eli5 What does it mean when a relative is “twice removed”?
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Xth cousin is distance from the younger relative to your shared ancestor (parent is 0, grandparent is 1, great grandparent is 2, etc.), while y removed is the difference between their distance and yours to that relative.
So your parent’s sibling’s lines are all 1st cousins, your grandparents siblings lines are 2nd cousins, your great grandparents siblings lines are 3rd cousins, etc.
Then removed just describes the generational gap, if your shared ancestor is your grandma and their mom, that’s 1 removed (an uncle/aunt), if it’s your great grandma and their mom then it’s twice removed (granduncle/grandaunt), etc.
It gets a bit more tricky once there are kids back down, but your 2nd cousin 2 removed’s children will be 2nd cousin 1 removed, then their kids will be 2nd cousin 0 removed, then their kids will be 1 removed again, and then 2 removed.
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