Yes I agree the experts are better equipped intelectally and environmentally, but your thoughts are so general ... most of us can't give a kid all he/she needs from our home, but some can.  I have seen it work very well and I have seen the opposite.  Have you read the papers lately about all the predators waiting to take advantage of our children (many of them are teachers) ... I could never give my children all they have gotten from structured public activities and institutions, but some parents are able to keep the kids home and still take advantage of these places/people...

  I don't think my position is the only right one on any of these things, I just think that the conventional point of view is too often dismissed as merely conventional, just old-fashioned.  There is real value to tried-and-true.  I do know stepfamilies that make it work, but it is more difficult, takes more thought and effort and kindness and all the values that I think we can agree on, than the single nuclear family. 

   A sequential family, by its very nature, starts at a deficit condition.  If a couple understands that and are willing to make the sacrifices, they make it work.  Because they anticipate problems and take action to prevent them, they seem to end up with very--I can't find a single word, honed perhaps--relationships.  If they don't understand it, they are blind-sided by the deficit, they struggle, and the  children pay more than their share of the price.

   If you can manage to make a first marriage with children hold together through its difficulties, the sound foundation that we wish to provide for our children is easier to achieve.  If you can't, the complications of divided loyalties and divided resources that happen in sequential families make that foundation less sure.  Before one undertakes the sequential family, one should consider the very real problems that can result so one can be prepared.

   That is why it is so important to teach our children to be particular about the life-stage at which and partner with whom they have sexual relations.  The will have a nearly 19-year commitment if contraception fails.  It's a practical path, not just conventional.  The conventional title for this board would be ordered in this way:  Commitment, long abstinent engagement = trial commitment, marriage = formal commitment, sexuality, continually and purposefully renewed commitment.  The order that troubles me is sexuality, temporary commitment, different commitment, different commitment.  It denies the psychological and reproductive realities of sexual activity.  

   But I don't want to pick on people who are in the midst of real life, so I put the conventional view-point over here, because I KNOW that I don't know the particulars of their situation. 

  I am really glad that this is turning into a discussion.  These are such personal issues that it is very difficult to find a forum where discussion is safe. 

I am still waiting for someone to take issue with the positions I have presented, there have to be more arguments than "Don't I deserve some happiness?" The children and former partners of the people we love also deserve happiness (in reference to should it be about the son or the son's mother).

We can move the discussion to consider those who choose the path of sequential families.

   Those of you who have made a succesful sequential family, what are the attitudes and strategies that make it work?

Wow!  That's not normal and I bet you posted it here because your marriage and sex life is suffering.  However, MAYBE mom should get out of your daughters bed now for your daughters sake too.

If your wife is that "close" with your daughter in sleeping arrangements does she also control every moment and interaction of your daughters life? 

Do you and your wife have time to be alone in bed becides bedtime? 

This is commentary on another thread again. Sexually active at 14.
There are more consequences to early sexual activity than simply disease and pregnancy. Those are the obvious ones, but the other consequences are just as profound. There are developmental tasks that should happen in adolescence that do not happen when teenagers are sexually active. There is social development that does not occur when teenagers are sexually active. There are academic consequences when teenagers are sexually active, even if they avoid pregnancy and disease.
This gets me back on what I started this thread about. What values, behaviors, and facts do we teach our children, when do we start, how do we teach? That's the discussion I think would be useful. I think a couple of viewpoints on what values to teach have been expressed, the conventional, and the other, we'll call it "consenting adults" that sexual behavior is appropriate as long as you aren't hurting anybody else, and there is muutal attraction and respect. If there are other values, and/or if I have not correctly described the consenting adult value, please feel free to articulate them.
But perhaps we could progress to behaviors and facts that need to be taught, and how and when to teach.

Still waiting for some input from someone who has made a success of a sequential family. Stephy, am I right in assuming that you didn't have children with your partner? Is the battle still so close and intense that others of you hesitate to judge that you are being successful? Do we need to establish a definition of successful family? If so, here's a proposal we can argue about.
1. Everybody is civil more than half of the time.
2. People respect one another's privacy and property rights.
3. School age children are actively learning at school or home-school.
4. Parents are aware of children's activities/whereabouts. There is increasing mutual trust.
5. Children are gaining competence in self-care and upkeep of house.
6. Medical conditions including psychiatric problems are appropriately addressed.

What did I leave out? What should I have left out? Bugaboo, any thoughts?