'Am I being unreasonable'/ ranting thread about families

[Hayls]

Will try to be brief but might not work
We live 6 hours (by car) away from all our families. My mum and s-dad and MIL are great in that they come and visit regularly, mostly by plane as EJ do cheap flights to airport an hour away. Other than my sister, who has visited once, NOBODY else has ever come to visit us despite having been here for over 6 years
Dsis (who admittedly always makes an effort when we visit family to come and see us for a couple of days) drove past our house then continued driving for another 4 hours to go away for a weekend. I cornered her and invited her to drop in on the way back on Sat and she said she would if they had time. Fri comes and I get a text saying the hotel was rubbish so they were leaving early and going to Manchester instead but had to be there for a certain time so wouldn't be calling in!!

BIL and SIL are not short of cash in any way and yet have never visited . DH explicitly invited them this summer and they agreed but as of yet have not mentioned it again. They also get huffy if they don't think we make enough effort to see them when we visit parents. Exactly the same situation with my dad- 6 years FFS!!

Other (close) relatives won't visit until their kids are older as it's too far (both older than dd incidentally)

FWIW, we do still see them fairly regularly as WE make the effort to fly or drive up probably on average every 6 weeks or so but then we have a mad rush trying to get round to visit everybody or making plans for them to congregate at our parents to see us there- not relaxing in any way!

This just bigs me. I know we made the decision to move here but it would be nice if more people could make the effort to visit us here... I know some people genuinely can't make it this far, which is fair enough but most of them could and frequently go off other places! I am dreading Christmas because I would love to spend it inour own house with just dh and dd but I know that's not going to happen

OK rant almost over I think. Didn't have the desire effect though as I still feel all worked up!

Hi Hayls, i can understand your point of view we used to rush around trying to please everyone mil and fil were worst offenders despite being retired and us with 2 under 5s in tow we were always expected to visit them - nver the other way round. One thing i would say is if you want christmas in your own house HAVE christmas in your own house and dont dare feel guilty about it please yourself for once.

on one hand i do understand how you feel. but on the other hand, like you say, it was your decision to move there. and while you're making the effort and doing the to ing and fro ing to see everyone they won't for you because they know they'll see you soon enough.

however, my dad and step mother moved abroad, less than 6 hours away but abroad none the less. and it is a huge faff to get there. they are constantly moaning that people don't go to see them but quite honestly it's a day to get there, a day to get back, the don't live near the airport, and their house is in the middle of no where. it isn't an ideal place for them to have bought a house if the want regular visitors. plus, the come over here regularly so there really isn't much incentive to go trekking over to them.

Those are reasonable points, unlike my state of mind atm! Door to door you can get here in just over 3 hours so it's not a huge trek for everybody and I just feel it would be nice if people could make more of an effort to see us in our home and visit dd in her home setting; then we might not feel so obliged to visit them so often! WE bought and renovated a house that we were so proud of and are now on our second renovation and only a handful of people have seen the first and even less the second!

Christmas will be difficult as due to all the politics I know we will have to go but I am going to sow the seeds of change for next year!