To be seriously angry that WE always have to do the visiting?!

[mrsoscarwilde]

I love my family to bits but most of my family live down the country. If I am honest, it is lovely for us to have the best of both worlds, yet it is as if time has frozen still when we go down. I pretend that I don't have another life.

I have had to make the journey down hundreds of times since my kids were babies.

Why do I bother you might ask? It is simply that my children would not have a relationship with their grandparents and cousins if I didn’t make the effort.

I have gotten the ‘we will come up and see you’ promises dished out – even over xmas but never any follow up. I have come to realise that this is a bit like borrowing a book from the library that you never actually read or sharing a Facebook post about homelessness but not actually doing anything remotely socially aware. In your head you feel by promising, you have done something virtuous. But the follow up on a promise is the hard bit.

Ok, we live in a smallish - yet it is a four-bedroom house. Very different to the monstrosities that people tend to build in the country. Yet I have felt that the living arrangements, the facilities are substandard, and this may be the reason why people do not come to visit. I had one family member mention that sleeping arrangements might be an issue when they declared ‘Well? Where shall we sleep?' I had no idea until this point that they had previously grown up in a house the acreage of Downton Abbey! 😊 How ever could one bear the inconvenience?

We live in the capital city. We are lucky to have museums, parks, even the lakes of Wicklow, a short driving distance away. I think it would be lovely for people to make the effort. I understand people have busy lives – we all have! Kids in school all week, and then sports and music lessons, parties and playdates at the weekend. I think it is promising that gets to me. Just be more honest and say you can’t make it.

I guess I feel less than valued in my family. I have been living away and raising kids away from my immediate family and my kids’ cousins. If one of my sisters lived away, I would make it my business to come up and visit. At least once. Even if she lived in a tent.

I have no wish to come across as a victim. I am used to packing bags and heading down. What gets to me is the lack of willingness to share in my life up here.

It is just really pissing me off. I must to be the one to slot in. I have 3 kids and NEWSFLASH! Everyone is busy. I just feel angry about it at this stage.

Anyone relate?

I’m with you. PIL haven’t visited for 12 years, despite regular invitations, yet moan and huff we don’t travel 200 miles to see them. DH and I work f/t, 3 kids, busy busy busy.
Makes me mad.

I have griped about the same subject previously, OP. My family is more scattered than yours but we haven't had a family visitor in the last 5 years For the last couple of years we have stayed home at this time of year instead of paying for hotels to see everyone and it has been lovely tbh.

My DD does miss her family though, as we used to live nearer to a few of them and see them frequently (a few within an hour or so of where we lived). However, the same people have driven past our junction on the motorway and not even called in for a quick coffee so my willingness to continually fork out on hotels to see them has disappeared!

We're not the only ones to move away by any means, just don't seem to get the visits that others do. I think we probably set a trend by going back home frequently in the early days, I regret that now tbh.

I understand what you mean. I now don't bother with my brothers as they only live 40 minutes away and one hasn't met my 3 yr old son. When my son was younger he developed pneumonia and sepsis. Neither one of my brothers came to see him (even though he required surgery and was very close to dying). My dad goes over every week to see one of them because it's the only time he would see his grandson but I don't go over because of past behaviour. It's worse now my adult niece is on fb, her dad met another woman and had a baby recently so she is always sending passive aggressive messages about how I've never even met her sister etc not realizing her dad hasn't see my youngest child once.
It's all very petty but it was all one sided on my part then my son got sick and I switched off to that side of the family. Fuck them.

I'm not suggesting you are being unreasonable, but is it you who moved away? That may make it feel different for them: you returning home v them visiting somewhere unfamiliar

My PIL live 20 minutes away yet they never visit and never have - 3 times in 23 years!

The standard MN answer is you’ve moved away so you suffer.
DHs home town is 5 hours away. We used to go there A LOT. One year I went 11 times.
At a push his parents would come once every 2-3 years. His UK based sibling has been about 3 times in 20 years. All we uSed to hear was ‘it’s much easier for you to come here.’ And we would incur all the travel costs and waste all our annual leave as well as it being exhausting.

I started to put my foot down and visits got rarer as I actually wanted to go away on actual holidays.
BIL is a terrible host and now PIL are gone I am not visiting. They offer us nowhere to stay so it’s as easy for them to come to us and stay in a hotel as it is for them to visit us (easier as they are self employed with grown up children).
DC have activities and plans and School it’s hard to plan these visits in as well. Which no one appreciates when they don’t have to do it.