We not only considered it we did it. The faithful and loyal will benefit. If there come a time when our ED has a true change of heart we will reconsider.

I have decided to leave some money to my Grandchildren...that will leave less for my son and his greedy wife.

I worked at a law firm when the estrangement happened for us. I talked to an estate lawyer who told me that if you put something in your will, like if my son is not married to xxx, he will get money - here is what happens: they go to the county, get a quickie divorce, get the inheritance and remarry. I couldn't believe it!

So, we chose to leave our ES out of our will. We left everything to the son who does so much for us. We had to include a paragraph that says we intentionally leave nothing to ES. I can send you the wording if you want.

Now that ES and his wife and daughter are "sort of" back in my life (they came back when my husband was diagnosed with cancer), I have not changed my will but plan to. In the will I will leave 70% to good son and 30% to ES.

Now if you have an IRA or investments funds, that is something entirely different. Your beneficiary on the investment funds can be whoever and unless you are a named beneficiary on those funds, NO ONE can find out what was left to someone.

My investment funds names my good son as beneficiary. Therefore, my ES will only know that he gets 30% of what I own (like house, car, clothes, etc) but will have no knowledge of what I have in my investments.

Does that make sense?

I should add that my sons are 35 and 32; if they were younger I would have made a contingency that they receive no $$ until the age of 30. I have known of kids squandering their inheritance on stuff like a new car and then continue to live on welfare.

I have removed my ED from my will and life insurance policy. I've also comprised a letter stating the exact reasons I've made this decision in the event my ED attempts to come out of hiding when the time comes, only to see if she can challenge the will.
I've also conferred with an estate attorney, who recommended the letter, and who also recommended placing my house in trust to my son, so there would be absolutely no way my ED could legally challenge the will while the property sits in probate. That's something I'm weighing the pros and cons of before I decide.
It's very sad that we feel we have to remove one of our children from our will, but our loyal, loving children don't deserve to have the sibling who didn't care, be rewarded....

Thank you for bringing up this topic as this has also been on my mind. Shortly after our daughter estranged us, we decided to put her portion of our will (one half as we have two children) into a trust available when she would turn 30. 3 1/2 years now into the estrangement, (she's almost 26), and now age 30 seems so much closer. If there were grandchildren, I would certainly skip our ED and leave her portion in their names, but currently there are none. She lives with a bf and apparently they are engaged, but we have never met him. We do know that that they both live a lifestyle that is contrary to God's Word. Yet, I find it difficult to completely cut her out of our will. I am glad to read how some of you have done just that, as it may give me the courage to move forward with that plan.

Thank you for your responses. It's all so painful- almost seems surreal. Like so many of you, I never dreamed that our family would come to this. Will never stop praying for our precious daughter, but in the meantime, we have to be practical and move on with our lives. So difficult.
Hugs to all.

It is such a waste of precious time we should be sharing with our children and grandchildren. All we can do is pray that one day they will see how wrong they have been to cause such pain.

Sommersmom - If your lawyer suggested you write that letter, I would ask him if it should be signed in front of him and notarized. It is such a great idea.

JulnJim - you could do what my cousin did in her will. She left a certain amount ($5,000) to her husband's niece/nephew and named them specifically to receive that amount. When she contested it and said my cousin wasn't in right mind, the lawyer told her that she was definitely of sound mind and that is all she wanted to give this niece. BUT- when you name someone in your will, they get a copy of the will and will see what everyone else gets. If she isn't named at all, then she won't get a copy of it, even if she asks. At least that is the way here in MN.

It is very sad we need to be thinking about all of this.

Yes its sad we all have to think of this right now but if we dont do it who will.My dh and myself have discussed the last one living will have to decide what will happen.My Dh has been collecting coins for sometime and wants them left to our gs but only if he is going to do right,and we have a saving account for gs and to be used for education forhim.We have 2 other gc but there parents really have nothing to do with us no attempt to visit.Dh and myself have to make the trip to visit gc and the gc call us by first name,we love them dearly i feel guilty for some of my thoughts and reasons,but i really dont want any of them {ec,gc}. to be snooping through our things i thought of getting attorny to pad lock home let him handle everything even funeral afterwe make arrangements.

We did this for one of our ES too. Had a new will written up. The writing is wall with our other ECs too, to just leave everything to charity. We'll probably do that eventually but at least for now one of them is out.

This is such a painful decision to make. We are having our wills rewritten and leaving our ES out. We are leaving his 3 children the same amount as our other 5 grandchildren, to be held in trust until they're 25. It's so sad to do that to him. I know it will hurt and anger him and make him think we have confirmed his opinion of us. But what else to do? Our daughters are good to us. But I think of the father of the prodigal son. He knew his son would go out and rebel and blow the money, but he didn't hold back his share. So are we being vindictive? I don't know. I just don't know.

P.S. Out of our three children, he is the one who genuinely needs financial help the most.

We did not write our ES out of our will, but we did make a very special provision if the rest of us all die at the same time. You see, we (my husband and I , and our other kids) take frequent trips where we fly all over the country together. The thought occurred what if the plane crashes and we all die and he is the sole survivor? We do not want him or his crazed wife getting the money, because we know they would blow it and the grandchildren would get nothing. So we made my sister in law the executor of the will, which states that in the event ALL OF US DIE, then his inheritance will go into a trust fund that his children will get upon turning 30. And if the sister inlaw dies, we have a second in command, and a third, and so forth.

I believe we did not write our ED out of our will until she wrote us out of her life. God can change things.