National Stepfamily Day | Celebrating Ties Stronger Than Blood

Sometimes family doesn’t come through blood. Sometimes family comes after you add a few “steps.”

NATIONAL | Sept. 16th is National Stepfamily Day. In an article posted on ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, almost 30% of American households have at least one step-kin relationship, either from a parent or an adult child of the family. The number of blended families is only expected to rise as the current divorce rate amongst married couples sits close to 50%.

A progressively larger number of Americans are forming step-kin relationships. So, it is important that we take National Stepfamily Day to embrace our families that have become a part of the family tree despite not coming from the same seed.

How Should I Celebrate National Stepfamily Day?

National Stepfamily Day isn’t a holiday that requires preparation or decoration. To celebrate this day, all you must do is give love and appreciation to those that have blended into your family. Remember that the love you share for one another runs as deep, if not deeper, than the love blood relatives share, as you and your stepfamily chose to accept and embrace one another without any shared ties prior to your meeting. Tell them how much they mean to you and remind them of the place they have in your heart.

Blended families are no different than traditional families. At the end of the day, you are the one who decides who your family is regardless of how they are related to you, and because of this, you have the opportunity to add an extra few branches to that family tree – even if they’re from a different one.