To not go to the in laws with DH and kids this summer

[DratThatCat]

I know this is a common AIBU so I apologise but I can't figure out if I'm being unreasonable or not so would appreciate your opinions.

We live about 5 hours away from the in laws so we usually visit them 3 or 4 times a year, for 4/5 nights at a time. We stay with them at their house. They used to visit and stay with us maybe 2 or 3 times a year but has maybe been once a year since covid.

My issue is that I have just got a new job (found out today!) and I'll be looking at a start date of late July/early August. At the time of the interview we hadn't set a date for visiting them over the summer so when they (the interviewers) asked if I had any holidays booked I said no. DH has now asked when we're going to in laws and I said I probably won't be able to go as I'll have just started my new job and I've already said I didn't have any holidays booked. He is pissed off.

In the interest of transparency, I hate going. I don't let this show to DH or the kids, although DH knows I'm not overly enthused. I didn't go for one visit last year due to the same reason, I'd just started a new job. I did go for all subsequent visits and all visits this year, which to be fair has only been one at Easter.

YANBU - You have good reason not to go, it's not the end of the world
YABU - You should go, suck it up buttercup

Compromise, go for the weekend then home early by coach or train?
Or just say you can't ask for the time off that soon

I loved my MIL dearly but no way would I have wanted to stay at her house. It was chaotic and noisy (luckily we lived 10 mins away so could pop in whenever so no need to stay overnight)
Just because you don't want to stay in someone's house doesn't mean you hate them!
OP I think it sounds great, DH and kids go to mil, you stay home and concentrate on your new job and have some 'me' time.

Well quite. Our daughter and DGC visit us without her husband quite often. We get on fine with him, but I'm sure he has better things to do with his time, and it's nice to have her to ourselves sometimes. However if our daughter fails to accompany her DH on visits to his parents, eyebrows are raised and my DD can expect a call from her MIL to see if everything is ok. I've noticed this a lot in families, the womenfolk are expected to embrace their inlaws, remember birthdays, make phonecalls, visit regularly - menfolk not so much.

YANBU

I think DH has a nerve being pissed off at you. I would start a new visiting pattern with the new job and only go on half the visits. He should be perfectly capable of seeing his own family without you!

And absolutely, no visits to you unless he is off.

He's more than capable of going without you!

I can’t get past the fact that you spend 25 nights a year visiting your in-laws. Even if you always visit over a weekend, that’s a massive chunk of your annual leave every year.

Your DH sounds like a petulant child, frankly. He has a laundry list of demands and has a tantrum when he doesn’t get his own way e.g. if you don’t pretend to adore his parents, don’t wear a ring that gives you dermatitis, want a bit of bloody room in bed to sleep etc. How exhausting (and utterly unattractive) to have to manage the emotions of a grown adult.

If I’m trying to imagine being in your shoes and being inclined to be married to a man like this… I think I’d be laying the law down and setting a new status quo. The 5x annual visits would be over for me. DH and the kids could obviously go, but I wouldn’t be dedicating so much of my precious down time on the trips. I’d maybe go once or twice. That said, I’d expect that my children would be available to spend time with me during a decent chunk of my annual leave, and not spending the majority of their school holidays 5 hours away with grandparents. Time with their actual parents should come first.

The days of DH ruling the roost and controlling me under threat of tantrums, guilt tripping and emotional blackmail would be over.

I wouldn’t wear jewellery that brought on a painful skin condition to avoid a grown man having a tantrum. He’d just have to get over that and stop being a selfish twat.

I would buy a bed that allowed me to have a decent night’s sleep. You say you’ve got a bad back? No bloody wonder if you don’t have room to sleep comfortably. Again, he’d have to get over it. I wouldn’t put his “wants” and the threat of him sulking over my actual physical well-being.

It's totally fine to tag team parent now and again and do things independently with the children. Plenty of parents do this over the summer where two parents work. Maybe he finds it too much as well and wants moral support, maybe you just need an open discussion about visiting less.

Either works op but I'd let dh go alone and refresh his relationship with his dp and dc.
Meanwhile you settle into new job and put feet up at home in evenings. It sounds that he's pissed off because your presence at inlaws takes pressure off him, and without you he might actually have to engage.
Most definitely buy that bigger bed.....I have a 6 foot bed to myself

Haven’t RTFT so apologies if this has already been said, but is this your only “holiday” OP? It’s sad you won’t get to spend time together as a family.

Don't see why. All our holidays when I was a child were going "back home" to visit family, most of whom were elderly. Its very common in immigrant families.

Not a chance in hell I’d use all my AL visiting in-laws. Your husband is being incredibly entitled to expect you to do so. You need to put down some rules and tell him how many days of your leave going forward, you’re willing to use to visit his family. And don’t let him emotionally blackmail you into more, they’re his parent and he’s perfectly capable of going alone.

YANBU at all to not want to go. 3-4 night visits 4-5 times a year with people you don't like is way too much and you shouldn't put yourself through it. No reason for you to go every single time and I think once a year should be your maximum.

However you've obviously tried to get out of this visit with a fairly weak excuse rather than just telling your husband you don't want to go, so I see why he's pissed off on that front. It's annoying behaviour. You're going to have to actually tell him you don't want to go at some point because you can't use a new job as an excuse every time.

It also sounds like you don't really like your husband very much generally. You might be justified or not in that but it feels like that might be your actual problem.

YANBU - it's his parents, he can organise a trip and go with the kids but without you.

My in laws live about 4 hours away and I don't like going either. Last year, I made the decision that I would skip going once a year and let my husband go on his own. He doesn't mind going as much as me but doesn't enjoy it either. He says he doesn't blame me skipping a visit! (I am still going 3 times a year but he goes 4 times)

YANBU
4-5 days is a long time. My parents live that far away and we stay 2/3 nights at a time which is enjoyable and doable for my DP. I wouldn't expect him to stay 5 days with my family! I wouldn't want to stay that long and I like them!

Your DH is being extremely unreasonable expecting you to spend 20 days a year (about 7 percent of whole life and what, at least HALF your AL) with his parents.

I'd go once a year max.

He doesn't want to look his is own for 5 days does he?

Perfect excuse, nothing to feel guilty about, it’s given you the out you need and deserve.

DH has some decisions to make. They may be your “family” but they are his parents. If he wants to spend this much time with them he needs to do it alone or with the kids in tow. You decide how much of your time you want to give them.

He needs to make more time for holidays with his immediate family. It isn’t fair to let his parents absorb everyone’s free time as well as his own.

And this one is very important. He need to realise that as his parents get older it will fall to him to look after them, not you.

Up and down the country, women will be taking their kids to visit their parents and the dad will stay behind and work and no one will think anything of it. Buy you try it and you’re met with sulking!

I think it is reasonable for you to want to make a good impression with your new employers. As a compromise could you join your in laws for one weekend?

4-5 times a year is too much. You were within your rights to nip it in the bud back when you were having to play wify woman whilst he was chatting with all the men. If he gets upset that you don't like his parents well you can say "They're not my parents!" So you don't have to put up with them. Rightly or wrongly my partner and I slag off each other's parents all the time.

You deserve more holidays. He's commandeered this for too long.

You have to see in laws for the first few years but then it's within everyone's right to stop the visits after that. But you can't force him to go to yours though.

Having read all of your posts, DH sounds like a big baby if I'm honest.

If you don't want to go, don't go. Nobody can force you - although DH is clearly adept at emotional blackmail.

Personally, it would be my idea of hell and I'd have never started these (near enough) week long trips in the first place.

Not to mention the fact you only get a family holiday every 3-4 years, due to having to go to the in law's so often. Nope. Wouldn't be happening.

You don't want to go, your MIL probably be happier with just her son and kids. The only person here bothered is the man child as you are the organiser in the relationship. Enjoy the new job, have some time to yourself

I like my in-laws, they live about the same distance away as yours ……….. not a chance in hell I would be going to stay with them 4 times a year for 4/5 days! That’s probably half your holiday allowance! We go stay with my in-laws twice a year (just for a weekend) and they come to us twice a year.
Your husband is being very selfish using up both of your holiday allowances going to see his family. If he wants to go that many times a year then he should go alone, or just him and the kids. He should see how unreasonable it is to expect you to do it 4 times a year! And he’s bloody lucky you've agreed to it so many years. If I were you I would sit him down and say “I love your family and it’s nice to go visit them maybe twice a year, but I can’t continue doing it so often.”

"At my last job it took six months from the interview to actually starting"

Wow! Was that civil service?

Don't go and enjoy the 5 days at home when the inevitable new-job-start- exhaustion sets in. Congrats on your new job!

even when one parent is deeply unhappy and uncomfortable? That will become evident to the children as they mature if not already. And that would tarnish it for me as a child, especially if I witnessed my grandma denigrating my mother, and my parents pissy with each other

Bugger that, OP - I wouldn’t be okay with these being our only family holidays either.

It may be that your DH sees your reluctance to go as reluctance to participate in your holidays as a family - but spending all your AL with his family is not the same as getting a proper break together!

Is he supportive of your job? What provision do you have for childcare over the rest of the summer holidays?