Travelling to London for Christmas - SEN child, pregnant..

[Mamma37868]

My parents want my family to visit for Christmas (we've lived abroad until recently so this will be the first time). It would probably be a day trip, 2h by car, and they live in London.

We have a 6yo with SEN and high needs. We've done the trip many times and it's been fine for 2-3h, but we've never travelled longer than that by car. I'm also going be in 8 months pregnant. 🙈

DH is worried about getting stuck in traffic on the M25 and says it's madness to go too close to Christmas. I want to propose going in mid December, so 7/8 or 14/15, which I know is very early but 21/22 is surely going to be very busy?

Any advice or thoughts please? We'd go first thing in the morning to said avoid as much traffic as possible.

Do whatever works for you. I’d be saying no sorry that is not going to work - for the reasons you’ve mentioned

Get them to come to you

Four hours of travelling while heavily pregnant and with a young child seems fairly hard work. Could you meet in the middle somewhere?

This or maybe an AIrbnb for everyone half way.

Both DH and my parents wouldn't want to spend the money on staying somewhere in the middle - essentially an hour from home. They'd rather just travel that bit further even with heavy traffic.

Parents are also in their mid 70s and don't drive. For public transport they would also have to take the tube across London and then a train, so in total 2-2.5h one way. I don't think they can do it with Christmas crowds and even if I could persuade them to come and visit they wouldn't want to pay for more than a night.

I do feel bad because they used to live abroad and we visited PILs every Christmas. Then when we moved abroad we didn't see anyone for Christmas. Now we're in the same country and much closer but it still feels too far to travel.

We don't have space in our home either - no spare room or bed.