Wild Things and the Dance of Temperament in Step/family Life

My eight-year-old son recently told me that he did not want to go to Where the Wild Things Are . A friend of his went, he told me, "and had to leave. It was just too scary." Indeed, my son grabbed my hand--a rare event these days--during the trailer for Where the Wild Things Are . When you're a Wild Thing, wild things can scare the bejujubees out of you. Parents and stepparents likely feel the same way. Sendak's story and Jonze's version convey not just playfulness but also the fearsome beauty of a child's most important impulses: to separate, to sass, to go away, to come back again. Particularly for stepfamilies, where wild things tend to run wildest during times of transition and stress, it has profound lessons to impart about different types of kids and their ability to self-regulate in the face of huge changes as well.... [read full story]                    

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