Staying with ILs is a hell of my own making

[LivinginILspockets]

I’m in a hell of my own making and just need to feel heard, however it may be taken.

I fell in love with a family oriented person from another culture who moved overseas to be with me. He is fab and hasn’t had the easiest time of it both growing up or acclimating to the new country.

The trade of is that half my annual leave is always dedicated to long visits to DH’s country of birth. As a country, it’s fine. I’ve lived there too and have no language barrier and understand the culture well. My complaint is that at his insistence, we stay with the in-laws the whole time. I can’t explain how claustrophobic it is or the weird dynamics that play out.

The in-laws are friendly enough but make no effort to engage with the kids beyond offering them food. They don’t ask them any questions or show an interest in what they’re doing. It’s like the kids are visiting zoo animals to be glanced at occasionally. The cousins and extended family are great but they’re mostly at work/school etc.

Their house is cluttered and dirty, which stresses me out. (Eg there’s food from three days ago still on the stove. I only eat food the moment it’s made and there’s no space in the kitchen for us to make or store our own food. No sooner do I clean the kitchen than it’s trashed again.)

We spend a solid month doing almost nothing except sitting around one or other of the in-laws houses. The town isn’t particularly child friendly and the few trips we’d planned away have been scuppered by some gastro-like illness.

My MIL and FIL barely tolerate each other. They’ve had separate lives since DH was a teen. We took them out to lunch recently and DH tried to carry a convo, but they had nothing to say to each other.

All of the above stresses both of us out, but I try not to say anything because DH made the bigger sacrifice in moving overseas for me. I know it drives him crazy too but after we leave it’s like he gets amnesia for all the annoying bits and we rinse and repeat the following year.

I can hear you thinking that we should stay at a hotel… and I would love to, but DH just would be inexplicably sad to do so. (And staying at a hotel would be as culturally unthinkable as it would be to suggest to an English person that they should just buy a second house for when their in-laws visit at Christmas… like a mind boggling weird idea).

Any dressing downs, sympathy or tales of your own frustrations with in-laws are super welcome (as I buckle up for another 14 hours straight of mainly sitting around at home!!)

I get it.

On those rare occasions that we could afford to go abroad we always had to stay with my dad's family. It wasn't really a holiday for my mum and me.

We had friends in a similar situation. They were a bit better off, so their compromise was a fortnight with the family followed by a fortnight at a resort.

Have you ever thought about not forcing him to do this? Why does he need to spend 6 weeks with your family every year?

I wouldn’t be wasting precious annual leave to spend it living in a shithole and risking D&V every time we travelled there whether it was family or not. You respect your husbands culture therefore they should be respecting your cultural differences and standards. If that means living in a clean hotel, and making sure hygiene standards are good then so be it. I seriously couldn’t get on a plane knowing that the children and I were going to get ill at some point. There needs to be give and take on both sides. Yes he moved to be with you but that was his choice and you’re making the effort to go to his home country. I’d be making sure a clean hotel was booked and there were safe places to eat, life is far to short to be spending lengths of time in places you dread going to.

I genuinely don’t understand why this matters. Your DH and family can chose to be outraged and dismayed if they like. Your DH has chosen to live in another culture so he can’t be that attached to his family’s culture. Why do DH and his family’s feelings matter more than yours, or your children’s?

Hire a car and get out when you want to. Take the kids out on a bus or train or a taxi.
Book a hotel and head off by yourself leaving DH to deal with kids and his parents for a few days.
Declare an emergency and take yourself home?
Dont sit there hoping they'll change, they won't.

From what OP says, DC might, having picked up the group culture. It's OP who has difficulties. Perhaps she should relax a bit. I let my DC ride with their cousin on a motorbike when on holiday in ex's home country. Cars had no seatbelts to make sure they were belted in, either. I had fun. We went to musical evenings, dined with interesting people...saw wonderful places. And in case OP thinks I am laid back, I have mild OCD and was a very careful mother - I didn't worry about unfenced pools though, DC could swim. I did miss a heartbeat when DS stepped off the edge of the underwater ledge in a man-made lake and disappeared, though. Came up again seconds later - he was 12, there was no indication that there was a steep drop. I was hyper-vigilant on beaches and by swimming pools, always hated 'beach' holidays with DC, not fun.

So you stay in a cluttered, dirty, unhygienic place with people who have little/no interest in your kids.

Because they would be upset if you didn't?

Why does that even matter?

They're hardly bothered about having you there are they or they would make an effort!

What a waste of time & money.

I’d be suggesting a nice ten day holiday in March. Some lovely all inclusive/full of activities/somewhere that DH has always had an interest in. Zero mention of the month long trip to Asia, just how lovely it would be to see the pyramids/Rome/Hollywood… then six months later when it comes to booking the flight to Asia you only have two weeks left of AL.

Cut it shorter and split the time between home and a tourist location. A week at home and a week at a tourist resort (with them even).
He can stay another week if he wants to spend time or do odd jobs for them or he can occasionally go solo in term time - much cheaper !

I've definitely reframed my annual week visiting my elderly dad and stepmom (we don't even stay with them anymore) as family duty. But a month of suffering is a really long time! Assume you're a teacher if you're taking a month off.

Reading back I haven't said anything new that you haven't addressed. But really you need to break the mold a little and make some new traditions. It's not like noone from this country ever go on holiday - they probably do it in larger groups.

Sorry but you are making a rod for your own back. You are choosing to put up with this. This is 2026, and you're being a doormat. Your H is riding roughshod over you and you are letting him.

You tell your 'D'H that next that you are all staying in a motel, and that it is NON-NEGOTIABLE. It's a hotel, or YOU DON'T GO, and you won't give children permission to go either. It's a hotel, or he goes over by himself. F'ing MEAN IT! And tell him if he doesn't agree, you will personally tell his MIL how filthy dirty she is. That will have him agreeing in fear you will blow everything up.

So staying in a hotel is “inexplicably weird” due to their culture so you bend to accommodate, even though his cultural norms are completely against YOUR cultural norms? I might’ve worded that strangely but where is your DH compromising here? I get he’s moved to another country etc but visits to family/holidays should always be a mutually compromising decision regardless of which of you moved countries. In other words, can you really spend the next several decades (no idea how old your in-laws are) essentially ‘paying’ the price annually for him having moved countries? Cos I certainly couldn’t live like that. Fair enough, many of us have to travel to visit in-laws and it’s rarely a fun experience but what you’ve described sounds like hell and I don’t agree that you should have to go through it every year with absolutely zero consideration for your comfort & happiness. Hell no.

I honestly don’t know why you would suffer this just because you love your husband. If he loved YOU then he wouldn’t make you. It sounds awful. Grow a spine and speak up for yourself and your kids, stop being such a fucking martyr. It doesn’t mean you love him any less.

I honestly feel your pain. My in-laws used to live abroad (their country and DH's country of origin) and our visits would be the same. Staying with them, doing very little. It doesn't help that MIL is extremely clingy with her kids but especially DH so the mere mention of doing something ourselves would be met with histrionics. It's made me really dislike a place that usually ranks very high among travellers.

Once DD was born I got away with it by saying it was too long a flight to do wit her and why doesn't he go himself and I'll take DD somewhere in Europe with my mum. Worked out great and now his parents live here, a couple of hours from us so it's different. I still tell him to go with them by himself when they visit the home country though. I've absolutely no desire ever to return. I can see you wouldn't want to go down that route and be away from the children for a whole month though! And I'm guessing despite their lack of interest, it would be unthinkable for him to go without the kids now! I don't have advice just understanding as I have defo been there!

If it is as intolerable as you say it is OP, I get the feeling it's your children as they get older who will kick off at the idea of spending a month in this situation. Perhaps your DH will then be forced to see his family under different circumstances. At the moment it seems like you just need to make the most of it & do what you can to make it a better experience.

I absolutely wouldn’t do this to my children. It’s not fair on them and it’s sounds unsafe and unsanitary. I would flat out say no and if your in-laws want to see their son/grandchildren then they can come here.

No I stopped doing this. Otherwise alike you say you spend all your annual leave frankly in a small house of hell

My max is 3 nights.

In an ideal world we split with hotel. Sometimes alone. Sometimes with in laws. We blame it on son so they are happy to stay elsewhere. Ie oh ds would really like to go to this zoo 3hrs away and then experience British beach so we are all going to stay down there for 3 nights. They often join so they get to experience also, and im not trapped in a house bored, with weird schedules and not my standard of food hygiene.

Sometimes also suggest they meet us a week later in say London on our route back to airport after seeing other family in between. Again, use child as excuse, Ds would love to go to this theatre or museum with you, join us 2 nights.

That way it’s something like: 2 nights at in laws on arrival, 3 nights away in hotel with them ( def separate rooms), 2 nights back at theirs. 6 nights we go to visit different side family other side country, 2 nights they meet us back in London before flight home. 2+ week trip, only 4 nights at their own home.

They also come and visit us more now Ds has school, activities, own appointments, and with dh and my work. We just say it’s not possible to do super long trips ( which it isn’t). Again, sign your children up for like a week intensive sport class or something one year so they have to be back.

I think it might help if you (ideally with your DH) could separate out what is culturally appropriate in that country and what are idiosyncrasies of his particular parents. I don’t know of any culture where it’s the done thing for grandparents to ignore their grandchildren and to live in unhygienic conditions. Talk to your DH about it. Did his grandparents ignore him when he was a boy? Do you observe that behaviour in other older people in that country? Do you ever visit the homes of his siblings, aunts, uncles, etc? Are they similarly filthy?
Not wanting to be unkind, but how old are his parents and realistically how many more years might this be an issue?

If this helps Im not from the UK and I would not expect my husband or kids to spend 6 weeks every year in my home country with my family. Thats really excessive if you don’t enjoy it.
seeing them for 2 weeks every year is enough. 4 weeks in home country is huge and 6 weeks every year is honestly bananas in these circumstances.

I don’t understand your massive guilt over him moving to the UK - is that him guilt tripping you subtly or is that entirely your own idea?
you may benefit from some therapy to let this go because it’s not a given, honestly, and as an immigrant I know lots and lots of immigrant/mixed families and you feeling so guilty about him moving away is rather unusual (and spending 6 weeks every year for family visit which is not enjoyable is also
unusual - I know people who go every year for extended periods but that because they all enjoy it).

I think you aren't valuing yourself enough. Your husband was lucky to marry you. While he has made a sacrifice by living in your country, I'm sure it's been of benefit to him too, and more importantly to his children's future.

You are being so careful to not insult his family and his culture, but they don't seem to offer you the same courtesy. A clean house and safe enough for children to be around, aren't exactly demanding requests.

I think you need a very frank talk with your husband, because this is just a waste of your precious holiday weeks.

Oh and also if you cancelled your middle week exploration because you were sick presumably you spent this time with in laws already. So just replace last 2 weeks with them, with a rescheduled exploration trip of cool cities. You really don’t have to spend last 2 weeks with your IL as originally planned.

honestly im concerned about your levels of guilt and you really need to work with it, its not normal

It might all come to an end by the time your kids hit teenage and they refuse to go because they want to spend time with their mates. We spent every summer at my GPs in France, with my father complaining it was the IL show every year. We just thought he was ungracious. Then when I hit 15 it was as if that lovely place in the countryside was just drained of all its beauty, colour and interest. I had no desire to go there whatsoever and because of that, and a few other reasons, the summers in France stopped. A long time to bide it out, I know.

I think you and kids could go bi-annualy, DH every year on his own? And for less time maybe. And insist on days away to visit tourist stuff?

I would absolutely hate it too OP, have you considered shredding your passport into tiny pieces the day before you are meant to go? 😂

I have something quite similar, added to the fact I can’t drive and my ILs live in the middle of nowhere so my option for getting out in my own is walking up and down the road…

i’ve worked quite hard over the years to build up their image of me as someone who needs a lot of alone time, so I will do a lot of reading in the communal area and also a lot of of phone calls to my friends whatever the time zones will allow, and I also now bring hobbies – the perfect time to get into adult colouring or embroidery or whatever floats your boat. And then I am extremely clear with my husband that he needs to mind the children so I can colour or whatever and I can’t be full-time childcare while he sits around and chats to his dad!