To not be grateful for this so-called free holiday offer from MIL?

[ungratefulbint2017]

...because according to dh everyone else in the world would jump at the chance and there is something wrong with me for not wanting it.

MIL has invited us to go to Spain with her next month. We would be staying in a friend's apartment for free and she has offered to pay for our flights. Great - but we are both temping atm, so although having time off is not a problem we will lose a week's pay. I'm with an agency, but dh is with a company who I think may be pissed off with him for taking the week off at relatively short notice so he may lose the role. Then we have two dogs who would need kennelling, so all told that is the best part of £1K before we actually spend any money over there.

It's not free is it? How can he see that as free?? We live pretty much week to week with very little savings (I'm training to be a teacher in Sept, so hoping to be more secure in the future) and we'll end up resorting to credit cards next month if he insists on this.

What really pisses me off as well is that he is talking as if it's her way of doing us a massive favour but it isn't - she needs us, or him at least to go with her. She was originally going with her partner and sil, who has mobility issues due to a degenerative condition. Mil's partner is a recovering alcoholic and has sadly fallen off the wagon over the past few weeks. She can't cope with sil on her own so needs help. I do get that, but I resent the fact that we are being expected to end up massively out of pocket and to feel grateful into the bargain!

I kind of feel if she had been straight and asked dh to go with her and maybe even covered his loss of earnings that would be ok, but for some reason she is insisting I go too. We have argued over it all weekend and now I have just checked my phone to find a fucking message from her about how nice it will be, how maybe I hadn't understood it's 'her treat' etc etc. They've obviously been talking behind my back as she referred to some of the points I'd raised with him. She's booking the flights today . I feel railroaded, and for the first time by her. This is fucking typical of his attitude to money as well.

I'm fuming and dreading going home as I can't stand going through it all with him again. AIBU to refuse to go?

LEAVE THE BASTARD

Brighteyes - you had a thread about that, didn't you? Your MIL is a bitch for booking longer, can you not just bugger off yourself and leave her to it? Sorry that's happened to you :(

brighteyes I agree you should fuck off and leave MIL to it.

Brighteyes

I agree with Thumb, that would be my cue to take off somewhere on my own with my library on my Kindle and go for long, peaceful walks on a beach somewhere. I remember Hartland Point in Devon as being a great place for that.

Yes I did. I am sorely tempted. As we are both having restructures at the moment so I/we can't afford to book any time away. I have cancelled my Annual Leave, but I may have to work extra hours 😜 Get my hair done and several other appointments to attend and friends to see nights out but I haven't decided what they are yet etc 😜
My DH did back me up and told her she couldn't come until x day which she agreed to. But then booked her train ticket for 10 days instead of 4.

Sounds like your marriage is not a partnership of equals. Your dh sounds manipulative, wants control, does as he pleases without any reference to you, has an ally to back him up, picks his mother's side over yours and uses her as an ideal you can't/don't want to live up to in order to make you feel a failure.

That's no way to live long term, OP.

Cut out your DH, message MIL: " It's great that you're taking DH on the holiday he so much deserves, but I will have to stay at home because someone has to look after the dogs and It's too short notice for me to arrange time off from work or get the dogs in kennels. I'm sure you'll have a great time in sunny Spain."

PS your DH is not behaving like a normal adult and your MIL sounds frankly bonkers.

It's not free is it? How can he see that as free?

Of course it's free. Your flight and accommodation are paid for therefore the holiday is free. Of course there will be other associated expenses such as loss of earnings and dog kennels but they would be an extra expense no matter what the holiday cost.

He values his mum and sister more than you. I'm sorry.

There's always one who hasn't bothered to read the thread and wades in with some now irrelevant codswallop.

And i don't mean you miles.

Of course it's free. Your flight and accommodation are paid for therefore the holiday is free. Of course there will be other associated expenses such as loss of earnings and dog kennels but they would be an extra expense no matter what the holiday cost.

But they weren't going to have a holiday because of the associated costs!! So why should the OP be forced into spending money they don't have for a holiday she doesn't want?!

It's not free if you haven't plannned or budgeted for it because you couldn't in fact afford to go away to start with.

How are you Op?

Of course it's free. Your flight and accommodation are paid for therefore the holiday is free. Of course there will be other associated expenses such as loss of earnings and dog kennels but they would be an extra expense no matter what the holiday cost.

Its like my MIL deciding I need a new sofa that requires my windows being removed and trying to argue that its ok because its free and we'd have to buy a new one at some point and who needs windows anyway

It still IS a free holiday, even if there are other expenses that come with it.

If you win a free meal in a restaurant and you have to pay for a babysitter, it doesn't be any less of a free meal.

If you win a free meal in a restaurant and you have to pay for a babysitter, it doesn't be any less of a free meal.

If you win a free meal you are normally allowed to refuse to take it and the next person will be offered it. The competition runners or the restaurant don't tend to guilt trip you into attending at your expense.

Just as OP is "allowed" to refuse to go on this holiday. She isn't going to be taken along in a suitcase

The money is the issue. She thinks she can buy you. In fact she thinks she has bought you. The deposit was you handing over your life to her. She owns you.
Can you live with this? I couldn't.

Ah, so guilt tripping and coercive behaviour is ok as long as it doesn't get physical. Good to know nabobs

We are going on a similar kind of "free" holiday with PILS. Involves us paying a shed load of money for flights, car hire, accomodation etc etc plus has messed up our normal family holday because of dates chosen/ work committment impasse.

It has caused many arguments between me and DP.I have had to resist temptation to have a forthright phone call with PILS because DH is unable to .

I feel your pain and can only sympathise with you.

Ah, so guilt tripping and coercive behaviour is ok as long as it doesn't get physical. Good to know nabobs

Yes, cos thats what I said

The entire point of the thread nabobs is that the OP has said no and is not being listened to. Your answer is she's not going to be taken along in a suitcase.

The amount of people here that are think that a woman who takes a 60k gift to buy a home is automatically a victim of the nasty woman who gave it to her are quite deluded.

Leave the lunatic husband, sell the house, give back the money you never should have accepted in the first place and THEN you can criticise.

OP's problem is with her husband, but you're all blaming his mother whose main crime seems to be giving money away.

Well done for saying no, OP.

He sounds like a cocklodger in the making, gradually reducing his working hours.

Hold strong

The entire point of the thread nabobs is that the OP has said no and is not being listened to. Your answer is she's not going to be taken along in a suitcase

The entire point is that if she has said no then she won't be going. So she needs to stop complaining about being "forced to go". She can't be forced to go, can she?