To want to go to a festival with friends for a week?

[TwixLeStrange]

Me and my DH have been married for 13 years, together for 16 years. We have two DD together, aged 7 and 11. Every 2 years, a group of university friends meet at a week long music festival. 7 years ago, I decided I'd like to go. We only had 1 DD at the time and she was 2 years old. Me and DH discussed it, he agreed it was fine for me to go and he'd get his Mum to help with DD. I booked the ticket but then he changed his mind. We had a big row about it, I eventually decided it wasn't worth it. I sold the ticket but said I would go in 7 years time.

7 years later it was cancelled anyway (COVID). Last year my time finally came. Again he wasn't happy but I went and had an amazing time. He looked after our kids and because his Mum lives with us now (not as bad as it sounds, as we get on well together), she helped out.

The festival is normally every 2 years but as it was cancelled during lockdown, they're doing it again this year and I'd like to go again. Again, his Mum will help looking after the children. He doesn't want me to go. He thinks it's bad for the family and traumatising for the children. They missed me last time and I missed them but we all got over it and I came home refreshed and happy. I don't see what the big deal is.

He said it was so challenging looking after them last time (the festival is during the school summer holidays) that he's going to take the week off work and take them somewhere nice. I thought that was a great idea. But then he said he doesn't want to come on our family holiday and we may as well have separate family holidays. I accused him of emotionally blackmailing me. Last year we still went on a family holiday. I've already booked accommodation for this years and told the kids about it, they're looking forward to it.

I conceded and said I wouldn't go. But then thought about it some more over the weekend and got more and more angry about the emotional blackmail and so changed my mind. I said, fine, he can stay away from the family holiday if he likes, I'll still take the kids and hope that he changes his mind about coming. I've offered to reciprocate and he can go away somewhere nice with his friends for a week but he doesn't want to. Equally, he doesn't want to come to the festival as he doesn't like camping or festivals.

Now he's saying he wants a divorce. He says we fundamentally want different things from a marriage. He thinks I want to 'carry on having a single life' while he wants to focus 100% on the kids. He doesn't want to be 'left to do everything alone at home' for 'weeks at a time' while I go off and do what I want. I asked him at what point he will think it's ok to go away without them for a week. He replied when they're at University, which I think is unrealistic. For context, I'm not some wild party girl who is always out. I'm not really a drinker. I'm a health nut who is always at the gym and prefers early nights and cultural events. The festival is a hippy, trance one with lots of yoga, talks on spirituality vegan food etc... I go out about once a month to meet a friend/friends for dinner/go to the theatre/art galleries etc... Last year's festival was the first time I'd been away from the kids in 10 years. I take the kids to my Mum's house one weekend a month and also for 1 week per year and he doesn't come with us so he gets lots of alone time to relax. But he's said he doesn't ask for this and he's right.

My issue isn't really about the festival. Of course my marriage is more important than a festival and if it was just this, I would skip it for this year. But I feel if I give in to this, I'll never be able to go on any of the other things I want to do in the future. Me and DH are very different and have different interests. But I've never thought that was a problem as long as we didn't stop each other from being who we are as people. I feel like he's trying to make me be someone else. AIBU?

If you do get divorced will there’re be financial implications with MIL living with you ie has she put any money into your home?

@toomuchlaundry no, she hasn't put money into our home.

I can see DHs point. You are away from the family a lot and gym etc he wants you to do more together. Is he controlling generally? How does childcare balance?

I would advise couples counselling because I think he has a point even if he is articulating it poorly and the cold reality is that if you dont work it out then there will be a lit if upheaval for the kids and you might well end up on a custody agreement.

I'm normally in the LTB camp but not here, I think heres a genuine problem because you do want different things.

It would seem though that the positive impact of counselling was somewhat superficial, as at the first proper hurdle… he’s talking divorce

Real men , real Dads, really divorced more like. He needs to wake up and see what he has that's good in this marriage . Honestly family's don't all sit found every night holding hands , they are a group of individuals.

@CheersForThatEh Thank you, you've given me something to think about, as has everyone who has kindly taken the time to post here. I think you're right. He wants to spend more time together and this is his poor way of communicating that.

Is he still saying he wants to divorce

or will he say he doesn’t want to divorce if you say you’re not going?

When I read posts I'm often angry on the posters behalf or sometimes astounded by their entitlement/weirdness. This post just makes me 😔.
You both sound like decent people but seem to have fundamentally different needs and ideas of what is reasonable. You say you might meet with friends just once a month. He says you meet every month. Factually they're the same but emotionally feel very different.
When you started a family you probably thought you'd 'covered' things. You agreed that you would both be OK to have a life away from the family as long as it wasn't 'too much'. I dare say you both agreed too that you'd be firm but fair parents, instill boundaries and discipline, but nature personal growth and creativity. We all think we're hitting that sweet middle ground.
I don't actually think he feels threatened as such, certainly not jealous or mistrusful. He just feels hurt that he (we) isn't enough. You in turn feel suffocated.
In my opinion waiting till children are at uni to have independent adult time seems ridiculous. But going away for a whole week again seems a lot if children are upset and hes needing to take a week off work to manage. So far you've managed a compromise but it was more luck than judgement. I can't help feeling that a compromise will always be one holiday/hour/party away for each of
you. There isn't a middle ground.
I think you'll go. I don't think you'll divorce.....yet. He'll hang in there and emotionally detatch, you'll do similar and one day you'll both look at each other and realise theres nothing more to say. Do it now.

Why doesn’t he come to your parents once a month then, instead preferring weekend to himself?

@Dacadactyl I am considering compromising, as you've said. I'm thinking about not attending the festival this year, as long as we agree that I can go to the next one in 2025 and can go every other year if I want to. Then also suggesting that the years in between the festivals, we make a commitment to go and do something shared together, away from the kids. I am also actually leaving the meditation group at the end of this term, nothing to do with him, it's stopping anyway - but he already knew that before.

@Vegrocks Actually, because I accepted his threats re divorce, he backed off and is now saying, I should go, although I can see he is still not happy about it. This is why I'm now thinking of compromising, as he's being more reasonable, I'm feeling more like being reasonable.

@Vegrocks He doesn't come to my parents for several reasons. a) he's very tall and the double bed in their spare room is too short for him meaning he has a bad night and wakes up grumpy b) he doesn't get on well with my Mum (she isn't the world's easiest person to get on with, she's very tactless) and while he's not openly rude to her, he'd prefer to miss out on her company c) he's a fastidiously tidy person. Mum is very, very messy and he finds it a chaotic, stressful environment to be in. So do I but I've learnt to shut my eyes to it for the sake of my sanity!

You sure as heck didn’t say All that on your other thread complaining about him! Instead you mentioned it as evidence that he gets a weekend to himself whereas you only get tiny snippets of time to yourself when the children shower!

In the space of this thread alone, you have completely convinced yourself that it’s all a mountain out of a molehill and Al is well 🤷‍♀️

It wouldn’t work for me. My mum modelled independence in a 65 year marriage and wouldn’t have stood for it, I’m exactly the same. Fortunately my bloke would never dream of behaving like this because I wouldn’t put up with it. I’m not buying the kids being upset at being with two familiar adults for a few days. He’s made that up.

He's shared with me a similar post he did on a men's group (Real Men, Real Dads on Facebook) and the kind of comments he got back. Most of the men were saying things like, "you need to man up and smell the coffee. She's cheating on you, that's why she wants to go to a festival, to get some strange whilst she's off her face."

And he presented these men's findings to you in the hope, that what, you'd crumble and admit that you were indeed going to festivals in the hope of random hook ups? Sheesh.

@Vegrocks I didn't know his reasons for not coming when I wrote the other thread. He'd always been vague before as he was scared of offending me re my Mum. I challenged him on it directly in therapy and he gave those reasons. So now I'm more relaxed about him not coming as I can see his points are valid. I only mentioned it in this thread to give context of how much time he gets to relax.

I think he was just looking for an excuse to divorce. If you give in to this, he will find something else.
I'm sorry OP for you and your children.
The question is... even if he changes his mind about the divorce, how will you feel about him moving forward?

@MurderAtTheBeautyPageant I think he presented it to me to make me see that his fears/point of view is reasonable because "see, loads of other men think the same".

@JackiePlace He's already changed his mind about the divorce! Once he saw I was perfectly willing to go ahead with it, he backed down. Which is actually now making me think about compromising as I've stated above. Also, some of the posts others have commented here are making me think I should cut down on some of the socialising I do and increase the activities we do together as a couple/family. I think that's what this is all about. And if we still love each other, which we do, it's worth working on.

All that says is that there are an awful lot of people who don’t trust their partners. I don’t know why they’re so proud of it.

I don’t think YABU OP but then I wondered how I would feel if my partner was away for a whole week and if I’m being really honest I might struggle. Especially if it was something like a festival, it’s like the textbook fun and carefree activity which is liable to make other people who are not there feel a bit crappy. I think my partner would feel the same way if it was reversed but I realise the norms of our relationship might be different to others.

The thing is once you tie your life to someone else’s you don’t have free reign to do whatever you want: that’s the whole point, right? In an ideal world everyone’s wants and needs would align perfectly and there would never be any cause for argument, and sometimes they do, but we live in the real world of messy fucked-up people who feel bad sometimes for irrational reasons and feel left out or confined etc. I suppose the question is can you reach balance between the extremes of never doing anything you want and doing anything you want irrespective of each other’s feelings? And more importantly, do you both want to try and find that point?

@Biscuitlover456 great post

UPDATE: We've managed to reach a good compromise here that we're both happy about. I'll miss the festival this year but go in 2025. Instead, I'll go with him and the kids to where he was planning to take them while I was away. Turns out the 'somewhere nice' he was planning to take them to was Jamaica!!! And it's festival season that month. We'll go to a daytime festival together while we're there, which he's happy about as there's no camping involved and it's reggae and he loves reggae. The best thing about this is that in 2025, there'll be no arguments about me going to the festival I missed this year as it's been pre-agreed well in advance.

Thank you to everyone who posted. You ladies are the BEST!

Reading your post I think it's highly unlikely you will ever attend this festival whilst married to him. I think your kidding yourself he will stick to the agreement.