D
r. Gary Chapman has been
helping couples communicate
for nearly three decades. His
unique approach to expressing
and experiencing love, as outlined in The
5 Love Languages®, has strengthened
countless relationships by identifying spe-
cific ways individuals feel cherished. After
selling millions of copies worldwide, The 5
Love Languages® has become one of the
premier books for couples, parents, and
singles.
Now, amid drastic changes to the
American family caused by rising divorce
and remarriage rates, Chapman is team-
ing up with marriage and family therapist
Ron L. Deal on a new book. Publishing on
February 5, Building Love Together in
Blended Families: The 5 Love Languages®
and Becoming Stepfamily Smart makes
essential adaptations to The 5 Love
Languages® while incorporating key prin-
ciples from Deal’s Smart Stepfamily series,
which is geared toward successfully
blending families.
“Family stability touches everything in
our society,” Chapman says. “But most
relationship resources still assume the
reader lives in a traditional family. That is
not the case.”
Chapman and Deal discovered that
40% of couples with children are step-
couples, and more than 113 million
Americans have a step-relationship of
some kind. The scarcity of resources for
blended families, which face unique prob-
lems as they strive for unity and harmony,
is one reason the divorce rate for couples
in blended families is 10% to 25% higher
than for couples in first marriages.
“This book is needed now more than
ever,” Chapman says. “It speaks to whatalready is—and will increasingly continue
to be—the norm in American families, and
it does so with great understanding and
insight into what actually takes place
within the modern home.”
In addition to helping families formed
after a divorce and remarriage, Building
Love Together in Blended Families
addresses challenges facing families afterthe death of a spouse or parent, as well as
other relationship dissolutions. The book
highlights key differences between
blended families and what the authors
call first, or biological, families, as well as
ways to overcome challenging family
dynamics such as pain from the past and
loyalty to biological family members.
“Efforts at communicating love can
backfire in blended families when well-intended adults apply the love language
principles to their blended families as if
they were a biological family,” says Deal,
noting that even when a stepparent
speaks the primary love language of a
stepchild, he or she may not communi-
cate love. “Just like walking up to a
stranger at work and giving them a hug—
the love language of physical touch—
might result in a negative response from
the person, giving a hug to a new member
of your stepfamily might result in them
pushing you away instead of welcoming
you closer.”
Building Love Together in Blended
Families also demonstrates that the five
ways to express and experience love—
receiving gifts, quality time, words of affir-
mation, acts of service, and physical
touch—can help bring blended families
together but at a pace individuals can
manage. “We saw the wisdom of a book
that could get underneath the unique
dynamics of blended family relationships
and help couples and families build the
family they dream about,” Deal says. “It
shows people how to find the preferred
love language of their partner, child, or
family member and speak it in such a way
as to truly touch their heart and make
them feel loved.”
With so many nontraditional families in
the U.S., Deal and Chapman say the
book’s most important message is one of
hope in the face of rejection. “Ron and I
believe that the high percentage of
blended families that call it quits simply
didn’t have the tools they needed to com-
bine their family,” says Chapman, who
emphasizes that while all blended families
are different, stability can be achieved
through patience and perseverance.Spotlight on
G a r y C h a p m a n
and Ron L. Deal
KEEPING LOVE ALIVE:
A new book from two bestselling authors looks to strengthen blended families
and provide them with the resources needed to handle unique challengesSponsored by Moody Publishers