To spend all our savings on a trip to Australia and leave Dh/Dc behind?

[iMemoo]

I'm struggling with this one.

My lovely sister moved to Australia a few years ago with her husband. I miss her desperately and it's starting to get the the point where I just really need to see her.

There is no way they can afford to come over to England any time soon and as a family we really can't afford to go out there.

We have a small amount of money in savings account which, despite being such a small amount, is basically our life savings.

Dh suggested that I use this money to go out and see my sister.

I'm really torn though. I so want to see my sister but it would mean leaving behind Dh and my 3 dc and not seeing them for 3 weeks.

It feels so selfish and indulgent too.

What do I do?

You do realise, though, that when she has a baby you'll have exactly the same problem?

manathome you would think me selfish too, then.
I came overseas because my field of work is based here. It was meant to be for three years. I met my husband. Now I continue to live overseas and away from my family because my husband is a citizen here, and has two kids (my stepkids) who are in school here and we want them to finish out school where they are. It would be selfish, would it not, for me to insist on the family unit moving back to my home, since that would mean giving up their own at a time when they would do better to have stability in their education.

What can we do? My husband's family is on one place and mine is in another. Is it selfish of him to ask me to live away from my family? Or is it selfish for me to ask him to live away from his?

Perhaps the reply is that I should not have married someone from another country, but that seems rather facile. I have a baby daughter now, which is a good thing. My stepkids have a second parent. My husband and I have each other. So the net happiness seems increased by our being together, even though it also means that I am separated from my family back home and they don't get to see me or the kids as often as any of us would like.

Point is, you have no idea what the sister's circumstances are. I am sympathetic, because I know that sometimes we end up in situations where no matter what you do, you can't be everywhere or please everyone. It is heartbreaking and I miss my family terribly, every day. I go to them when I can, and they come to me when they can (not nearly enough!). Unless we go back to the way things were 300 years ago and families never left their own plot of land, people will be separated by geography. Fortunately, the OP has the means to make the trip, and her DH wants her to go, and I hope that she does. :)

OP just go.

It amazes me that some people would advocate putting the theoretical boiler break down ahead of the need to see your dear sister. Your wonderful DH has actually suggested you use your rainy day money, so go!

The kids will be fine, DH and the youngest will be fine.

Take the maximum time you can, just pick your time around the cheaper ticket prices and enjoy.

If you go now then i doubt you will be in a position to go again when she has the planned baby.

How would you feel if you went and then 4 weeks after you got back your car needed £500 worth of work to keep it on the road and you didn't have it? or we sufer a really cold winter and you cant aford to put the heating on?

I would start a savings plan so that i could go later. it would give something to look forward to and plan for but then i couldnt sleep at night if i knew that i didn't have at least a few £££ rainy day money.

I think you should go.

If you can find a way to go without spending your savings, do that, but if you can't, you need to go.

Tell your family that you don't want any Christmas presents. Tactfully request cash rather than John Lewis vouchers. Do your PILs or your family have millions of air miles? Perhaps they might get you the ticket with those. eBay like a fiend - if you sell everything that is not nailed down, you could almost certainly come up with GBP650. Babysit, walk people's dogs, eBay stuff on behalf of other people (everyone I know asks me to list things for them - if I charged them a commission I'd be making a fortune).

I agree that it's important to see your sister's life - her friends, her DCs' school, her suburb. You will feel more connected when she talks to you about these things in future if you have a mental image of them.

If your boiler breaks down you will just have to do what the tens of millions of people without savings do, and get a low-interest credit card. The thing that is making people hesitate - the bad economy - is also in your favour. It means that interest rates are low and likely to remain so, so if you DO hit an emergency it will be cheap to borrow money.

I am usually as financially conservative as they come, but there is one thing that is more important, and that's love.

I wonder whether the replies would be different if it was the dh wanting to spend the family safety net on something like this.

I guess so, she probably just wants to go out on the town boozing and 'on the pull' over there with her sister!

Well that is what most women would think if their husband wanted to do the same from what you are saying isn't it?

How about this? Take the baby and go for a few months. May as well get your moneys worth, and spend a good amount of time with your sister. Get sister to line up a temp. job you can do with your current health, if possible, for you in Australia, and save the money to re pay the family savings.

If you don't go, at least get your sister to do a video of the house and neighborhood for you.
Good luck deciding what to do.

I have to be honest and say I think yabvvvu in thinking about doing this. You have your family now and it's unfair on them - that's just my opinion.

Spiderpig you make an excellent point

I'm amazed at how self-indulgent and selfish some people can be. This action is unfair on everyone in your family, your kids and dh I mean.

oh please go OP. It's not selfish to want to see you sister and the kids will be fine xxx

imeemoo

Did I read correctly that none of your children have ever been abroad? If that is the case then yes I think yabu. If you are to spend that money on traveling I think that you should be taking your kids on a nice holiday.

Look, I live abroad and a 14 hour flight away from my family. That is my choice it is really up to me to make the effort to go back and see my family, not for them to leave themselves short and for their families to go without to come and visit me.

Perhaps you are feeling left out because your parents are going. Perhaps your husband doesn't really want you to go, but feels he can't really say no.

I never went abroad until I started college at 18 - it never did me any harm!

Who says children must go on a foreign holiday, desnatada????? My childhood holidays were just one day at the beach which we have lovely memories of.

Children have their whole lives ahead of them and when they start working and earning money they can go on foreign holidays like I did.

Am in the don't go camp. Agree with lydiawickham and it's all about attitude to risk.

OP just can't afford it without putting the family's financial stability at risk, unless you get the money from others, eg MIL, sister, parents.

It's not about the boiler, if the OP's husband gets made redundant they only have enough to cover one month! The OP isn't fit to work. Saving more is hard. And living in rented accommodation is not protection. oP seems to be saying "oh well, we only have a month's worth, may as well spend it then", which isnan irresponsible attitude imo.

Perhaps OP has a safety net from other, wealthier, family members, but if you're relying on them as a back-up plan it'd be better to have the conversation first about whether they'd be willing to help out with the trip or, should OP pay, any financial problems afterwards.

OP's younger sister should take some responsibility here, OP talks about her having got married and thinking of starting a family, but that all sounds standard and nice tbh. Whereas OP has had a lot going on. When people emigrate they must surely know that situations change, people can get sick, have incomes reduced etc, and if they care about the family at home enough, plan to be able to visit.

A long trip bynplane may not, in fact, be good for OP's health, depending on the health condition, eg long flights and jet lag not good for people with immunological issues, painful for those with chronic pain.

OP - can you really not see a time in the future when you might need that money? What if you had to move? Would you get your deposit back from your current place before you had to pay the deposit for the next one?

For whatever reason, your sister has chosen a life on the other side of the world and your financial and family situation means that seeing her will be a once in a lifetime trip. Once that trip is over, you have to accept you won't see her again unless she comes back to the UK. Even if you do make this trip, in your mind, you must see it as a trip to say good bye, because eventually you're going to have to deal with your feelings of loss.

Oh OP, I feel your pain! You sound so bereft without her.

I personally don't think you should go, I'm sorry. Yes it's 'only money' as some have said and I kind of like that attitude. But I'd be concerned about clearing out the savings.

Also your dd is only 2, three weeks is a long time as you know.

But the main reason is because it won't really help you in the long run will it? You will feel the same when you come home. Better to find ways to work with the separation and begin to adjust such as Skyping.

YANBU

your DH says you should go, you have the money there, your circumstances are obviously 'ok-ish' to allow it so go for it if it's something you really want to do!

I personally wouldn't but then I dislike my sisters, and have a list as long as my arm with what our rainy day fund needs spending on!

Whoever said it's unfair on the kids for not taking them away next year, there's no saying what would've happened between now and then where the money could've been gone anyway, AND the cost of a ticket for one to and from Aus is hardly enough for a holiday for 5 these days...ad I doubt anyone would ever nastily say 'sorry kids, we have no money as your mum spent it all going to Aus last year' - how silly!

OP - please please ignore the posters who say that doing this is selfish and that once you have children they have to come first in all things. I want to thump people like that. You're a person too and it's ok to be selfish every now an d then.

Two years ago I posted a question about whether I should sail across the ocean for 5 weeks without my children (then 5 and 3) and it would mean us having no family holiday that year. Wow - some of the responses I got were pretty vitriolic. People even suggested I get reported to social services for being a bad mother.

Well I went. You can read the thread here. It was (and continues) to be a good thing that I did.

My family live in New Zealand, Ireland and South Africa. It is very, very hard to see them. It does hurt. And I completely understand where you're coming from.

My advice would be go. I wouldn't take your 2 year old (mainly because the flight is so long and the jetlag so bad and it's worse when you're trying to get over your jetlag and help a child with theirs - you'll feel as though you're wasting the first week you're there).

Use the time that you're there with your sister to have a brainstorm about how you can change your life so that you can get the money for more frequent visits. I know it often seems like there is no way out of a situation but there always is. Sometimes we just need a break from our everyday life to see it.

(Just to be clear, though I don't think OP should go, I do not think she is being selfish, I feel for her deeply)

I think you should go for it, whether it's you going there or paying for her to come here.

Like a previous poster said, sisters can't be replaced.

I know it sounds a bit reckless but like you say you are never going to be wealthy anyway any time soon, you have 3 kids, one income, if your DH lost his job you'd kind of be in the shit anyway with you unwell etc, and to be honest, if you were in that situation suddenly, having savings doesn't necessarily do you any favours anyway - I know that sounds awful but the welfare state would see you back on your feet and your savings would get taken into account before that kicked in anyway, and yes, I know that's sort of how it should be but like you say at what point do you put yourself first?

What I am saying is that rightly or wrongly, your children would be fine if your DH lost his job, as the welfare state would see them right, so even if its not the most noble correct thing to do its not like you are gambling your children's future.

I have a similar issue going on in that I want to see my Brother's baby who is due to be born any day now. He lives in Perth, (Oz) and I live here in the UK. It was me who left, I've been here 13 years now but I really want to see that baby. Okay so admittedly with us its not money that stopping us, but I want to go without my children because it would be unfair to decend on them with my 2, plus my 2 are in preschool etc so actually what I want to do is zip over there, spend a week in my home town in Melbourne then go to Perth for 3 days on the "way back" to see the baby. I want to see the baby when its still a baby, and my brother and his partner when they are new parents. But we are reluctant to do the big massive family holiday over there with the 2 kids and my husband etc (which costs about £5k once you've done flights, car seat hire, car hire etc because we'd need a car if we have both kids etc etc) - but its not so much cost its that we don't want to do that massive holiday right now, I'd rather wait a year till my youngest is at least 3 and my son 5 and it would be a lot easier.

Anyway, I digress. My issue is my husband. I wouldn't blink about leaving the kids with my husband, they would love a week with him - (it would be a week plus 2 weekends, essentially) - they are happy as long as they are with one of us. But I feel bad for him having to use a week's worth of annual leave (or perhaps 6/7 days if he picks me up from the airport though I could do it over Easter I guess). But he reckons I should anyway - he said if he really doesn't want to use a weeks worth of leave we could just get a nanny to do the school runs for a week and he could do a mixture of working from home and maybe half days annual leave but actually he doesn't want to do that, he said he may as well go the whole hog and experience a week at home with the kids like I do. But I still feel a bit bad!

But then I think of 24 hours on a plane with several good books and magazines, oh, and duty free shopping , the deliciousness of sinking into bed with jetlag and being able to sleep till I wake without having to manage the children's jetlag, being able to come and go from my parents house in my home town as I please and- have coffee with ex boyfriends-- no only kidding that's not it honest, but seriously I just think, wow, having been at home for the last 4 years with kids it would be great to have a bit of fun and freedom and catch up with my family as just me, not Tatty + rowdy kids, if you see what I mean?

Its only money, and we are not talking stupid amounts. Do you have any debts? (i.e loans or credit cards)? If you are debt free, I think you should do it. If you are genuinely debt free apart from small car loan or mortgage (I think you said you rented) then I think you should spend your savings on seeing her somehow and worry about the rest later, because if you are debt free and have no mortgage or house to lose, and your DH is in work and whilst no job is ever 100% safe its probably fine and if its not we don't live in a non-welfare state, sod it, just go for it. Rightly or wrongly, that's what I reckon you should do.

So I'm going to do it! Sod it!

I'd go too
My mum went to israel on a pilgrimage when I was sitting my a levels
I didnt mind

oh for god's sake, go! Maybe it's selfish, but go anyway. Your DH's opinion is the only one that matters.

joshandjamie well done. WELL DONE!

I'm off to go surfing in Brazil for two weeks in a couple of weeks time. A 40th birthday present to myself

Joshandjamie - what a selfish person, you should have stayed single!

As for the sister, why did she go there? She doesn't seem any better off, why not move back? SHE buggered off, SHE should be the one coming back to see you OR at least funding all or some of your trip for ALL the family.

Thank goodness I'm not married to someone that needs to f'find themself' or have a need to 'prove something' to themself, I married a bit later when we had both done things, now we do things together because we chose to get married. I do feel for partners who have to put up with these type of people who think they have something to prove, I wonder if all these people are short as well! Not an abusive comment, just a thought

damn, coffee all over the keyboard. You are FUNNY manathome!!

Manathome, that's hilarious!

I mean, I assume you're joking, no one could possibly be that clueless in real life.