AIBU to think our current grandparent visits are fair?

[Pinkmondays]

Trying to keep this as short as possible, is the following - in your opinion - adequate time with family (we have 3 sets of grandparents). There's me, DH and our son.

-Grandparents 1- live 5 mins drive away..we see them on average every other week, sometimes more.
-Grandparents 2: live an hour's drive away, we see them once a month for a full Sunday usually

• Grandparents 3: live a 2 hour flight away. We see them at least every 2-3 months for a week, and the whole summer holidays plus every Christmas.

Is this fair? I'm asking because grandparents 2 make noises about not seeing us enough!

Do your family never come over to visit you?

This. Never at Christmas? Then the other grandparents could see the family at Christmas too.

Agree.

Your responsibility is to build a fulfilling life for you and your children. Not facilitate competive grandparents.

You say grandparents 1 and 2 always expect you to visit them but the irony is that you always go and visit your parents and seem happy with that. Do they ever come here for the summer or Christmas?
You are being unfair.
Could you meet grandparent 2 halfway sometimes at a park of suchlike.

Right now, a ds who is slightly neglectful of his parents works out for OP as the ds is her dh, and it means she can comfortably spend as long as she wants with hers.

A future ds who is slightly neglectful of his parents won't work out as well for OP when the ds is her ds, not her dh, as then she'll be one of the parents who's slightly sidelined.

It's probably better to try to break the chain with her own ds, not just sit back and watch it happen again!

So you see:
Grandparents 1 - 26 times a year
Grandparents 2 - 12 times a year
Grandparents 3 - 5 or 6 times a year.

If you and your DH are happy with so many visited to GP3 (are you teachers??) then it sounds fine.

The more frequent the visits, the shorter you stay. Sounds perfectly sensible.

My parents live 3.5 hours away and my inlaws live 20 mins away. I see my parents 3 or 4 times a year but stay for 3 to 10 days. We see the inlaws every other week for a few hours.

Sounds like a cryptic GCSE maths question!

I think it’s fine and hard to split time exactly even to please everyone. You have your reasons.

Is he 'slightly neglectful' or is he just not as close to his parents as OP is to hers. Why force it just to equal what OP does?

I echo this. As the mum of a boy, I’m keen to model equality with both sides, and hopefully that’ll filter through to him in the future. We have people in different countries also, it is hard, but we do a trip with one, and then plan another trip with the others. Can’t imagine honestly never having a Christmas with one side ever

I think you’re very blessed to have family who are involved and visit regularly.

Your husband sounds a bit pathetic! He “doesn’t want to disappoint one set of his parents by spending Xmas with the other” but instead he probably leaves both sets disappointed because everything revolves around his in laws. I feel so sorry for his parents being ditched EVERY Christmas so you and your parents get everything you want. I think you are being selfish and thoughtless.

Bit odd one set of grandparents get Christmas exclusively every year.

It’s not just the grandparents who miss out, the kids do too. My mum refused to bother much with my dads mum and I really resented the close relationship she had with my cousins whereas she was a slightly unfamiliar but fascinating woman to me. I was never as comfortable with her as they were.

I agree too. I don’t know how old the children are but there is a chance this isn’t going to work when they get a bit older.

You say you don’t see them for most of the year but you go several times a year and you see them more than the other 2 sets so that’s what’s not fair (in their eyes).

Oh god who can be bothered to work out “fair”. See your family when and where you like. Your time and attention is not a jar of sweets to be divided up between small children.

Purely on the maths (since you asked), you are being unfair, as you are clearly spending much longer at your parents than the others, who also miss out on special days etc. I can understand why they might feel somewhat aggrieved.

And maybe it's time to loosen the apron strings? You may miss your parents a lot, but part of growing up is becoming less dependent on them, especially when you have a family of your own. 70 full days a year suggests imo a tad too much dependence.

I think it sounds mostly fair aside from giving grandparents 3 every Christmas. We alternate who we spend Christmas with and anything else would feel unfair to me.

But how do they even know? Do you report back on every visit you make?
Stop discussing everything you do, and preserve a little privacy - it's really important.

Duplicate post

How do they even know? Probably because they leave the country! So aren’t around if they call/ring. Or say “we won’t be around for the next seven weeks/Christmas…etc”

I don't think it sounds "fair" in terms of the GPs getting equal time with you at all. You very much favour GP 3. But I don't think your time with family is about being fair. It's about the relationships you have and what works.

If you, DH and DC enjoy spending time with one set of GPs more than others then you absolutely should spend more time with them. And it sounds like DH maybe finds visiting his parents to be somewhat more obligation and balancing act than uplifting family time.

I mean it's usually women who like visiting family and keeping family ties so to speak, so is it surprising that a daughter visits her parents often?
I used to visit my mum daily, and my brother who also lived 5 min away used to visit perhaps every month for 5 minutes lol.
Now imagine being surprised that he doesn't visit after having kids?
Like, he never used to, so why would he now?
so it's like they're acting like dil are same as actual daughters 😏

It's obvious that you are spending a lot of time with your parents. This is probably why MIL is being upset about it as she will know that.

However, you should be able to spend your time with whoever you want to spend your time with. MIL can always call and invite you round or organise a lunch or something. I do think it's a bit of a shame that they don't get to see you over Christmas at all though. I'm not a massive one for focusing on 25th Dec as being 'Christmas' but I would want to organise a special Christmas get together with the other GPs either before or after Christmas either at yours or theirs.

@SunnyRedSnail you have conveniently looked at times, not number of days. No GPs lived locally to us (similar number of sets of GPs due to divorced in-laws). My parents lived closer, so could visit for the day, so would visit for a Sunday lunch and then come home. In-laws were other side of country so visits involved a stay of a few days, usually at ours (younger GPs) So if you looked at actual length of visits it worked out reasonably fair

You see gp2 12 days total in a year & gp3 for at least 77 days. While 1 day a month isn’t unreasonable, life can b busy, I can see why’d gp2 would be unhappy with that when gp3 are getting much more quality time. You say in your comments that you like gp2 so why is there such a big difference?