My sister keeps criticising me for travelling

[whoamitocomplain]

I’m 27, and live alone in a rented flat. I have a decent salary and get by pretty happily on my own.

My sister is 31, and her and her husband have 2 sons under 3. Since the youngest was born, they’ve probably been abroad once a month. A lot of the time, they got out the children. This started when the youngest was about 5 months old.

I was at their house a couple of weeks ago and they asked when I was going to “stop this travelling business” and settle down with a mortgage. I have been abroad once this year and have three more holidays planned.

My sister has now responded to a close friends instagram story I posted with a countdown to my next trip and said it all seems really excessive and I shouldn’t be going away like I am. I pay for it all outright, don’t use delayed payments, pay in three or credit cards etc.

AIBU to snap back and ask why she cares so much when she’s leaving her kids once a month to go abroad? They’re always with my brother in law’s parents when they go, and I’m pretty fed up of the hypocritical criticism from them when they do the same, if not worse!

Not to her, to friends but not people she also knows. I do wonder if she’s realising she’s about to be stuck without childcare. But I couldn’t do it anyway because I’m working. I just think it’s really odd to have kids and then act like you don’t have them

She is envious.

You are living the life she could have had if she hadnt settled down so quickly. So now she leaves her kids once a month to sod off abroad to pretend she is free of responsibilities. As a result she wants you to shackle yourself to a mortgage, so you will have less money to travel. I would imagine that her perfect scenario would include at least one kid to tie you down even further. She can't give her kids back to get your life, so her next best thing is to make sure you at least have the same (or fewer) opportunities to travel, to make herself feel better.

If she mentions it again say "I have no plans to buy just yet" then ask "How was [insert her latest destination] by the way?" She will soon get the message.

Yeah no wonder there's a lot of judgement! Couldn't imagine leaving my DS to go away once a month- different if it's a work necessity- but to actively choose to leave my child behind every month?! No way.

I normal fins saying travel police is here again or food police etc each time the person brings it up does the trip.

It is odd that they go away so much. Aren't the kids a bit disregulated from all the disruption? Surely the bils parents are taking a bit of a toll with them going a way so much, haven't they complained? It can't be great for the kids.

Don't let this go on. It's time to shut that shit down and the best way to do that is make a comment about how often she leaves her kids for long weekends. Put her on her back foot and she'll think twice about coming at you to deflect attention from her parenting or whatever she's got a damn bug in her bonnet about.

She’s obviously jealous that you have the freedom to do longer trips & aren’t tied down with kids. I’d tell her it’s her who’s being excessive by going on holiday once a month when she has children to care for. Leaving your kids to go on holiday once a month is ridiculous

The kids really struggle with it. When they see the BIL’s parents outside of these long weekends, they get really upset because they think their parents are leaving. They’ve called their nan mummy a few times before, and generally don’t do well with their parents leaving. Obviously to them they can’t recognise that mummy and daddy are coming back and it’s so sad

Jealousy is a disease 😄😄, keep on enjoying yourself girl!

Not enough people are willing to tell interfering busybodies to just fuck off in my opinion.

If you really want to get under her skin, compliment her MiL on having such patience and fortitude and energy to take care of 2 little kids for long weekends every single month and you could never keep up.

I just saw your post about her kids. That's pretty sad, poor babies.

Don't ever agree to babysit for her.

Honestly, I think you both need to stop judging each other's choices. And that's all I have to say on the matter.

That's awful! I feel for those poor kids. what is their reason for not taking the kids with them? And, surely they see all this upset happening with their kids and chose to ignore it. Also, why don't bils parents shut it down when it's causing upset to the children?

I would tell your dsis that you’ll stop all the trips when you have the responsibility of dc because they’ll come first.

You should stop judging each other.

@whoamitocomplain are your 4 holidays a year just using up your holiday allowance from work, or are you actually travelling for long periods of time each of the 4 times you’re away?

If just 4 normal holidays, then that’s nothing unusual and you’re clearly settled just not yet with the mortgage.

If not working and still travelling your DS may just be getting worried about you never being able to settle down.

Saying this though, your DSis leaving her children monthly for long weekends away is an odd but tbh once the first goes to school this freedom will stop. It’s a short lived enjoyment.

They don’t want to travel with children (valid)

Your sister is well out of order. It’s amazing how some people feel entitled to criticise like this.

Having said that, please pay regularly into a stock and share ISA, for the long term. Don’t tell her that you do.

What does (valid) mean...confused?

Edit. My bad read the post wrong

That isn’t a valid reason to go without your kids.

If they were going away monthly for work purposes, then leaving them behind would be valid.

It’s not really ‘valid’ to have 2 kids in quick succession, neither of whom have been on this earth for more than 3 years and dump them 12+ times a year just because you want to travel without them. It’s incredibly sad really, whilst holidays look different with kids, they still can be extremely enjoyable.

I think it’s valid because the idea of travelling with kids makes my skin crawl, but that’s why I don’t have them yet😂

But yet you "feel for the kids" so that's a bit of a contrary viewpoint!

It’s not really though is it. It’s totally fair for someone to not like the idea of travelling with children. As long as they remain childfree (which the OP is) if they wish to carry on travelling!