When did your adult kids stop going on holiday with you?

[chocolatesaltyxmaspudballs]

We were talking last night about what we might do for holidays next year when the restrictions are lifted. Background: we are both on second marriages, I have a 17 yo and husband has a 20 yo in second year at uni.

My daughter will be 18 next year and has already said that she wants to go on holiday with her friends. So my thinking was that we would have plenty of time for holidays on our own and I was pretty much thinking that our days holidaying with kids were over.

Then husband pipes up that he has to factor in something with his son. I said won't he want to do something with his friends? Which sparked a bit of a row because he said 'you wouldn't cut your daughter off so quickly like that.' I was a bit because I'm not 'cutting her off', but the fact is I'd expect her to have her own life and not rely on her mum for holidays, except for maybe the odd exception where we might have a girls holiday.

So my question is AIBU for wanting to just go on holiday with my husband without having to accommodate another grown man into the equation?

I could not wait until I was 'allowed' to go on holiday with my mates. Sure, said holiday as a 16/17 year old was camping with my friends in Cornwall, surfing during the day, drinking shit cheap cider in the afternoon and sneaking into pubs while living on bacon sandwiches and crisps. We had very little money but we were 'free'.

I started going away without parents at 17

mine still holiday with us aged 21 & 18. They still go with friends but were horrified that we had thought about going without them
So as long as they want to come with us we will accommodate them

My 21 year old still comes with us but we also have holidays on our own and he has ones with his friends. Love the fact that he still wants to come with us and spend time with us.

Ds 20 would like to be asked but probably wouldn't come unless it was a decent holiday long haul then he would but 2 weeks in Greece no.

Until they were probably mid 20s and/or firmly partnered*, dds would go with us, if a) we were paying!, b) it was anywhere they wanted to go, and c) if they hadn’t arranged to do anything else.
We always enjoyed having them along - they’re good company.
*Though we’ve been known to take a partner along, too.

Now and then when they were students with long holidays, they’d do a ‘friends’ holiday as well as a family one.

We never had a ‘girls’ holiday. TBH I’d never have wanted one.

My parents stopped taking us on foreign holidays once we were secondary school age, we still had some week long UK holidays until aged around 15/16. My parents started taking my sister on holiday again when she was 24 but it was because they wanted to take her son on holiday but she wouldn't allow it unless they took her and paid for her too. I would have thought at 17 and 20 they would prefer to go on holiday with their friends not parent and step parent.

If your daughter had said to you that she wanted to come away with you, would you have said no to her? If not then YABU because you aren’t treating both children the same. If you were planning on telling both your daughter and your husband’s son that neither were welcome next year, then YANBU.

Consider if it had happened the other way round and your daughter had still wanted to come on holiday with you but your husband had said no.

Daughter knows she's not invited away with us next year and ain't bothered. We took SS on a 'final' blow out holiday the summer before he went to uni and I offered to do the same for my daughter and she wasn't bothered.

I just worry that he's gonna be 25/30 and still tagging along because he hasn't built up any independence.

My last holiday abroad with my mum I was 18. My brother was 21.

We had booked to go abroad this year with our older teens(not been abroad for 15yrs) but this pandemic scuppered this plan, both are saying they want to go away with us next year if we go abroad.

Does there have to be an age limit?

Perhaps you could do a shortish ‘family holiday’ that anyone is welcome to, and then plan a ‘couples’ holiday that is very obviously just for you and your husband. Time alone is important, but so is family.

YABU, just because your daughter doesn't want to doesn't mean his son shouldn't be invited.

If it was the other way round I reckon you'd be fine with it.

He might be older but he's still at uni, saying this won't change til he's possibly 30 is faintly ridiculous

If it was made clear that neither child was invited then YANBU. Like I said, possibly trying to book in a shorter family trip might be the way forward for now. That way your husband and his son will get their time together and you can plan a romantic couples holiday with your DH. I’m guessing if you phrase it like that your SS might not be so keen

Watching with interest.

DS is 15. We have some big holidays planned for the next few years - but quite frankly, I love travelling and have some 3 week holidays doing my own travelling - planned for myself when he is away at Uni - or working - in several years time.

Just to be clear, if my husband wants to take his son away, I won't be going. We don't like doing the same things so it just wouldn't work.

I'm 50 and I still go on holiday with my mum and dad. I really wish I didn't have to but we got into a bit of a habit when DD was young and now they expect to get invited. If you find a solution let me know!

We still take my stepsons and girlfriends with us sometimes and they're in their 30s! Sometimes we go just the four of us (the younger kids, 12 and 10). And sometimes my husband has an additional holiday with his older sons as it was something they did before we met and I've always encouraged him to continue it.

Ha! My daughters (in their 30s) and I still have mini holidays together, and a few weeks ago all of us (including partners and baby) had a week's holiday together.

But we also have 'our own' holidays.

Not everyone has friends who want to holiday with them, or the logistics of doing so doesn't work. So I don't think young adult offspring should necessarily be dumped from holidays. But everyone's circumstances are different. We certainly assumed that our kids would come with us (if they wanted to) when they were at Uni. But holidays and travel were always important family times for us.

Once DD got to uni age we did a mix of holidays with her and not, and her doing stuff with her friends. It's not an all or nothing thing.
Clearly holidays with adult kids are only appropriate if everyone wants to do them.

( we had holidays/minibreaks with just the two of us when she was on school ski trip, DofE etc, as I'm sure is commonplace)

My parents took me and my brother to Florida when we were 21 and 19 as a final blow out holiday before we'd finished university and left home properly. They went to Lanzarote two years earlier and took my brother but I decided not to go - I was at university and more interested in travelling with my own friends.

That said, I’ve since taken my mum on a couple of short holidays - we've been to Brussels and to Malaga together. I wouldn't expect her to pay for me these days, though - in fact, I paid for the majority of expense on those trips.

I'm 30 and my dad and stepmum still occasionally take us all on holiday (me, sister, and my older stepsiblings).

This includes partners and grandkids so there's quite a few of us!

Obviously we are incredibly lucky that a)they want to take us and b) they can afford to treat us.

It's not every year though and obviously we don't begrudge them their couples holidays. It has also never stopped us having our own holidays with friends/partners. It's just a lovely way of spending time together.

Anyway, if you would be as quick to refuse your daughter if she did want to come, I can't see a problem with not taking your stepson...

But this has to be your husband's decision too.

From the age of 18-22ish I preferred to go with friends, but rediscovered the fun of holidaying with parents when I was no longer a student and life was expensive Not every year, and not as a freeloader, but I still enjoy holidays with them now in my mid-30s. When I was in my late teens though, it was the lamest thing I could imagine. Absolutely depends on the relationship between parent and child, as well as the potential for alternative holidays for them - not everyone at that age has a bf/gf or big group of friends they can party on a Greek island with, or a couple of friends to go backpacking with.

@chocolatesaltyxmaspudballs

Just to be clear, if my husband wants to take his son away, I won't be going. We don't like doing the same things so it just wouldn't work.

Plan a holiday on your own. I will when I've saved up enough!

I think women grow up quicker than men, hence your daughters independence and if your husband pays for his son's holidays, that may be a reason his son wants to carry on the arrangement.

Actually, if we include trips in which I pay my own way...

Me and dh do long weekends with my inlaws fairy regularly, I've had girly holidays with my mum as an adult, and me and dsis do a short holiday together with our partners most years!

I guess mumsnet would frown at us all for not being independent enough though

We're fifty and have been holidaying with my in-laws since I was dating DH! They go on holidays on their own as well, but rent accommodation in a resort town every year where the whole family stays, including my kids and SIL and her family. That's what I expect to do as our teens grow up.