I am thinking about taking my 10 year old Niece to live with my husband and child of four and myself. She is the child of my husbands sister and she passed away when she was 3 and we have been very close with her all of her life. She has a brother aged 8 who my sister in law is going to have custody to live with her and my brother in law. They currenty live with Nanna and have since they were born. The father is not capable of taking care of them and is no help whatsoever. All the childeren would attend the same school even though brother and sister would live apart. I need some advice on how I talk or ask my niwece and my son if they would like to do it and what things I need to do for both children to keep it as peaceful and an easy tranisition with as little stress as possible.

I think first of all you should talk about it to each of the separately and ask then if it is OK.

And try and let the two spend more time with each other and get use to each other as much as possible.

What I think then is to sit them both down and ask them if it would be OK.

I think the main thing is to get the both of them comfortable with each other and I reckon time will sure help :)

I really think you need to talk to the older one first. Your child may get his hopes up or down. If the older one is agreeable, then you need to assess how well they might get along or not get along and get the older one to help out by interacting as much as possible together. Once that happens, you should be able to spring the "Would you like a big sister"? etc.

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Originally Posted by rubywest

I am thinking about taking my 10 year old Niece to live with my husband and child of four and myself. She is the child of my husbands sister and she passed away when she was 3 and we have been very close with her all of her life. She has a brother aged 8 who my sister in law is going to have custody to live with her and my brother in law. They currenty live with Nanna and have since they were born. The father is not capable of taking care of them and is no help whatsoever. All the childeren would attend the same school even though brother and sister would live apart. I need some advice on how i talk or ask my niwece and my son if they would like to do it and what things i need to do for both children to keep it as peaceful and an easy tranisition with as little stress as possible.

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First off there needs to be some questions asked. Who has legal custody at this time and are they going to be willing to give it to you ?
Why is the father not capable ? Is he disabled ?
Is there some reason the children need to be split up ? Even though they are in the same town etc it still is going to be yet another loss for the child. Its kind of like a go to your room situation. Is there any way they can stay together ?