Sick friend and boxing day plans . Who is being unreasonable?

[Crayolaslug]

Name change but long term poster.

Who is being unreasonable about this Christmas day argument please.

Me and DH have had a Christmas day argument that we've tried to put behind us but tbh after a heated spat and some crying in the middle of the day has created an atmosphere and I feel Christmas has been pretty ruined.
I can't tell if my POV was unreasonable or his was.
We both strongly disagree and have had to just agree to disagree and not talk about it, with both of us not understanding each others point of view or priorities.

For context we always do Christmas eve with my DHs family which we did yesterday. Boxing day with mine. Last year we had to cancel to my Grandad last minute. He is getting old and not in great health and I fear we don't have many Christmas' left with him. He will be hurt if we cancel last minute again.

Yesterday we heard the news that a long standing friend (more my partner's friend of 20 plus years but also my friend for about 16) had been rushed to hospital. This is a good but not very close friend to either of us anymore but someone we both care about alot none the less. He is an important person to us. We were told he was unresponsive and feared to have had a stroke. We have been very very worried.

We got a call from another friend today to let us know that he was awake, he's had a serious medical emergency that I won't disclose as its not my medical information and this thread could be outing but he isn't going to die, hospital are investigating why this has happened and looking at sending him home.

Friend was visiting family the other side of the country.

DH offers to go fetch him when he is discharged and bring him back home. This will take a day with all the driving. Obviously this is completely fine with me. Of course he should help. .

The argument happened because he then tells me he might be doing this tomorrow Boxing Day. I say "umm no not boxing day it's my family Christmas" I wouldn't be able to go as I can't drive and we would have to late cancel my Grandad yet again. I explained this. I said it was important to me. I said he could go the next day.

He said I have funny priorities. That my reaction was weird and not ok. Got very annoyed with me. I got upset. Argument happened.

Now if this was still a life and death situation with friend I would have said yes go. If friend had been likely to die I would have told him to set off in the middle of our Christmas dinner if needs be. But to me if hospital are looking at discharging, then this is no longer an immediate emergency / not really even an emergency anymore and he is not at risk of dying and so I think it's great to help friend but it can wait until 27th.

His opinion - That I have my priorities all wrong. That friend needing help as he is in hospital top trumps family Christmas because we could just go another time and friend has been sick in hospital and so is far more important then Christmas or seeing family. He implied strongly that he thought I was selfish and that I only think of myself.

My opinion - That this is no longer an emergency. It would be unreasonable to late cancel my Grandad again. That my family Christmas is important to me and it is as important as his family Christmas (that we never have had to late cancel or miss because he would never allow it). Yes help friend but not at the expense of my family Christmas. Helping him can wait until the next day (which still would have messed up our family time plans but still fair enough friend needs help). I don't think it's selfish to think that my elderly Grandad not being let down again is more of a priority then a non emergency with a long standing but not close friend, this isn't his bestie. I feel upset he can't see this and that he has questioned my ethics and thinks I am selfish.

So am I being unreasonable and I am in fact selfish for thinking that it's not ok to cancel my family boxing day so he can drive across the country to help friend or am I being reasonable to have said hold on no not boxing day you could go in the 27th

Whose priorities are off here?

As it turns out friend isn't in danger of dying but hospital are keeping him for a few days so partner isn't driving there anyway but this argument has definitely soured our Christmas day and I am just really sad about that.

Is it me that's being a dick about this? I honestly don't know and would like some opinions as I don't know what to say. I just feel sad about the ruined Christmas day.

I actually think that your DH is very unreasonable here. He offered to help someone when he had plans involving and affecting other people. He wanted to look good in his group of friends but it would be at your expense as your Christmas visit to family would be cancelled. And he is saying to you that you are selfish!
He is not involved closely with this friend anymore, this friend has relatives, this friend didn’t ask him.
He just volunteered because he wanted to be a saint for other people but didn’t cared about your feelings and didn’t want to visit your family.
And the fact that you don’t drive doesn’t matter at all. You could have one car so the same problem. Your family’ve made plans for Christmas and your DH agreed to these plans.

YANBU.

Friend could stay with family if discharged and it seems bizarre that your DH was making plans to go and get him without any detail or even checking in with him.

Seems he likes to make excuses to not go to your grandad’s - what was the reason last year?

I think this is the crux of it too.

Nobody normally organises spending a day driving across the country to give lifts from hospital to home without checking with the actual person/family first to see if it is actually appropriate/needed.

This is how I felt about it yes. Once we found out friend is no longer in ICU and were under the impression hospital were going to discharge him to me that means he is well enough to leave hospital in which case the situation while has no doubt been awful for friend and a big worry for his loved ones and friends, is no longer an emergency, and friend has family to stay with, so there was no reason to rush there on boxing day and the 27th would be fine. Thus I am not letting my Grandad down last minute again and DH can go help his friend.

If friend was dying or it was possible he could die or even if friend was being discharged but was completely stranded then I wouldn't have just said of course go. I mean if friend was dying I would literally have been fine with him leaving in the middle of Christmas dinner. Of course I wouldn't mind that.

But if friend was well enough to be discharged then to me there was no need to let anyone down. Boxing day plans could still go ahead and DH could still go fetch friend.

Argh this has a typo and I've missed the edit window.

Where it says "if friend was dying or it was possible he could die of even if friend was being discharged but was completely stranded then I wouldn't have just said of course go" it should have said ,"but was completely stranded then I WOULD have said of course go".

I mean of course if his friend was drying or it was possible he was going to die. Or he was still in ICU then that is completely different and it would be awful of me to try and stop him - nor would I want to stop him because I also care very much about this friend. I would want DH to go under those circumstances even on actual Christmas day.

But that wasn't the situation as friend is out of ICU and we are discussing collecting him when discharged from hospital. So no longer the same kind of emergency

I would have the utter hump with him for trying to wriggle out of your family Christmas Day. (For the second year running)

His not so close anymore friend has family who love him and can care for him nearby for starters. Your dh has no need to go charging in like some great saviour.

And now, that his heroic Charlie big banana gestures are no longer required, he seems to be sulking and humphing and creating a fuss to spoil your family day anyway.

I wonder how he would have reacted if it was his day on the line?

I find it really weird that your DH and his mates decided among themselves that the friend would want to leave the hospital and immediately travel hours home (to be on his own?)
Assuming he gets along with his family, wouldn't his sudden illness mean he would want to spend some time with them upon leaving hospital and perhaps even extend his stay so they can look after him..?

If her husband can find the money to get petrol to drive halfway across the country, then their financial situation is clearly not so dire that they can’t afford food and heating.

This is an agree to disagree one. I’m firmly in camp DH. Personally I love family Christmas but in this situation, I wouldn’t be able to prioritise it, and if I was forced to, I wouldn’t be able to enjoy it. It’s also quite worrying how many people can’t conceive of wanting to be supportive of a close friend without a performative element. I’m curious if there’s a cultural element to OP and her DH’s disagreement.

Surely your relatives can all pitch in for a taxi there and back.

Or why can't the friend just get a taxi from the hospital to their relatives?

I've taken a taxi from hospital before as my exH didn't drive.

As for your driving, how much are you practicing each week?

Your not being unreasonable the friend is not a priority he should be engaging with your family Xmas. Why can't your so called friend get his family to bring him home or why can't he stay there until he's better and make his way home via public transit. Also I wouldnt be rushing away even if that person was on death bed what would you be able to do realistically ??

Yanbu
I know this is now sorted. However, your dh sounds rather selfish and self absorbed. I would consider having a migraine next year to coincide with his family’s Christmas and see how he reacts. Make sure you save up the taxi money though…

If the friend has had an emergency hospital stay, including a spell in ICU, he is likely to not be up to spending hours being driven across the country.

He'll likely be tired and hungry so may well prefer a few days recuperating with family to care for him and to sleep, rather than returning home alone to fend for himself.

You need to learn to drive. Simple. Also, you should be seeing your grand dad often enough that Boxing Day would not matter. My DH has unexpectedly been in hospital for 6 weeks and the hospital is difficult to get to so where would I have been if I'd never made the effort? Also, I'm wondering if you work? OK the taxi isn't cheap but not having the financial wriggle room for an emergency is not good.

I voted YANBU purely because of the way your H reacted. If he hadn't tried to make out you were selfish, you could have had a calm discussion. I think PP was right that he (and his friends) wanted to leap in and play the hero.

Congratulations on pushing through your driving anxiety and good luck with the test. Once you have passed, don't fall into the trap of letting him drive all the time, or you will find yourself out of practice.

Me too, it's such a weird thing to do. It's not kind or caring deciding for someone else and he'd be better near the hospital and with family. I don't think they even considered he might not be up to a long drive or might need care after being discharged. I thought and a lot of people probably did too that the friend was all alone there because otherwise DH and the other friends actions don't make sense. I don't know if it's wanting to play the hero or get out of Christmas at the ILs.

Your DH is just trying to be a hero, because that is preferable to spending the day being an ordinary person with your family. And there was no logic to the plan he and his friends concocted. Someone who’s been staying near family and got admitted to hospital wouldn’t surely prefer to be discharged back to said family, to recover a bit before making their way home.

Your DH wanted to be a hero, and when you essentially took his superman cape off him, he had a tantrum!

YANBU, but what this episode does show is that you need to book another driving test asap OP, so you can be more independent.

Exactly.
No need for sky high emotions and a massive row involving questioning your fundamental values because your values aren't part of the decision if it isn't based on weighing up one person over another.
He created that clash when it could have been entirely avoided by choosing another day (which would have not affected anyone negatively so was a valid choice).
Your DH was either manufacturing a reason not to go to Grandad, or missing the basic logical point entirely.

There is an awful lot of speculation happening in this thread about my finances and my family. I can't reply to every individual post about it and I don't really feel like to disclosing all the fine details of my personal life but I just want to say that we don't have shared finances at all. His ability to decide to spend petrol money to drive across the country has no barring on my personal ability to conjure up over £100 in taxi fairs at the drop of the hat.

It's possible he would have paid for i me to get a taxi maybe but as I've said quite a few times in this thread we never got to the stage of trying to work out a compromise on the situation because my gut reaction was to say "boxing day is important to me so not boxing day surely it can be on the 27th" and he reacted by questioning my priorities and implied I had bad ethics and then I started crying because he'd got short and shitty with me on Christmas day and then we had a row about priorities.

I made this thread to work out if it was indeed me that had terrible priorities like he implied, or if instead I was being reasonable to ask him to wait. Not really to ask for solutions to the predicament due to it not being relevant anymore as he doesn't need to go.

There is also a lot of speculation about my family asking why they can't come get me or drive me somewhere or drive my Grandad to me or rearrange Christmas. I don't want to go into the ins and outs of my family but my family is pretty dysfunctional and no there is no way anyone would be coming to get me or helping me or driving me anywhere. If it wasn't for my Grandad I would have been far more likely to cancel however my Grandad is old and I know looking forward to seeing me and I late cancelled last year so like in context of having to do that I do not want to late cancel on him again this year.

There is a comment about needing to visit my Grandad more often so boxing day wouldn't matter. That is fair and something I feel bad about often but as I have explained he is very hard to get to on public transport and it takes hours so whilst I do visit I don't visit as much as I would like as it's very hard to fit visiting around work and school pick up and all that. Buses don't run on Sundays. DH offers to drive sometimes. But yes I should visit him more often but I mostly keep in touch with him by phone and visit a few times a year and so I know seeing Grandad on boxing day is important to him and he would be very disappointed if I late cancelled again.

Well said op. He was unreasonable.

You didn't see (and there wasn't one) the need for a conflict of choice = nothing wrong with your values.

He wouldn't release his grip (maybe deliberately or maybe unconsciously) on the idea that boxing day has to be the day for grandad or friend = created artificial conflict of loyalties.

Your argument was impossible because he thought it was an argument about what was more important. You thought (rightly) it was an argument about sensible scheduling choices.

Sounds like he just doesn't like seeing the dysfunctional family and was happy to have a reason to get out of it, knowing it wouldn't happen another day.
YANBU

@Disturbia81 that's my suspicion too.
His position would be reasonable if he was open about that and discussed a work around. Not admirable for a grown man to behave like a teenager and use tactics to try to wriggle out of something. (If that's what he's doing, op might know).

As for all the saviour complex comments. I do think DH wanting to drive to help friend came from a place of caring for his friend and wanting to help. We have been very worried about this friend. I also think he probably got swept up with his other friends in this rescue mission idea because he just wanted to help.

I don't think badly of him for wanting to help. I have no issue with him driving to fetch friend. Just I didn't understand why it was so much if an emergency that it had to mean our boxing plans got canceled when we could do both and not let my Grandad down and he could go drive to friend on the 27th. And his reaction of questioning my priorities as if it was a moral failing of mine to not be like "of course friend top trumps my Christmas" caused the argument as he couldn't see why friend didn't top trump family and i didn't understand why not late canceling my Grandad again didn't top trump helping friend in a no longer emergency situation that could wait until the 27th.

I appreciate that I am dependent on him driving me and he can refuse to drive and go do something else but it also this is an arrangement to drive me and our children so an important family event that he knows i cant get there on public transport. So whilst he can just choose not to ultimately he would be choosing to drop a commitment to his family that he had made at the last minute to do something for someone else.

Thank you for this. This is how I saw the situation. 🙂