's a very encouraging story. How he navigated all the hurt and the challenges in his life, I just found that so inspiring. Jim was very candid about his step-parents on both sides and his struggle to build a relationship with them. And there was even this brief physical attraction that arose between he and one of his step-siblings, his step-sister.
And, you know, it turned out to be nothing. But I was so glad he talked about it because that really is something that people find themselves a little concerned about. You know, what do we do when we have kids about the same age going through puberty together, for example? And how do we deal with that?
And I just want listeners to know we have an article online that's available. I've written quite a bit about this in my book, The Smart Stepdad. We have a whole chapter that deals with issues like that. You're not alone.
And, yeah, there's some boundaries that you need to set in order to guide your family well. How common is that? Because, you know, you think about the Brady Bunch and everybody was attracted to Marcia. And I'm guessing that happens.
Marcia, Marcia, Marcia. That's exactly right. I'm sure it's a lot more common than we even know. Yes, I think it is. I wouldn't say it's common.
I will say it's not uncommon. And even if there's not an attraction that's an obvious one, there's sort of this awkwardness that can be there for people. It's sort of like, you know, if a distant family relative or a neighbor were to spend the night in your house, you know, you just want to make sure nobody's running around in their underwear. Like, you want to make good decisions about how boys and girls end up in the same space with one another. And so it's just something that we encourage families to be proactive and try to get out in front of so it doesn't become problematic for them.
And I think as a parent, I would want help with that. Like, what do I say? Do I bring it up? How do we discuss it? So you're saying in this article, you get into it.
Yeah, I do. And I get into what to do to be proactive, to try to set boundaries on the front end, deal with that awkwardness. And we actually get into, well, what if there's been some sort of exchange that's already taken place between the step siblings?
What then do you do at that point? That's good. And this whole thing, to hear the whole episode, it's on episode 51. Is that correct?
That's right. The Fame of Life blended podcast, which, by the way, is part of what we call our Growing Up in a Blender series. You know, Jim's an adult now reflecting back on his life growing up in a step family. We have a whole series, a sub-series, if you will, within our podcast where we talk to people and have them tell their story.
And it's so informative because what's happening for the listener is you get perspective on what's going on with your kids, what's going on with your step kids, how are they making sense of the world, how are they coping with things, and what is it that you can do and not do that will be helpful to your children as your family moves through time? Yeah, Ron, I just want to say thanks for what you do. The whole blended ministry, you know, growing up in a blender.
We just spoke at Weekend to Remember. There's probably a thousand people there. And we asked at some point how many families, marriages in this room represent a blended.
And it was at almost half the room, if not a little bit more. And, you know, we don't often speak directly to their circumstance like you do. So it's a really, really valuable ministry. Thanks. Thank you. I appreciate that. And you're a gift, Ron, not only to family life, but to so many families across the country and across the world. So thanks for all you're doing.
Glad to do it. I'm Shelby Abbott, and you've been listening to Dave and Ann Wilson with Ron Deal as he talked with Jim Ramos on family life today. You know, if you wanted to hear that full episode with Jim, you can find the link in the show notes, and it'll take you right there to Ron's full conversation about growing up in a blender. And today we've been talking about blended families. And the cool thing is, is we've got a summit on Step Family Ministry coming up in October. It's going to happen from October 10th to 11th. And we encourage you to join us for two days where you can hear valuable commentary coming from ministry leaders across the nation specifically targeted at blended families.
So you can leave equipped and inspired to better serve blended families in your community. Just register now to be a part of the summit on Step Family Ministry. Again, it's happening from October 10th to 11th. It's going to be at the Hope Center in Plano, Texas.
For more information, you can head over to summitonstepfamilies.com or you can check out our link in the show notes. Now coming up next week, myself and many people who I know struggle with perfectionism. Are you one of those people who wrestle with perfectionism? And how does it impact you spiritually?
Well, it impacts me quite a bit. And next week, Faith Chang is going to be here with David Ann Wilson to talk about peace over perfection. We hope you'll join us for that. On behalf of David Ann Wilson, I'm Shelby Abbott. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a donor-supported production of Family Life, a crew ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.
