Join the Dance: Embracing Change, Blending Families, and Letting Life Flow

I never planned for this. Not the blended family, not being married twice, not the chaos that comes with starting a business and raising four kids.

But sometimes life just sweeps you off your feet and calls you to surrender to something unexpected. To join the dance before you know the steps or where it’s going to take you.

I’m a total sucker for good quotes and on our recent podcast in speaking with Ben Fanelli, he referenced this quote from Alan Watts that I haven’t been able to shake:

“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” - Alan Watts

We’re so conditioned to be (or at least look to be) in control of our lives, but the only time we actually feel that way is when nothing is changing. For me, the one constant in my life since childhood has been change. I got pretty good at rolling with it, mostly because I didn’t have any choice as a kid. You’re forced to go along with it, whether you want to or not. As an adult, change kept showing up, but most of it was on my own terms, which made me feel like I was steering the ship.

I’m certain a therapist somewhere would dig into this and tell me about my lack of stability and constant change growing up, and how it likely led me to feel restless when everything was “fine” or blow up my life at various points through adulthood. Although that’s probably really good content, that’s not what this blog is about. :)

Sometimes the real beauty comes from letting go, diving into the unknown, and seeing where life takes you. Sometimes you just have to join the dance.

When Greg and I started our relationship, it was equal parts beautiful and terrifying. The best way I can describe those early months is like standing together in the middle of a tornado, just the two of us holding hands while everything flew around us. For starters, we had worked side-by-side for years, and I was no stranger to workplace romances or all the baggage and shame that can bring. So even though we weren’t working together when our relationship became romantic, those deep feelings of shame followed me right into it.

While the idea of being together felt right, there were SO many massive unanswered questions. For Cole (my son, who was 10 at the time), how would he react to having a stepdad? Or to having not one, not two, but THREE new step-siblings? Would he resent me and wish he could live with his dad full-time?

For me, there were other questions. Greg had three kiddos, all under the age of five. Could I actually be a full-time stepmom to three kids who had just lost their mother? Did I even want that for MY life? Would I ever be enough for them?

Then there were the questions we both shared. Could Greg and I ever actually create one big, blended, loving family? Was it too soon? What would our families think? What rumours might start, and what quiet judgment would friends and colleagues have?

I had ALL the questions and NONE of the answers. There was just too much for me to even begin to think I could control.

But in my heart, I had already made my choice, and so had Greg. We locked in. In those early days, we came up with a mantra that we said all the time (and now have hanging in our home, thanks to a close friend who gifted us a sign for our wedding): “We’ve Got This.”

While we kept things looking calm and collected to the kids and everyone else, on the inside it was really frickin’ hard. Messy. Complicated. The kind of messy and complicated you can’t tidy up with a checklist or a self-help book.

A counsellor I was working with suggested I read The Step-Family Handbook. The book had a lot of valuable content, but unfortunately, there was no chapter on ‘how to fast-track to a smooth family dynamic in a blended family with four young kids, a divorcée and a widower during a worldwide pandemic.’ There were no magic solutions for what we were facing.

I’ll never forget our first Mother’s Day together. Each year leading up to this one, Mothers Day was a day where I’d feel special and celebrated. But when this one hit, I didn’t know what to do or how to process it.

The sadness of the day was heavy on all of us. Greg wanted me to feel special and encouraged the kids to celebrate me in some way, but I could feel how much they just missed their mom. I wished so badly for them that she could be there with them instead of me. I didn’t want to be celebrated, even by Cole. I genuinely just wanted to disappear and for the day to end.

At bedtime, I went to kiss one of the kiddos good night. They pulled away and said, “I don’t want you to kiss me. I only want a kiss from my mom.”

I wasn’t hurt or mad, and they didn’t mean it to be hurtful either. They were just speaking the truth of how they felt, and I was just deeply heartbroken for them. I told them I wanted their mom there to kiss them goodnight too. I cried myself to sleep that night.

There is no guide for how to navigate days like that, and there have been countless other moments like these over the years between both Greg and me with all four of the kids. Blending families means different rules, different houses, different rhythms, and different histories. In our dance through those early years, we lost our balance more than once and stepped on our own, each other’s, and others’ toes more times than we can count.

But, there were some real and beautiful moments when I got to see what we were building.

When we moved into our house, the trampoline in the backyard came with the place. One night after dinner, just a few months into living together, Greg and I were cleaning up in the kitchen while the kids went outside to burn off some energy before bed. We were in the middle of cleaning up when we suddenly heard the kids laughing. We peeked outside and saw all four of them bouncing, playing, and cracking up together. Greg and I locked eyes (mine full of tears) and felt it. This is us. These kids are incredible, and this is something special. We’ve got this.

I never tried to logic my way out of it. Even on the hard days, I didn’t want to be anywhere else. My gut kept telling me to stay. My heart said to let life flow. Surrender the idea of what family is “supposed” to look like and let this one we were building take a shape and life of its own. Let go of the external expectations and any image I thought I needed to uphold.

It was awkward at times, and almost always hard, but somehow we fumbled our way through it and started to see what’s on the other side. Unlike other times in my life, I surrendered and joined the dance and somehow, something beautiful came from it.

If 2020 taught me anything, it’s that life is short and can change in the blink of an eye. While it might feel safe, don’t sit on the sidelines. Sometimes you just have to join the dance, even when you have no idea where it will take you.

I’m grateful I didn’t run away from the hard stuff. We didn’t let fear make our choices. We stepped onto the dance floor, even when it felt like everyone was watching, judging, waiting for us to fall. We danced anyway.

I’m not saying we’ve got it all figured out, or that what we’ve built is perfect. It certainly isn’t. But it absolutely IS beautiful.

If you’re standing on the edge of some change or transformation, heart pounding, not sure what to do, I have three words for you: Join the dance.

Let life flow. Trust yourself. Because while staying still might be easy, you’ll never find what’s in the dance. And while it most likely will be hard, what you’ll find will be beautiful.

And it will be worth it.