AIBU to think that a gift isn’t really a gift if it’s being a carer on holiday?

I was an unwilling travel companion to my mum. She died some years ago and I look back on those holidays with a lot of lovely memories and so glad I did them despite not really wanting to at the time.

And I would never go away with her and my kids all at once. We’d never get through the airport (or I’d end up spending the week in airside Wetherspoons while the rest of them jetted off which isn’t a bad idea come to think of it 😂

You appear to have hit on a solution that works for everyone! Problem solved.

Well you could request 2 weeks unpaid annual leave and ask her to cover the costs explaining you need to save your annual leave for a family holiday.

Only the OP can clarify re her mother

Excellent idea.

That's harsh. She sounds like an elderly lady without the mental acuity to necessarily appreciate the issues OP would have in taking such a holiday. My DM used to regularly offer to have my dog stay with them when we were going away. Absolutely no understanding of the fact that said DDog would need 2 hours of walks daily, and she was almost wheelchair bound. She just wanted to help. It sounds like OP and her mum have a pretty close relationship and mum thinks it's a nice offer.

So…. You and her aren’t close? Not a particularly loving and thoughtful mother?

I am not clear on whether or not you’re even close to her!

She sounds bloomin selfish

Just leave her chilling on the sun lounger with a margharita and you enjoy time in the pool with your kids lol

You don’t answer the key question - do you have a close and loving relationship whereby if you explain your situation, she will be totally understanding?

This

My point is…. The reaction of the DM to the OP pointing out that her circumstances simply can’t do a full weeks holiday - will be telling. I get the impression, the DM won’t accept that as an answer and keep on at the Op, which 89 or 39 - is selfish behaviour.

Other issues aside, I’d have thought the sort of holiday she’d want would probably not be at all the sort of thing you and your children would enjoy.

There's a lot of crucial detail missing from the OP's posts when it comes to assessing what's reasonable/manageable. For example, I am not clear as to whether the OP is a single parent or whether the children's Dad could look after them for a weekend while the OP goes on a weekend break with her Mum to a nice hotel somewhere in the UK. I am also not clear how much care the OP's Mum needs, eg whether she can wash and dress herself and take herself off to the toilet when needed or whether she will require a high level of personal care from the OP. That makes a big difference.

Does it count as part of the gift allowance if she’s spending it on a holiday? Surely that something that can be put down to just a regular payment rather than as a gift, if that’s what she’s wanting to do with the money.

My MIL used to "treat" us each summer to a week with them in a place of their choice. They would pay accomodation and our limited budget would have to spend money on food and transport for a holiday that didnt feel like a holiday to us. But now she's dead we're really pleased we put in the effort for her and gave her the family time that she wanted.

I think the problem is that it's gotten mixed up with this whole gift/inheritance tax business and so you're finding it hard to see it as what it is, which is a gift for her. You have more sway over the holiday than we did so modify it in terms of length and venue to something you can get through and make some memories. Shortening it to a weekend means you can go somewhere expensive with kids/teens activities built in perhaps?

I don't think a holiday has anything to do with inheritance tax. She's muddled perhaps? Or just after a nice holiday or two where she spends it with her kids and her kids look after her!

Perfectly ok to say no.

But stipulations on what to spend on (herself) then mean it's not a IHT free gift as she retains some control. Gifts should be no strings. A Gift with Reservation of Benefit (GWR) is still subject to IHT

She is 89. Quite possibly she would have "adjusted her expectations" twenty years ago but many, if not most very elderly people become very set in their routines and extremely inflexible in their ways and forget that others have different ways of doing things. Their world has diminished and they genuinely do not consider that they are behaving selfishly. When my elderly mother visits us, everything is arranged around her needs and wants - even the television seems to be changed to her programmes. This is fine for a few days in one's own home but a very different proposition when on holiday. @AmazonDiamond, I think you are going to have to be very politely firm. You could say that a long weekend in Eastbourne really is the most you can do as you do not have enough holiday from work. To be honest, most very elderly people would find more than two nights in a hotel overwhelming in any case. She probably has fond memories of past holidays when she was younger and fitter, forgetting that this is impossible now.

Yes would it work for her to pay for a very expensive holiday with you and a carer to do the the helping so that you could actually enjoy it? Or are there hotels that have caring built in? I have never looked into this, but I'm thinking a service a bit like what kinder hotels do for children?

Similar - My mum was going to take me on a cruise when Dad died. She'd be saving up to £14k A MONTH (yes a month, for 24 hour care) and was very free and easy with her potential savings

in the end we went abroad and I paid £1,000 for the "privilege"

My sensible siblings wouldn't have dreamt of being so stupid as to offer to take her, be her carer and pay for themselves.

Oh @AmazonDiamond I am in a very similar position to you. My DM is also late 80s, wealthy and keen to spend on us - which is really, really generous. But the strings that come with it are sometimes just too much.

My DM too wants to go on holiday with me but she is hard work, more in that she is judgemental although her physical decline is more noticeable now.

I think all I could commit to is a long weekend away.