The Two Guardianships Needed to Protect Your Children
Most simply, a Guardian, in the context of your children, is a replacement parent - a person that has legal custody of and authority over your children, along with the responsibility to provide and care for your children, in your absence. There are two types of guardianship that every parent needs to have in place to protect their children: Permanent Guardianship and Emergency Guardianship.
A Permanent Guardian is probably what you think of first and are most familiar with. A Permanent Guardian takes on the legal responsibility of raising your kids to adulthood, should you die. It’s vitally important to nominate Permanent Guardians for your children in your Last Will and Testament to prepare in the event a tragedy occurs and you are no longer there to raise your children. An informal agreement or understanding between family members or friends will not suffice and will not be effective. Making nominations in your Will is the only way you can guarantee your wishes are carried out. If you do not make that decision yourself in a proper legal document, a judge, without any guidance from you, will decide who is going to raise your kids. Just imagine the last person in your or your spouse’s family that you would want to parent your kids…the judge could pick that person. Sometimes knowing Guardianship is an important decision does not make it an easy decision. You must carefully consider many important factors like age, energy, health, relationship to your children, financial responsibility, lifestyle, parenting experience, parenting philosophies, where the guardian lives, religion, hobbies, and a whole host of other important factors, to choose the best replacement parent for your kids.
The other overlooked Guardian is the Emergency Guardian. An Emergency Guardian is granted legal authority to take custody of your kids and make decisions in the event of an emergency, if you cannot be reached, or are otherwise incapable of caring for your children temporarily. An example: You and your spouse go out of town for a nice dinner and special date just 40 minutes away down the highway. The kids are at home with their favorite babysitter, you’ll be back by 10:00 pm. On the way home, you are stuck in a blizzard, you hit black ice and go off the road. No one is hurt, but with no cell service and a deserted highway, you are stuck. Around 11:30pm, the babysitter calls the police having still not heard from you and your phone going straight to voicemail. Enter your Emergency Guardian: the person police are legally designated to leave your children in the custody of, rather than with child protective services, until things get sorted out. If the accident was worse, and you were seriously injured, the Emergency Guardian would have legal authority to take care of your children until you were released from the hospital. This would also be the person you would list on your child’s school’s emergency contact form. The most important factors in choosing an Emergency Guardian is proximity, availability, and whether they be able to help keep your kids in a relatively normal routine for a temporary period. This Emergency Guardian may or may not be the same person as the Permanent Guardian you nominate.
Planning early is best. Lubnau Law offers a full range of legal planning and strategies to help protect your family and assets now and into the future. Because the best things aren’t things. Call Lubnau Law at (307) 682-1313 to discuss how we can help protect your family.