Tsakani – Faith ka Benji Ngoma recently launched a space for blended families to grow and thrive. At the event, held at Kingdom Power Church International, Dr Rick Netshiozwi unpacked the complexities of navigating blended families in South Africa.
“There are things that we don’t know that Western culture has struggled with that the African culture did not struggle with.
“Blended family in the normal African culture was not a struggle. In Western culture, it’s a struggle because people live an isolated life. One of the proverbs of the African customs is that your child is also my child,” he explained.
Netshiozwi is a distinguished South African-born marriage and relationship counsellor, psychotherapist, author, and visionary leader, with over 19 years of professional experience transforming lives, marriages, and families across Africa and beyond.
Faith ka Benji organised the event to equip parents to establish solid blended families.
He further noted how most African people grow up with their cousins, nieces, nephews, and grandmothers all together in one place.
“You cannot parent someone you don’t have an emotional connection with. And so the power of a blended family is emotional connection.
“When somebody sees that you care, you love them, you appreciate them, to discipline them is easy,” he said.Netshiozwi said that when adults get divorced, children are more disoriented than the parents.
“So a blended family is not necessarily for the parents, it’s for the children. The parents themselves, though they believe they love each other, also need to go through a process of healing,” he added.
Netshiozwi said there was a time when women would come and prepare a bride-to-be. The men would do the same for the groom-to-be.
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“And you were accountable to the chief. So if you wanted to separate, you couldn’t just separate. You had to first call all the men and explain your decision,” he added.
He said that families were more stable when there was a sense of authority, culture and community. There’s no sense of all those things.
He added that it is the parents’ responsibility to convince the child that they are now in a solid place and that things will work out.
“The child must be emotionally secure,” concluded Netshiozwi.
Dr Rick Netshiozwi is a distinguished South African-born marriage and relationship counsellor, psychotherapist, author, and visionary leader.
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