Asking for help
How do I choose a guardian for my children? It is a big question, a question you hope will be academic and yet it is important to get this right. In March we are looking at the questions that you should ask yourself when making this decision.
This might be one of the most important questions in this guide, will these potential guardians ask for help? Whether that is within their own network, or within the kids’ existing network, will they ask for help? Will they have access to help?
I mean it takes a village, right, so will they ask for help? Have they tended, in the past, to take everything on themselves and get a bit buried and lost?
Your relative who has just moved to a new town, and will likely also move the kids to that new town, is probably not a good choice. Where will their help come from?
It takes a village, so where is this person’s village, and will they let them help?
Additionally, do they know your existing village? Could you create some sort of list, maybe a google Doc that you share with them and your spouse, of the full names and phone numbers of your team. This might be helpful even if you are alive, if you are trying to figure out which friend your kid went home from school with, for instance.
So, how can you help encourage them to ask for help? Who to ask, but also just generally encouraging them in their life now that they are not an island?
But I have already chosen the guardian?
Great, you should still think through this topic. Asking for help is a problem for most people, and actually talking through these issues is helpful to both of you.
If you encourage the guardian to do this, you are also encouraging yourself to do this, and you are both better off no matter what happens in the future.
Estate Planning is overwhelming
Preparing a Will when you have children comes with a lot of decisions, who should be the guardian for my children, what should I tell them, should they control the kids' trust, should they be a beneficiary of the trust, should I tell my family who I have chosen, should I tell my kids? What is a letter of wishes and how does it apply to my kids? Many of the steps we will talk about can be done by you, once you know why and how.
What if your kids are older, can you appoint a guardian for a 17 year old, or a 20 year old? What age should they be before they get the money? What if they need the money before that point?
Would you like to join my free Facebook group where we are discussing all of this, and I have provided a checklist to help you to work through all of the decisions yourself.