Parents in law obsession with arriving safely

Maybe you’re a terrible driver! Just joking by the way, but it’s interesting how you interpret ‘drive safely’ in that way, whereas I’d view it as a ‘throw away phrase’ meaning safe travels.

As others have said, just turn your phone on silent and ignore the calls whilst travelling.
Then just send them a quick text when you’ve got home and sorted yourself out to let them know you’re home. Don’t rush to do this as getting unpacked, kids to bed is the most important thing.
I remember when I was young my Grandma always asked me to give her 3 rings to let her know I got home safely. I mostly always forgot to do this and would have a call from her asking me if I was ok.

Drive safely is an instruction, bless you isn't.

I do get annoyed, yes.

I regularly check flight radar if I know a friend or family are flying. 😉

Do you also get annoyed when people say ‘bless you’ if you sneeze?
Drive Safely is just a phrase, not a judgment of your driving skills,

Are you also annoyed by people who love you telling you to 'take care?'.

I mean, you don't need reminding do you?

YANBU. The phrase 'drive safely' (usually from parent) really annoys me. As if I need reminding to do so!

Well yes exactly and most accidents actually happen locally to where you live. More likely to have a crash driving to Sainsbury’s than driving 2 hours to the beach.

Your regular routes you also get complacent so work / school run is probably your most dangerous trip.

I agree with above PP. My DS and DiL visited at weekend as they are off to the US next week on holiday. They both texted separately to say they'd had a lovely time and would keep me updated from USA
They live 20 miles away.
I will be following their flight on flight radar too.. it's not control, it's out of interest!
I don't understand why texting a loved one is something to tick off the to do list.
As a teen, my friend and I used to give each other " 3 rings"

Yep. This.

Tell them you are there when you arent - eg we’ve just arrived safely, good journey ….mil, why can I hear speeding motoway traffic ?
it’s just the tv , bye now we’re just making a cuppa. 😂

Yes-they could do that. They could have therapy. Or, as I said, you could send a 5 second text.

I just want to add to this, the ‘back home safely’ message is only part of it as it’s usually ‘ and it was lovely to see you too’ so in a way with us it’s just a way of our family saying ‘I love you and you are important to me.’
So It’s not about control, or tracking, or blue lighting somewhere in the event of an accident, or anxiety.

But I don’t understand how it works. If I drive to Sainsbury’s, do I text then? It’s travel, it could be my last journey, but is it somehow safer because I set off from my home and not theirs?

So after a visit why not assume the best, and when you wave visitors off home, pretend they are going to Sainsbury’s, so no text needed.

it’s anxiety and it’s not healthy.

Yeah. 5 seconds to put soneone’s mind at rest is such a fucking obligation…..

My parents used to do this - mind you they used to get upset with their parents as first thing we had to do on my childhood hoildays was find a pay phone.

It was hard because kids were young and demanding and frankly whatever we said they insisted journey was terrible and we shouldn't have gone and wouldn't get off the phone in less than 30 minutes.

In end I told them less - was vauge about travel plans - and stopped phoning straight away but sent pics from beach next day. They adjusted and think were happier as they didn't have information to worry about and come up with worse case situations about. I was certainly less stresses and irritated.

I'd only do that it someone was visiting and I was collecting them or waiting for them at home, so I'd know if they were going to be late arriving. Otherwise I'd find it a bit OTT.

My best friend even follows my flights, how sweet is that!

it doesn’t hurt if the OP remembers or wants to, but the OP shouldn’t be obliged to either. Messaging or calling ten minutes after their ETA is smothering and if the MIL can’t handle that people might stop or be delayed for more than ten minutes on a 2 hour+ journey, or might have things to do in the ten minutes after arriving which aren’t updating MIL then frankly, that’s for her to work on and limit the information she has if it exacerbates her anxiety.

Oh give over with “l haven’t got time” bullshit. It takes literally 5 seconds to send a 2 word text that will set someone’s mind at rest. Not doing it is deeply unkind-even deliberately cruel.

My mother does this. She follows the progress of any flight or train journey a family member is making and gets in a fuss if there are delays. I've actually had to tell her to stop texting me with updates because I'm in the airport and can see what's happening myself, also to cease burning up my battery. If she doesn't get a reply she starts blowing up the phone of everyone I know. She's always been an extreme worrier.

It's got worse as she has retired and doesn't get out so much, so her world has shrunk and her travel obsession increased. She even monitors flights we sometimes take but are not on that day. I keep her on an information diet because she is so extreme sometimes and then she complains I don't tell her anything.

I let her know when I am home safely of course. I think that's fair enough.

When you kids are adults you still worry about them you’re PIL do seem particularly anxious, is there a reason for this? My DS1 will always msg when he gets off a flight etc, and after a really long journey, but a shorter one, he wouldn’t and I wouldn’t expect him to. He’s getting on with his life, 😂 just as I am typing he’s just msg to say he’s back!

My mum is worse than this. She has my dad on life 360 and is obsessive with it. I’ve been out with my dad and she rings constantly asking ‘why you go that way, what’s happening’. So on a hours drive she will call multiple times. He’s so patient but it would do my head in. She put me on it and my brother once - we removed ourselves after we got endless similar calls. I found it so so intrusive and invasive (as did my brother). She is most offended that we removed ourselves.

id get ‘oh how come you werent there today, what was that for?’ Etc. so so annoying. Shes gutted she can’t spy anymore. lol.

Does it do you any harm to just send a text saying “Arrived safely.xx