... not to want to be H's and PIL's cash cow?

[TheGlorifiedSecretary]

NC as this one will out me to anyone who knows me.

PIL are coming over for two weeks. They live overseas, in a less than affluent place, and have never left the country before. Yes, it's a big thing for them and yes, they're all terribly excited. Unfortunately, so is H.

So far he has ...

• Delayed booking their flights until the prices skyrocketed. The combined price of their flights is now at a third of my monthly salary.

• Allowed his mother to invite her youngest son along on the trip - on our (i.e. my) expense.

• Insisted his parents cannot sleep on a camping mattress and made the ludicrous suggestion of buying a brand new double mattress just for them. Decided to put PIL up in our bedroom instead when I vetoed this.

• Decided that since they're coming to Europe he'll take them to Paris for a weekend - 4* hotel and all.

• Picked a gazillion fancy restaurants to take his family to for various dinners. He took me to the kebab shop for my birthday FFS!

• Promised his mum a shopping trip at the local equivalent of Selfridges.

• Promised his brother to take him to a football game

• Promised expensive souvenirs to SIL back home

• ...

Decent is never good enough for his parents. It has to be the finest and most expensive of everything!

All of this would be fine - if it weren't for the fact that I'm the one paying for it. H and I moved to continental Europe last year. I work as an IT consultant and make decent money - H is refusing (by his own admission) to learn the language and is hence an intern at a company where only English is spoken. He earns a pittance and I pay for everything (rent, bills, food, him going out with his friends, ...)

H doesn't see what the big deal is. He is saying that the entire stay for the three of them "only" costs me one month's salary. Yes, one month. That is some 20-odd days of getting up at 6am, dealing with my thoroughly unpleasant client's antics all day and coming home at night ready to drop dead!

We had a huge row about this last night, during which H said that after PIL leave he's finally going to learn the local language and get a proper job. He plans on doing this by attending a three week residential course. Guess who he thinks is paying for this as well?

WIBU to sell H and PIL into slavery in order to recoup some of the money they apparently all think I'm making exclusively for them to spend?

We're in Switzerland - generally speaking much better money than in the UK. But, yes, some people earn a pittance here too. And, yes, we're both in IT - H as an intern web developer, me as a consultant for a huge corporation. Hence the income gap.

Not sure if I've mentioned this upthread but, no, we did not come here due to my career. We moved here because H wanted to move here. He thought he would land a much better paid job. As it turned out, it was me who lucked out.

As for the language courses: He's already been on three German language courses while here and has signed up to another one at the OU. He doesn't attend/do the exercises. I am fluent in German - he won't speak with me, although I've offered. I've tried to bribe him by offering to introduce him to my boss, who seems very interested in his skills (but not without the language) - to no avail. So, no, I really don't want to pay for another course he won't learn anything from.

If he has no job, so no money & no access to your account what has he been living on since you moved?

He has his entire income - which amounts to roughly half the minimum wage for a regular employee. But he doesn't pay any rent, bills, food or transportation costs, so really it's just spending money. It's more than most families have left at the end of the month, to be fair. No need to feel sorry for him at all.

Too late to change anything now - PIL are arriving on Friday. H finally managed to book flights last Saturday, by the way.

Gosh, how did he not book flights earlier? That and the laziness with language classes makes him sound quite unreliable.

Was he operating behind your back because he thought you'd veto everything? Would you have agreed to fund a better managed visit?

Have you got hold or have you cancelled his secret credit cards yet?

Sounds lie he cannot be bothered and is relying on you to freeload off.

Yanbu.

Tell him to scale the whole extravaganza down to his OWN one months salary, as that is what you can afford, and not a penny more.

That, or tell him to move back to his parents and treat them at home.

Would I have agreed to help fund it? Of course. Despite my resentment, I'm not a complete bitch, and I do get that this is important to H.

That having been said: I wish I had managed this project myself. I could have saved on the flights and booked them into a B&B instead, thus avoiding the inevitable clash between their religious sensitivities and my bare legs in a skirt.

I have vetoed Paris and football tonight, by the way (he's obviously not booked those yet, either), and have downgraded shopping to shops we can ordinarily afford for ourselves as well.

His response: Full frontal emotional blackmail cum guilt trip. His parents apparently love me like their own daughter.

Guess what? My parents don't get invited to Paris either!

His parents love you like their own daughter, but can't stand the sight of your legs in a skirt.

Of course they love you, they are grateful to you. It doesn't mean they respect you one little bit though.

It sounds as if you have got a bit of control now. I think all you can do now is try and enjoy it, and mention how much you would like to visit them, whenever you get the funds to go over there.

Well if they live you like a daughter they won't want to burden you with the debt left behind from the trip of a lifetime ow will they?

So the OP earns a decent wage - the in-laws are coming to visit from a developing country - everyone' except her is obviously very excited. I'm not surprised her husband wants to treat them. What a shame that it s being spoilt by talk of who pays and earns what. For many years I have earned a small perentage of my husbands salary but he would never begrudge hospitality to my family who often descend on us from abroad. It's called a partnership - both of us contribute in different ways.

OP, my husband is also from a developing country. He is also in IT. We have contributed about half towards building his parents a new house, have funded a fatherless cousin through university etc, when his parents visit we give them our bedroom etc. However, this has all come from DH's earnings and for all trips etc, they have gone halves. This is point of pride for my IL's more than DH insisting that they do that. I can't imagine them, or my parents, expecting luxury trips when one of us was not earning well (especially if it was not their son/daughter).. Why did your DH want to move to Switzerland if he could not speak the language(s)? Did you learn German over there or did you know it before the move? Did he pay more than his fair share of the bills when he was earning more than in the UK?

His laziness regarding laguage learning is utterly unreasonable, especially given he pushed for the move. To not do well because you try but don't have the aptitude is fine, not to put every feasible effort in is not.

Regarding the parents, he is unreasonable there too. Joint money means joint decisions. Credit which you take without discussion and you can't afford to pay back yourself is by defualt joint money and also requires a joint decision.

More generally, I would step back from excessive support to his family. The longer it carries on for the harder it is to end and it will encourage an expectation which you can't afford to commit to. There will always be something you can do to help them which gets in the way of savings for your rainy days, pensions, house deposits, own children. Emergencies and one off help for things which are definable and finite aredifferent. However long term dependency is draining and corrosive.

How is your husband in other respects? It really seems like he is taking you for a ride!
I am all for pooling resources when married (whoever is the higher earner) but decisions about what to do with these pooled resources should be discussed and agreed upon (beforehand). I am wondering if he has led his parents to believe HE is very successful and wants to show off HIS wealth. I think he is being extremely unfair.
Also, I think it is wrong for you to be expected to cover your legs up when your husband's parents visit. If you were visiting them, then yes, as mark of respect to their religious views in THEIR home...but, no, not in YOUR home!
Your husband sounds lazy and entitled. I am not sure I could stay in such a situation.

Hmm. So all was fine and dandy when he earned more than you; he wanted to move to Switzerland because he felt he was entitled to a great-paying job that would just fall into his lap. It didn't, and he is now in a major, major HUFF. And you are being PUNISHED, OP, because you did get the great-paying job because you had the necessary skills that he would not deign to acquire.

"His response: Full frontal emotional blackmail cum guilt trip"
I would be so very tempted to embarrass him in front of his parents. He wants to impress them with how much he has 'made it', I'd drop into conversation just how much of a sham that was.

Cocklodger. If this carries on you might well be bitter in your twilight years and who could blame you

Buy him a one way flight home.

springtide a partnership does not involve one of the partners not pulling their weight, he really should be trying harder to get a job seeing as it was his idea. Also a "partner" doesn't sneakily apply for credit cards and run up debts. I am in his shoes, newish country, no job (am SAHM) and my DH is generous to a fault with both sides of the family - if we can afford it. Dropping an entire month's wages on a jolly is ludicrous. Nobody needs that much entertaining...

Massive red flag, OP. If he is not at all sorry for running up deceitful secret debts and just can't see that it would have been at the very least, courteous to discuss the five star nature of the things he was planning for his parents, you can bet this will happen again and again in the future.

Added to his not trying to get a job because he CBA and his entitled attitude (i.e. re the move), and I would be thinking very hard about your relationship before you have kids to complicate things.

For heavens sake. A months salary is not that much. I wouldn't begrudge it. Yes, you can be the Voice of Reason to veto the more expensive items but I cannot see how you can begrudge flights and accommodation. Why can't you take pleasure in your family coming to visit you both?

Some nasty, nasty comments on here. I can't believe people have called your DH a cocklodger just because he earns less than you.

"A month's salary is not that much" wow! Does it grow on trees round yours?

I think she is begrudging the fact that he booked flights at the last minute which means that they were at their highest possible price. OP said she wished he left the flights to her where she would have booked them months in advance, so clearly she is not begrudging the flights. I do think it's not unreasonable to give up their bed for aging parents though and sleep on the camp mattress.

If the whole thread was the other way round gender wise you would be saying things like controlling and of course you should have your parents and treat them.

Can't have it both ways -

Joining

If the roles were reversed she would have been flamed.

I wanted to move to a different country so we moved we have no children I've now decided I can't be bothered to learn the language to improve my chances of making a contribution to the household despite already going o. Several courses that dh funded but I've just had a tantrum because dh has asked me to keep with in our means.

I've taken out a few credit cards that he didnt know about and don't have the funds to repay them and I can't be bothered to plan or budget for things to make them affordable my dh already pays for things like my family's homes and bills and he's just asked me to stop being extravagant for there upcoming visit but I want 5 star everything its not fair AIBU?

cocklodger, sorry.

If it's a month's salary, rather than a month's spending money, I can't imagine spending that on anything (apart from my own wedding/honeymoon). YANBU, DH really needs to rein this in.

If I was entertaining visitors, I'd expect a mixture of eating at home and eating out, and would be going to restaurants I might normally go to. If they've no money, I'd be looking for free/cheap activities to do. It should be about quality time, not pretending you're a lottery winner.

Sock - fair point well made - but it wouldn't be phrased like tht I suppose