The Beauty and Challenges of Blended Families: Real Stories, Real Advice

Blended families are real life—beautiful, messy, and full of moments that will stretch you. And if God has you on this journey, you know it takes more than love to make it work. In this episode of the Imagine Yourself Podcast, Lanée Blaise and Sandy Kovach get honest about the ups and downs of blending families through remarriage and stepfamilies, cross-cultural/interracial marriages, adoptions and chosen families.

They share personal stories—like cultural clashes in the kitchen, navigating new traditions, and the tricky business of holidays, boundaries, and loyalty. You’ll hear how faith, communication, and a good sense of humor can help keep things together when it feels like everything’s pulling apart.

This isn’t a “how-to,” it’s a real conversation from two women walking the journey—and finding grace in the process. You'll also hear about Lanée’s new TV series Blended and get tips and resources to help your own family find its rhythm.

More about the Blended TV Series

If you're in a blended family—or love someone who is—this is worth your time.
🎧 Listen now and be reminded: God can work through any mix.

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"Imagine Yourself" is hosted by Lanée Blaise and Sandy Kovach—two dynamic voices with a passion for inspiring and uplifting others. Lanée, a TV writer, producer, motivational speaker, and podcaster, brings powerful storytelling and insight. Sandy, a radio personality, voiceover artist, and podcaster, delivers warmth and wisdom with every conversation. Broadcasting from the Detroit Metro area, they welcome guests from around the world to share valuable perspectives on health, career growth, faith, and personal transformation. Tune in and imagine the possibilities for your life!

Transcript

Lanée Blaise [00:00:06]:
I'm Lanee here with Sandy, and today we are talking about the entire concept of blended. Being blended. Embracing blended. There are so many people who have asked for an episode like this. I guess I just want to start by saying really keep this in our minds. We are better together and we are better as a whole because of all of our differences. And so today we are going to dive into the concept of blended life. Blended families.

Lanée Blaise [00:00:48]:
There's lots of different definitions of it. We're going to kind of get into that. There's the blended, where you have a. Like the Brady Bunch blended, where you've got that. There's a lady and here's a story and a man, you know, where you've got the. The families blend together as a result of either someone passed away or as a result of divorce and remarriage. And you have, like, step parents and step kids. There's the concept of blended where you have a family that has different races and then the children are multiracial children.

Lanée Blaise [00:01:22]:
You have blended where there's people who aren't your biological family or your adopted family, but circumstances and life has a way of blending you together. All these different things we are going to talk about today in the most honest and personal and positive way possible because Sandy and I both have examples of blended families ourselves. And also, hey, I just had a premiere for a show called blended that.

Sandy Kovach [00:01:58]:
Coincidentally, by the way. Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:01:59]:
Yes, coincidentally, you know, just by the way, it's called blended, and it is about a fam. Two families that are blended because of circumstances and they become one. So I just wanted to start you off that way. And, Sandy, I know that you've got a lot of good stuff for us, too, so we'll just dig in.

Sandy Kovach [00:02:21]:
One thing I'll say is there's blessings about being blended, but there are definitely a lot of challenges and we'll get into a little bit more because I do want to talk about the premiere of the TV series that you produced called blended, because there's some good examples in that. But maybe we'll start with a more personal angle. And I can say that my family is blended in a couple of different ways. One is that I'm white. My husband is black, and I'm also remarried, so my son is his dad. It was my first husband. We had to blend in a couple of different ways. We seemed to do okay in most cases that way.

Sandy Kovach [00:03:03]:
My ex husband and I kept up a good relationship and kept Joe first. That was the thing. When we got divorced, we used to go to football games together to support Joe, who was in the band. And we go to different events, recitals, rehearsals, plays, whatever, you know, and we didn't have a problem with that. But I would say that culturally, and it's not because my husband is black. It's because he's Jamaican. So we're throwing in something else again, which happens as well. Sometimes.

Sandy Kovach [00:03:30]:
Just people can come from different countries of origin, and he grew up there and lived there till he was 18. Just a lot of. I mean, little things like cooking and, you know, oh, my goodness, I could go on and on about the way you make things and misunderstandings because, you know the cliche about white people and their bland cooking. Well, that was super true with me, especially. Cause, you know, I was always watching my salt and watching my fat. So I'm super bland cook. And Joe grew up eating super bland food. And Jamaicans love spice.

Sandy Kovach [00:04:05]:
And I just never knew what I was missing until now. But, man, there were some arguments. And also for him and his family, and I'm not sure this is a Jamaican thing, but they have hot meals, like breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and it's very important to them to have their meals. And I'm like, well, I can just eat some hummus and pita bread and some orange juice.

Lanée Blaise [00:04:25]:
Nope.

Sandy Kovach [00:04:26]:
And that's it. Nope.

Lanée Blaise [00:04:27]:
Nope. Yeah.

Sandy Kovach [00:04:28]:
So you know what I'm talking about.

Lanée Blaise [00:04:30]:
Yes. Because my. So my husband's family is from Haiti. And even, like, the preparation of meats, there's a whole process that he's just looking at me like I'm crazy if I don't include white vinegar and lemons and limes to clean the meat properly and. Or sometimes boil the meat before I cook the meat. In that case, I'm sure culturally it is. And, you know, Americans sometimes miss the boat on this, but you do want to make sure any trace of salmonella is gone. And, yeah, there have been some arguments at my home as well because of, like you said, because of some cultural differences.

Lanée Blaise [00:05:12]:
And like you said, there's some things like, I didn't even know what I was missing, or you said, I didn't even know what I was missing. And I feel the same way. But there is a learning curve, and there is. There needs to be a heart and a posture of openness and embracing if it's going to work and if it's going to be respected. So, yes, ma' am. Blending. Blend and blending all those lovely spices into.

Sandy Kovach [00:05:36]:
That's right.

Lanée Blaise [00:05:37]:
Your dishes. Yes. Into your meals. Oh, yeah.

Sandy Kovach [00:05:41]:
The way you cook things, I Just never realized how important and to me stuff like that isn't important, but to him, so very important. And I guess and what I maybe want to get into next and look at your perspective maybe from culturally or maybe because you have a step family, you know, you grew up in a step family.

Lanée Blaise [00:05:59]:
Oh yeah.

Sandy Kovach [00:05:59]:
Just traditions and priorities in general. Do you feel like we need, when we go into these situations, we need to have our talk to our partners and have our eyes open about this?

Lanée Blaise [00:06:13]:
Absolutely. Because to me one of the biggest things that you said was that you and your ex husband put your son Joe first. Think about the Christmas holiday or the Thanksgiving holiday, especially if there's been a divorce and there's children from the divorce and what if they live in different states? How do you manage that? In our family we had to decide that every Christmas I was going to wake up at my house that I usually am at for school and stuff with my mom and my stepfather, open my Christmas presents, give them a big hug, have a big Christmas breakfast, go to the airport, hop a plane on Christmas day, land at my dad and stepmom's with my siblings over there, go over to the house, open the Christmas presents, have a wonderful Christmas dinner there and stay until New Year's, enjoy New Year's Eve and then when it crosses over, then come back home and get ready for school whenever that starts. When you talk about like traditions and blending, there's a component of sharing. Sharing your child, sharing your day, sharing your traditions. And humans are not always that great at sharing but. But we hope that parents, I mean I'm all about self care and doing things for yourself, but when you're a parent, there's a whole component of when you're doing the blending component, blended component. It's a lot of sacrifice and compromise and a willingness to allow your child to be with the other parent and to be with their other siblings.

Lanée Blaise [00:08:07]:
Yeah, this is something I am like a poster child for.

Sandy Kovach [00:08:12]:
But you sound like your family did it well. And just looking at some recent research, one in six kids in the US live in a blended or, or step family. That's a lot of people for various circumstances like you say, And I remember, yeah we used to trade Christmas Eves and Christmases and that's not always fun sharing. And then I guess also when it comes to if the other parent does something that you don't agree with, whether they take them somewhere you don't like or whether they discipline them. And this could be for step parents too. And I know it's kind of an odd feeling.

Lanée Blaise [00:08:53]:
Yes. That's the part too because at the end of the day, here's the crux of it. When you live with somebody, it's a whole different world than interacting with someone. So when you are remarried and there's the stepchild that comes into the home, living together is tricky for anybody. It's tricky for any couple. It's tricky for any parent child relationship. But in this case too, there's, you know, the. And we talked lightly about cooking but there's things with especially like think about if you have teenagers or whatever.

Lanée Blaise [00:09:32]:
There's things with rules and curfew and chores and all these different things that pop up and you don't want those types of things to ruin the harmony of what could be a beautiful family component. Sandy I was really blessed to have my parents agree to say, hey, I know that our marriage did not work out and there were some parts of their marriage that were very bitter. But for the sake of not just Lynae as the child but, but for all the siblings that came after, we're going to bite our tongue on some things and we're going to kind of let you parent the way you want to at your household and we'll then when Linnae comes back here, you know, parent her the way we, we have her this way. But it even included. And this is the thing where I was saying a lot of people wanted me to share this story on Imagine yourself. My dad and stepmother would go on a trip with their kids every other year. Like a big nine day vacation. And girlfriend.

Lanée Blaise [00:10:49]:
Do you know that they would reach out to my mom and stepdad and make sure that my little sister Rhonda and I would go on these trips as well. Which means that my little sisters from both sides who happen to also be the same age, which was also kind of cute.

Sandy Kovach [00:11:07]:
Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:11:07]:
All got to blend in the most. Those are, they are each other's sisters independently of the parents, independently of Linnae. They don't have a drop of blood in common, but they are sisters, you know. And my brother as well. My brother is adopted and that's like never even a thing that said that is our brother. It just goes on and on. Like I have a stepsister but I never dream of calling her my stepsister. She is my sister.

Sandy Kovach [00:11:39]:
Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:11:39]:
And it just grows and grows. And again, just like I said at the beginning, we are better together as a whole. We have spent Thanksgivings together, we have spent siblings, we have siblings reunions. You know, we'll get all the siblings together. And the grandparents and our kids. It is just robust and flavorful. And I feel so sorry for families where the bitterness of the way the breakup happened seeps in so deeply that it takes away from the good times. Because, like, kind of what you're saying, Sandy, I know, I bet you're going to say, yes, I know for a fact that at Joe's graduation from high school and college, his dad was.

Lanée Blaise [00:12:25]:
It's not like you all were giving each other any kind of eyes or sitting super apart from each other.

Sandy Kovach [00:12:30]:
No, not at all. But it sounds like you took it a step further. And the fact that there were other siblings, I mean, that added to it. Do you have any advice for people who. Well, let's talk about, A, somebody who's just getting into this, or B, somebody who feels like they did it wrong. Is there a way to correct it?

Lanée Blaise [00:12:53]:
Yes. So for A, the person who's just beginning this blended family, communication and patience is the thing. It's where I wonder if a person who's just getting into it can take a just moment to sit still and think in their mind and look into the future and say, what my goal is, is for those things, like the kids, whatever kids, graduations, weddings, that there is such a smoothness and a peace and a harmony within the room. There's no dark cloud of bitterness lingering. And that patience is. I know that I still have some bitterness right now. You know, I'm not there yet agreeing, you know, especially if there was a hard breakup. But to really say that that's what I want my end goal to be.

Lanée Blaise [00:13:48]:
So in order to get there, to do little steps of communication like, hey, I just wanted to make sure that I shared our daughter or son got straight A's on this report card or even I want to wish you a happy Father's Day, even though, you know, our breakup was bad and we're not married anymore. But I do thank you for giving me this gift of this child, or vice versa. Happy Mother's Day. And it's not like you need to talk to them all the time or be bending over backwards, but a nice cordial level of communication, a healthy dose of patience, knowing that it's going to take a minute to get there. And a dream, a visualization of one day smiling when they come into the room and sit down at the graduation party at the table to celebrate the child. To me, that's just the beauty of it. And I know that's what my folks kind of had to do in order to get there and. And to get the step parents on board.

Lanée Blaise [00:14:53]:
Also, like, because my mother is now like, hey, Lenae, your dad, he is a family member to me now. I don't think of him really even as my ex husband. I don't think of him romantically. I just think of him as a.

Sandy Kovach [00:15:07]:
Because that would be a problem.

Lanée Blaise [00:15:09]:
Yeah, that would be a problem. And it works both ways. But how about this love for his children? My mother sends birthday cards to all of us children and gifts and something where you learn, this is bigger than me. This is bigger than us. This is bigger than me. What would God want? What would God do? Even, you know, with the forgiveness level, with the cordial, if it's something where it's been a mess all throughout the years and it's like, how do I try to turn this around? That will be difficult and that will be dependent upon how much the other parties will be able to forgive. But even explaining like, hey, I have this dream of us having weddings and birthday parties that are full of harmony for the sake of the kids. Do you think we could get a clean slate? Do you think we could tolerate each other or even, you know, a few inches past tolerate each other so that we can have what we will like, we'll start fresh and this will be our blended family.

Lanée Blaise [00:16:21]:
We are linked together in this world. Things from the past, we didn't forget about it, but we will forgive for the sake of the future. Dreams.

Sandy Kovach [00:16:33]:
Yeah. So I want to touch on something that you said. What would God do? What would Jesus have us do? And, and that was, I believe, the reason that I could move on and co parent and keep Joe as a priority. I'd like to think I could have done it by myself, but I'm pretty sure I couldn't because the faith element, the leaning on God, the forgiveness element, which you brought in, which especially if you've kind of screwed it up up to now, is going to be requiring a lot of forgiveness. And we had a whole episode on not only forgiveness, but self forgiveness, which is so important and biblical. And we invite you to definitely look those up because it plays such a huge role in this. So I would say bringing faith into it, it's going to be the only way to get by. I will say too though, and, and I'll touch on this just briefly because sometimes blended families have a hard time with faith.

Sandy Kovach [00:17:39]:
And even though my husband is also a Christian, our differences in, let's just say theology and the denominations our backgrounds come from actually created some issues too that we had to work through. So these Are all things like when you get remarried or when you get married or all this stuff needs to be on the table? Because I just thought, oh, well, you marry somebody that's a Christian and da, da, it all works out. No, it doesn't.

Lanée Blaise [00:18:11]:
So it's still. Because we're still human. We're still human. And you really have me thinking some parts, too, about this blended component, too. It goes a little bit further. Also, I want to just mention people who are listening who aren't themselves in the situation. What if you're the auntie or uncle or grandparent who is in all of this, too? I'll put it this way. Let's say, like, when I go, I'd land in Cleveland for my Christmas Day visit with my dad and stepmom.

Lanée Blaise [00:18:42]:
And my stepmom had her sisters there and her mother there. Please understand. Those were my aunties and grandmother also. And they had Christmas gifts waiting for me along with my other siblings as well. There was no, oh, well, that's his child from previous marriage. The separation part. Oh, gosh, that would have been awful. And even my stepmother said that she grew up and she had to withstand that with her father and his new wife.

Lanée Blaise [00:19:16]:
They treated her like, oh, here she's coming for her visit, the mandatory visit. And, you know, let's just get through it and then send her on back. And she's like, it was really one of those. Cinderella, wicked stepmother, Snow White, wicked step Hansel, wicked stepsisters.

Sandy Kovach [00:19:35]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:19:36]:
And Hansel and Gretel, Snow White and Cinderella had the worst people as their stepmoms.

Sandy Kovach [00:19:45]:
You know, there's a big theme going on there. And the stepmother gets a lot of flack in Disney, doesn't she?

Lanée Blaise [00:19:53]:
Yes.

Sandy Kovach [00:19:54]:
Doesn't have to be that way. Doesn't have to be that way. But it can be, is what you're saying. You're stepmom actually lived through that. So people do act that way.

Lanée Blaise [00:20:04]:
Yeah. And I think it made her be a better stepmother. Because I'll tell you this, unless you have abuse going on, toxic abuse, I think that even if whatever the other parent or step parent, if they're not perfect, it's still better to try to do your best to have this blended, robust environment for the kid where they see their parent. And like I said, unless there's abuse and something going on like that, then I cannot abide by that. But definitely there were things like, my mom is super duper neat and very precise, and my dad is like, hey, just hang loose, it'll work out. And so, you know, it's. That's a big dynamic when you're like, oh, my gosh, okay, I'm gonna send Lynnae there, and she's gonna not be on schedule and structured or foods or she just drinks soda pop or whatever. But let it be.

Lanée Blaise [00:21:00]:
Let him parent the way he wants to. Let him. I had the. The blessing to be able to grow up and enjoy those times, and I knew how to come back home and then get back to my chores and boring homework and all that stuff. You know, it worked out, you know, but like I said, just really try to kind of close one eye to some of the little minuscule things that you think that they could be doing better. People are wired differently. And again, blended. More unity, less division.

Sandy Kovach [00:21:35]:
Yes. And I think that's a good way to kind of get into your project blended. And this particular situation, I'll just say it has a little bit of blending in many different directions. So you want to just talk a little bit about that and maybe your inspiration for making it.

Lanée Blaise [00:21:53]:
Absolutely. So in this case. So we talked a lot about the step parent component. I touched maybe briefly on the adoption component through my brother, which we did get to meet his biological family as well. And sometimes that can be a healthy way, because I know that there are some children who wonder even what the people looked like or to get to find out what were the circumstances that I was adopted. So there's that kind of blending. We touched a little bit on race, you know, and cultures. And that is something to really be mindful of, in my opinion as well, because I personally don't like it when people say, oh, I'm just colorblind.

Lanée Blaise [00:22:37]:
I don't see color. This society sees color. This world is very colorist. And there's racism that happens. There are scenarios that black people and Indian people and Asian people and native American people and Latino people have to deal with that White people in America don't have to. And also, I never want to diminish. Like, I love cultures. I love the differences.

Lanée Blaise [00:23:05]:
I don't want to say that I don't see it, because there's language differences, there's, like you said, food differences, there's tradition. All these things are beautiful not to be all assimilated into one. And God did choose to make us all different colors and races and cultures. So in this show, blended, there's a white family and a black family, and they are the best of friends, and they have children, and they've known each other since their college years. But there is a tragic accident that happens and it requires one of the couples to care for the daughter of the other couple. Like, can you imagine if you were tasked to have to take your godchild or your best friend's child and raise her? And in this case, it's the black family that has to take this on. And there are challenges that come up with people thinking, oh, well, I don't know if this little white girl should be with this black family. There are challenges with.

Lanée Blaise [00:24:13]:
You have to arrange your schedule differently, you have to share bedrooms differently with the kids that you do have. You have to make it where this has been. Your friend that comes over to play to. This is a constant situation. She is our family now. Blended was created by Renell Golden. She was also the director. She and I co produced and she and I wrote on it.

Lanée Blaise [00:24:42]:
She wrote the foundation of it. But because she's a white woman, she said, lynae, I, I'm so happy to collaborate with you being a black woman because there are certain little family things that are little traditions and things that black American families do that white American families don't tend to do. There was also the component that I said, if anyone's going to watch Blended and really believe that these two families have fully blended, we have to set up some things in the opening scenes to prove that these couples, there's no racism going on there, that there's no inferiority or superiority complexes going on and that they love each other deeply. There are friendships that we have where we do anything for that friend and that's the heart of this family. But overall, it's meant to bring harmony. There's been so much division lately, but to bring harmony, to bring acceptance, understanding, awareness and love.

Sandy Kovach [00:25:46]:
Absolutely. And it's very well done. And I would just tell people to follow Blended. It's Blended on Instagram and Blended TV series. Thank you.

Lanée Blaise [00:25:58]:
I know you have it on Facebook, Instagram, to follow either Renell golden or myself, lennae blaise, on LinkedIn to get little. It has been such a fun project and I love the title. I love the concept of blending both.

Sandy Kovach [00:26:15]:
And we'll post links to all that on our website and in the show notes as well. And just kind of to piggyback off, you know what you said. Interracial and inter ethnic couples now make up about 17% of new marriages. That's according to Pew Research in 2021. It's everywhere. And I never really gave it much of a thought. I mean, let's see, we've been married since 2008, I think, so Our families were both totally normal about it, but I know that that's not always the case.

Lanée Blaise [00:26:50]:
Yes.

Sandy Kovach [00:26:51]:
And our area is such a melting.

Lanée Blaise [00:26:52]:
Pot, but that actually speaks to something too. Sandy. Where you live in the world, but also where you live in the United States is extremely important when it comes to race because you can find yourself in some terrible situations if you are in some areas that are just blatantly racist. And like you said, where we live, it's not even just many places I live because I lived in Miami as well. It's not just black and white, but there's Caribbean, Indian, Asian, Latino. And then even you break it up into, you know, there's Puerto Rican and Cuban, which totally different. You know, in Mexican, you can't just lump everybody together. But I'm with you.

Lanée Blaise [00:27:44]:
I love being able to be friends with and to see the cultures and restaurants and. And activities and festivals in our communities that celebrate those different ethnicities and races. As opposed to. There are places in this country where not only is it not celebrated and not shown and not a lot of folks from anywhere else there, but it is ostracized at best and criminalized at worst.

Sandy Kovach [00:28:17]:
Wow.

Lanée Blaise [00:28:19]:
Yeah. I hate to say this, but I have to say it, but there were parts. I used to live in Virginia, also. A little, tiny, tiny town in Virginia. Even though it was years back, if there was ever an interracial couple, people would just be pointing and whispering at them and just making them, I'm sure, feel awful. It was just a terrible dynamic. It wasn't even just live and let live and leave. It was going to point at them or stand in their way or say something rude, awful, awful, awful.

Lanée Blaise [00:28:53]:
The only reason I bring it up is just to say that any relationship has challenges. And in this case, when there's an interracial relationship, an extra level of compassion and support for the community is just, I think, in order, especially if you live in certain spots.

Sandy Kovach [00:29:13]:
Yeah, Know.

Lanée Blaise [00:29:15]:
So there's also something I wanted to mention. I have an aunt who is a published famous author, and she wrote a book called Blended. And it is. Her name is Sharon Draper. And like I said, she's published. She's well read, easy to get that book, Blended. It's a book that's mainly for teens and Twains, but it is about a family where there's an interracial couple and the daughter is trying to navigate through different circumstances that happen in school and. And even, you know, within.

Lanée Blaise [00:29:50]:
There's just something that we need to be mindful of as a community. As far as the whole sentence of, well, what are you? And you aren't black enough or white enough. This type of stuff, we could go on for. Write a whole book about that. But I do just want to at least say that I'm hoping that through talking about some of these things, that people's minds are just being very in tune with. If I were in that situation, how would I want to be spoken to? How would I not want to be talked to? Adoption is another situation where you always want to make sure that you have a heart for the person who has been adopted and make sure that you, in a way, follow their lead on how they want to talk about how much they do or don't want to share. Because there's some tender components that might still be. People are still.

Lanée Blaise [00:30:45]:
Might be in a healing place when they either adopted a child or they've been an adoptee. I really just hope that we watch what we say and we think before we speak in all of these scenarios. And again, even with the stepparents, to not belittle the other parent. Oh, my gosh, well, your dad is gonna come and pick you up, and you're probably gonna. He's gonna do this wrong. That is not helpful. None of these things are helpful. And to, you know, if you're in an interracial relationship, making sure that you don't start thinking that because you are in a relationship with a person of another race, that you have the whole scoop on what it's like being a member of that racial community.

Lanée Blaise [00:31:35]:
These are things. I'm not saying that anyone listening is doing that. And I'm not saying that I don't need to be mindful of some of these things myself, but just really tread carefully. Keep your heart in check. Keep your mouth and tongue in check. You know, it really matters. There's challenges that come up.

Sandy Kovach [00:31:56]:
There are definitely challenges. There's beauty in it. Like we talked about, the beauty of discovering things. And be curious. Like, in my case, I get stories of my husband growing up in Jamaica, but they don't have to be from another country. Like you were saying, there's differences in black families and white families and how they do things and the traditions and various things. Be curious about the other one. And like you said, don't assume you know everything about the other's race or their family or anything else.

Lanée Blaise [00:32:27]:
Yeah.

Sandy Kovach [00:32:28]:
And one thing that might be good to do, whatever way that you are blending, and maybe specifically if you're blending families with children, this might be helpful as well, is do some kind of Family counseling, even if you don't feel like you need it right now, you may have this idea that, hey, we're gonna get to be a family and everybody gets along. So automatically it's all gonna talking about these things and differences and concerns ahead of time in a safe place. And okay, if you don't go to counseling, just keep open communication. Not everybody would have to do that. So go, you know, if you're attending church, go sit down and talk to your pastor. Go talk to a trusted friend that you can be honest with. There are many different ways. Just, I guess what I'm saying is think it out, talk it out, go in with open eyes.

Sandy Kovach [00:33:21]:
Because as much as we want to believe that everything's just going to be happily ever after, it isn't going to be unless you are intentional about it.

Lanée Blaise [00:33:28]:
I agree. Because all this stuff that I'm talking about, how great everything is with my parents and my siblings, I have to even remind myself that there was a, about a, I'll say like a five year gap of resentment where nobody was really cooperating with anybody.

Sandy Kovach [00:33:49]:
Ooh.

Lanée Blaise [00:33:50]:
And yeah, see, that's the part that I failed to mention. It wasn't just day one, you know, so after the divorce, it was not pretty for about five whole years. And then right around when my, one of my sisters was born, that's when everything changed. Like, wait a second. Now these two sisters, I guess on paper you'd say are going to be half sisters, but we don't really do that half sister thing either. But wait a second, these are about to be sisters. We gotta fix this. We've gotta get ourselves to some kind of place of peace and cordial and forgiveness.

Lanée Blaise [00:34:31]:
And so please understand that if it's not magically happening right away, and like you said, then maybe you can get counseling, maybe you can talk to a trusted friend, maybe you can even listen back to this podcast and just put in your head like, there's a dream, there's a dream. I have a dream to be good for it, to be, you know, harmonious. And even though I'm like, it's, it's year four and we're still not there, that doesn't mean that God cannot turn it around and have some smoothness. And like I said, especially when the surrounding had the aunties and the grandparents start to have a warmth and some of that bitterness is taken away and some of that negative talk is eliminated, things start to smooth out. It can become beautiful. It's like if you look at a cake and you've got some eggs and some flour and sugar and butter and oil just sitting there. It does not look pretty. But when you blend it all together and you give it time to bake in the oven properly, you come out with something that really is mixed well with love and beautiful and nourishing.

Lanée Blaise [00:35:43]:
If Kate can be nourishing.

Sandy Kovach [00:35:45]:
Well, yeah, maybe. Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:35:46]:
But thanks.

Sandy Kovach [00:35:47]:
In moderation.

Lanée Blaise [00:35:49]:
In moderation. Yeah, in moderation. But it takes a while to get there and it doesn't always look pretty on the front end. So that's our spiel on blended for the day.

Sandy Kovach [00:36:00]:
That is our blended spiel. And don't forget to head over to Blended TV Series on Social media to find out more. And this has been not always an easy topic, but if we don't talk about it and we just brush everything under the rug and we just assume everybody is okay, that's the way misunderstandings start. And that's the way, like you said, division starts. Whether it's division in our own home or it's division in our neighborhoods, the country. Whatever the case, yeah, I think this.

Lanée Blaise [00:36:31]:
Was very relevant, timely talk. I hope and pray that everyone out there took something beautiful from this and is able to incorporate it. Even, like I said, if it's not in their direct family, but in a sister or brother, grandchild or child's life. We really just want to say imagine yourself having a smoothness, a compassion, a patience, a communication thread to end up going from disharmony to harmony and from separated to blended.

Sandy Kovach [00:37:07]:
Thank you so much for spending time with us today. If you found it helpful, we would love for you to subscribe so you never miss an episode. And if you feel led, rating and leaving a comment is a great way to help others find us too and to give us some of the feedback that we need, you can always reach out. We'd love to hear from you. Use the text feature in the app. Visit imagine yourself podcast.com you'll get more faith filled encouragement and content there too. And also ways to connect. We're on Instagram, Facebook and all the links are waiting for you in the show notes.