Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Choosing guardians
So I meant to ask this a week ago, but I kept forgetting. DH and I have a meeting this afternoon with a lawyer to go over estate planning/wills/etc. The number one thing we need to decide on is a guardian for DD if something where to happen to both DH and I.
We completely disagree in who is should be. I think it should be my sister and BIL and he feels it should be his brother and SIL. We can not agree. We both have great arguments for both sides, and neither of us want to "back down" for our #1 choice. My big thing is that she has met his brother twice, and once was when she was 2 months old. If we were to die tomorrow, I would want her to be somewhere she is comfortable with. DH's big argument is that his brother has younger kids, where my sisters kids are a bit older.
Anyways, we are going into this meeting today without the decision being made. I really dont know what we are going to do.
If you have had something similar happen to you, please let me know how you came over the decision. We are really stuck here, and in the end I know one of us is going to be really disappointed and unhappy.
Re: Choosing guardians
for us, the decision was made by who was and would be in J (and now N's) life(lives). We didn't look at who had kids the same age, but who would step in and love our children as much as we do and help them through everything with the least change/added stress as possible.
We also factored in that we don't want them cut off from one side of the family or the other so we did want to make sure if we chose xxx that they'd still be able to see yyy , kwim?
if your sister is close to YD, maybe make the point to YH that she knows her/her family and even though she's met her uncle, he's essentially a stranger and should something happen to the both of you, you'd want her to be comfortable and not in a situation where, while very loved by all involved, she may feel alone.
Those are great points. I agree with it not mattering how old the other kids are. but DH 100% disagrees.
His major argument about my sister is that she is done raising kids, they are 15 and 16 and "almost out of the house." He feels that she and my BIL are done raising their kids and they wont want to raise one from the start again. I dont think it really matters.
The whole thing about not being kept from the other side of the family. My BIL lives in Texas... most of the rest of our family lives up here, except for my FIL. Now my BIL hates my FIL and they do not talk what so ever. FIL sends money and gifts to BIL for his kids and he throws it away. I told DH that is a major issue for me. She needs to know her grandfather. DH feels that BIL would allow DD to see him.
I think parenting mag. recently had a great article on this.
One point to consider (and maybe you already have), but would either of the candidates not want to be a guardian? I remember one of the big things in the article was making sure to ask the person you choose so they know in advance. A couple people had commented in the article that their first choices asked not to be selected based on other factors the person hadn't considered (Financials, where they were in life, etc), so maybe one of your candidates wouldn't or couldn't take on that responsibility - which might make the decision easier.
You know, they may be almost done, but if something happened to you and your husband I bet they wouldn't hesitate to take A in, and that thought wouldn't even go through their minds. My former neighbors had to take in 2 of their granddaughters (Mom was an addict) and raise them from start to finish. Talk about being done and having to start over. But when it's family, it's okay. I'm assuming you discussed this with them, and they agreed to it. They wouldn't have agreed if they truly felt that way.
And um, that last paragraph would be a huge deciding factor to me to NOT send them to BIL. That's a big deal. If he's willing to cut his father out of his own children's lives, of course he'll have no issue cutting him out of hers. I don't see how that will be any different.
We have not talked to either of them yet.... we dont want to until we make a decision and then we will ask. We know 100% neither of them would say no, but we will not make anything official until we do speak with them. I know what we are going in for today will not get complete because of this reason.
Pam - in regards to DH's father... he feels that his brother would not go against our wishes and would allow her to see him. He would want something written in the paperwork that stated that. I don't know... I want to believe he would do it. But it's the whole fact that she would be away from the entire rest of her family. All my family is in RI or NH. DH's family is in RI and MA mainly, with his brother is Texas and his dad in FL, with his dad talking about moving back up here.
This is such a tough decision, and it sucks that we can not agree.
I wouldn't assume that they'll say yes. Just a head's up!
And just because BIL may sign something does NOT guarantee he will keep his word. I mean, not to be morbid, but it's not like you guys would be there to enforce it, ya know?
Ditto this!
I like your plan much better, which means she'll be closer to just about all of her family and friends.
I never really considered if it were years down the road with her friends... good point.
I just get so flustered in situations like this... I don't think straight and I know I really need to. I do love his brother and SIL, don't get me wrong, and I feel like crap trying to pin them against my family.
I know DH talked to his mom about it, I might call mine later just to see what she says. I know my MILs concern is that because DD is half black, my family can't relate to that portion of her background and what if someone says something hurtful to her as she gets older they wont be able to relate. I see it as valid, but not something they could not work through. Especially because we would still want the other side of the family being involved.
Call me naive, but I don't really see that as an issue in this day and age.
We are in the same process now - we have the draft documents from the lawyer and we have yet to sign them because we've had such a difficult time choosing a guardian, and have yet to choose a backup for that person. So, from my perspective, I'm jealous! You have 2 families that she could go to that would love her and care for her. Having to choose one over the other is actually a good problem to have in my eyes.
That being said, I tend to side with you. We chose a backup who is just a friend of ours. We know he would do a great job caring for our child, he has a good head financially so we trust him to use our life insurance policies in the best interest of our child, and he's local and would therefore not require a big move on his part, or moving our child. I do have some family in the area that would help him should something happen to both of us, and he knows my DH's brother and would help stay connected to that side of the family. He also has similar values as we do, and would raise our child in an environment that we think is most similiar to how we would.
I also agree that you should talk to your siblings/in-laws before making a decision and see what they say. Tell them that they're being considered, and ask them if they're ok with doing it or not.
If you can't agree, or if neither really wants to do it, is there someone outside of your family that you would consider? Might be the only way to end the stalemate without hard feelings.
Good luck!
Well, I don't know what your attorney is going to say, but when we were asked to be guardian's for friends of ours, they asked us a few weeks before their appointment. They even wanted us to sleep on it before giving them an answer. We all knew (the four of us) that DH and I would say yes, but it definitely is a lot to consider and discuss.
I think I would postpone the appointment if I were you. Good luck.
I was going to suggest this as well. If you haven't even asked them, you really can't go to the appointment and assign people until all parties have had a good long talk about it. You may NEED to postpone, especially if you can't agree.