I am so sorry for your loss and your feeling of guilt. You must understand that you are not responsible for the life choices your sister made.It is too bad that you couldn't reach into her heart and set her on the right path but the path she took was of her making.Your sister knows that you love her because your wouldn't have cared enough to try to help her if you didn't.Drugs do terrible things to people and they get caught in a whirl-pool that they just don't have the strength to climb out of. You did what you could and even though you were not able to help she knows you tried and I'm sure she loves you for that. She is with Jesus now and not in any more pain. Please try not to beat yourself up and to forgive yourself, you did your best and your sister knows that and loves you for it.Thoses of us left behind always have the hardest time because our loved ones are at peace now and we have to keep remembering that. Put all your strength into your nephew now and see if you can get him to see himself as he is and much Good Luck. God Bless you, I send you hugs.

Hmmm.. I certainly don't have great advice to give here, but I will tell you what happened with me. I had my first cat for 7 years (she had moved cross country, and a few different apartments with me) and she was my one and only. Until one day at work in a barn I heard a little pathetic "mew-ing" coming from a dark corner. I searched real hard (the barn had no lights, only natural daylight coming in through the door, and the cat was black and about 2-3 lbs) until I found her. Against the advice of my boss (who owned the barn) I went inside and got some food and some milk to give to the starving kitty. I kept this up for about 2 weeks, and during this time my bf (the boss's son) started to like the kitty as well and asked if we could take her home with us. I knew my one and only cat would certainly not appreciate it, but my heartstrings got the better of me (the area was well known for kitty road kill) and I agreed to bring her home. Once there my precious cat, who up until now had been queen of the castle, displayed her nasty side and I have never seen so much hissing coming from what I though was the gentlest cat in the world. I was the young PUNK then because I knew nothing about socializing cats and how to introduce them to one another. I just plunked Kitty down in the same room as Jelika and watched what happened. Lots of growling/hissing/swatting and who knew what happened when I wasn't home (working on a farm is no 8 hour a day job.. I/we were gone a minimum of 12 hours a day, 7 days a week). But when I got home they both seemed to be in one piece still and eventually... eventually the hissing/growling/swatting subsided. This was 12 years ago and up until sweet Jelika passed away in April, they still occaisionally swatted at one another, but more often than not I would find them curled up together on the bed. Jelika would always sleep by my side, in the crook of my arm and Kitty would sleep by my feet (if on the bed at all). Kitty always wanted to be where Jelika was. Even though I had 2 exact same cat beds in front of the fireplace Kitty would always wait until Jelika left hers and then promptly jumped into that one. And even to this day, with Jelika being gone, Kitty still waits whenever I fill up the food dish, I presume to see if Jelika will want to eat first. She waits until I tell her it is ok to eat, because Jelika isn't coming back. Even at the end though, I think Jelika wanted to prove to Kitty her "ownership and first cat status" over Kitty, because most times when Kitty would sit on my lap, and Jelika got wind of it, no matter where she was or what she was doing she would drop anything and come over and jump up HIGHER on my lap (she would usually end up on my chest somewhere, because one lap is crowded with 2 cats) effectively hogging all the attention/petting and cutting Kitty off. It was kind of funny and I never knew that a cat could give an "evil eye" until I saw Jelika looking at me whenever I would give Kitty a petting. She would always come over and assume that since I had 2 hands, I should be using the free one to pet HER. I certainly don't NEED 2 hands to pet Kitty! I guess I'm telling you all this because I don't think it really matters what you do or how long you separate them or leave them together. The first little while will be a little rough, but eventually they will learn to like each other, and find comfort in each other. I guess I've never done anything "properly" or to exacting standards when it came to my cats, but as long as there is enough love to go around, it will always work out in the end. Good luck, and please don't send Jayden away to a shelter where he may end up in a home that is not even half as loving as yours. Mokanee

Hmmmm, interesting. I'm going to wager that there are indeed times that your daughter provokes by deliberately ignoring the other girl...whether you want to admit it or not, but guess that's not here nor there in what's going on. I'm also going to say that somebody chattering at me non-stop is going to annoy me sometimes more than at other times. But lining the kids up and doing what DH did 'now you must respond to _____' is silly. Seriously, if there is indeed an issue address it individually. The way 'rules' and 'explaination' session was set up was asking for a show down between DH and you and BS from the girls. Chatterbox needs to be told to have 'quiet time' now and then from time to time. The silent one needs to be told (not in front of the other) that she is expected to be civil and polite to everyone (but she should not expect to be constantly badgered by chatter). Is there a reason SD may have a short attention span? Does she chatter to DH/you as she does to her stepsister? What do you two do at the times the girl is questioning/chattering at you both? You advise the DD to ignore her stepsister. DH squeals the child is ignoring his daughter. I'd like to hear what you do when the SS yaks and yaks at you? Do you tune her out and ignore her? Or does she only do this chatter-chatter to your DD? Different rules for the girls? If there really are, again would it not be better to address issues individually than in front of the girls together. To me pointing out ups and downs of each child in front of each other just re-inforces pitting one against the other. Currently when 'rules' don't suit you during 'explaination time' you call out the DH in front of the girls for a private chat?

I know I'm weighing in at the end... but I spent all weekend at a Biology fair, teaching kids about fun science and didn't have a chance to log in until last night. I think Mom2emall is absolutely right to expect better behavior than she saw from SD. She was terribly rude and deserved to be called out on it. You remember how one of our new house rules is "It's OK to say your opinion, as long as you don't hurt anyone's feelings"?? Well, IMO, that's exactly what happened here. Like many people have said, SD could have been nice about saying "No thanks, I'd rather play by myself" or "Right now we want to play just the two of us, but you can play later". I also don't think it's OK to choose to not play, and then be mad because you missed out on the fun. Richard Scarry even had characters about that (anyone remember Pig Will and Pig Won't and how Pig Won't missed out on everything, so he became Pig Me Too?) I do think Mom2emall went a little far in how she excluded SD when they were all sitting on the couch, but since it was quickly followed (as I recall) with letting her come sit with the family and including her, I'm not too worked up about it. I'd probably be more concerned if the "punishment" had been that SD spent the evening in her room while the rest of the family watched a movie together and ACTUALLY been excluded, rather than just told she was. I'm used to rude and anti-SM remarks from KKNY (you'd think that as an adult, KK could handle "It's OK to say your opinion, as long as you don't hurt anyone's feelings", but maybe I have unreasonable expectations) but I'm really annoyed with that KKNY keeps calling Mom2emall "OP". "Mom2emall" is a bit long to type out all the time, so maybe if KK is feeling lazy, she could say M2EA? I might be the only one, but I think it's incredibly rude, and actually a form of adult bullying, to not use someone's name. IMO, continuously calling M2EA "Original Poster" is really disrespectful. Ima, I agree that TOS is spewing psychobabble as gospel again, but IMO, in this case, she's not being rude or anti-SM, so let's cut her some slack on this one. She's giving her opinion and wasn't being a big jerk about it, so I think we should respect that TOS has a right to express her opinion. About "forcing" the kids to play together.... That's not how I see this at all. My perception of this situation is that it's OK to play separately, as long as you're being nice about it. Mom2emall wants all the kids to be able to get along and play together, but also seems to respect their own space and individual interests, as long as everyone is being nice to each other... So I'm not sure why anyone is saying she shouldn't encourage the kids to play together. I think she's bang-on by encouraging them to be nice about playing, whether it's together or apart.