My parents have spent the last 9 years living in the middle of nowhere. It took a 4 hour plane ride and a 4 hour drive to reach them, so my husband (32m) refused to visit. This upset me, partly because I want to see my family more, but also because my parents think it is the child’s duty to come visit their parents, and not the other way around. My husband had a few reasons for not wanting to go – chiefly cost and time of travel, since we initially were not making much money and he has bad back problems. He also didn’t think it was fair for my parents to expect me to visit when they live in such a remote area. He has only gone to visit my parents once in the 6 years we have been together.
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Now, my parents are moving to a tropical island that is a popular vacation destination, and only a 4 hour flight and quick 30 minute ferry-ride away, we make twice what we used to and live very comfortably, and he is in the process of getting his back fixed and will have some significant (though not full) relief by the time my parents want us to visit – and yet, he still refuses to go.
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He promised me all year that we would go, and I was excited to both see my parents and have a relatively cheap island vacation, and he kept stating the whole time that we would go. He only refused when I went to book the tickets. I’m fuming mad, I haven’t even told my parents yet because I am so angry with him. I haven’t spoken to him in days. It genuinely makes me feel sick to my stomach that he would lead me on for 6 months about seeing my own parents!!!! Especially when his parents live a 3 hour drive away and we go multiple times a year! I have gone above and beyond to show him that his family is as important to me as my family because they \*are\* my family, but he treats my family as if they were worthless hillbillies. He never sends them gifts, or reaches out to them without prompting. He doesn’t seem to care at all how much I miss the comfort of my parent’s home. I don’t mind that we don’t see my parents so often, but I think every-other year should be a minimum and once every 6+ years is just depressing, but he doesn’t seem to care at all. He won’t budge and he won’t even talk about it. I am so ashamed of his behavior, I can’t bring myself to tell my parents. They were so excited to show him around the island and had several spots they wanted to take us. How can I make him understand how important this was to me?
46 comments
Go without him.
Why can’t you go without him? I get that’s not your preference, but if he’s being a pill about it and you have the financial and logistic means to do it, then go visit your parents!
Don’t allow him to be the deciding factor as to whether you want to see your family.
Go without him, OP. You’re not joined at the hip.
Obviously he doesn’t care and isn’t going to magically start caring so stop complaining and do something about it. For a start, stop going to visit his family and start booking flights to see yours. Why would you allow someone to dictate when you can see your people? Also, start thinking about an exit plan cause that man does not care and no amount of bitching is going to change that.
He does have a point that they should also occasionally come to visit you. As for this trip, go without him.
Go without him.
Roads and skies work both ways. Both sets of parents can come visit you as well. You need to book your trip as often as you’d like if your husband isn’t on board.
I know they have certain cultural expectations but your parents could and would have visited you if they genuinely wanted to see you, culture notwithstanding. And your husband is willing to not have a cheap tropical holiday to avoid them. There’s far more going on here than you’ve told us.
That said though, if you want to visit your parents, then visit them.
First and foremost, you need to decide whether he is this transparently careless towards you and your feelings in every facet of your relationship and take it from there.
If he isn’t, read on.
Secondly, some people have issues with their in-laws, and many are no contact for valid reasons even if their spouse remains in contact. It sucks, but it works. What has the relationship been like between your husband and your parents ? If there have been issues, it’s reasonable your spouse doesn’t want to travel with a bad back for many hours to see people he doesn’t like/who don’t like him. No matter how supportive a spouse might be, sometimes you have to choose your happiness and comfort over pleasing your spouse. Clearly the one visit he had he felt was enough. So what happened there ?
Thirdly, *why* haven’t your parents made *any* effort to see you both ? This feels important. Are they very old or very ill ? Or do they simply not bother to make a trip to see you ? What is the reason why the onus of the effort always lies with you ? Could that be what’s bothering your husband ? Why would he make such an effort – financial and physical – to see people who aren’t prepared to reciprocate, not even once ?
Fourthly, .. at the end of the day, they’re *your* parents. Not his. If you don’t want to make an effort for his family, don’t. But stop using it as a bargaining chip – “I treat yours like my own, you ignore mine!” – unless he’s the one insisting you go all out for them, giving nothing in return to yours.
Go without him. Have loads of fun. Let him visit his parents without you.
Super confused about why him not wanting to visit means that you haven’t visited.
This is easy.
Visit your parents without him, and have an incredible time.
Do not visit his parents again while he’s refusing to visit yours.
Problem solved
You have a ton of problems in this whole post. 1. Your parents chose to live in the middle of nowhere. It takes a 4 hour car ride after a 4 hour plane ride to get there. I would never go visit them either. That is a long exhausting travel day. 2. They believe that travel only works one way. 3. Your husband has back issues and you want him to do this journey to Mecca. Do you know how much pain that will bring. 4. You are holding him to a standard that you set. You don’t have to visit his parents, you can stay home when he goes but you played the game of well if I do this for him, he will reciprocate. Selfish people never reciprocate. That’s just who they are. 5. You can go alone. Your husband doesn’t have to go with you to see your parents. He doesn’t even have to like them.
Op, you’re in the middle of three stubborn people.
Tell him , you’ll go without him. And don’t be afraid to not go with him on trips you find inconvenient.
Tell your parents , this is the last trip you make to them, if they want to see you in the future they need to visit or meet you somewhere.
Can’t you go alone?
“Only a 4 hour flight and quick 30 minute ferry-ride away” yeah, that’s still super far away.
I usually visit my family without my husband. They’re relaxed, easy going people and he…. Isn’t. He doesn’t have fun when he visits them, so I don’t expect him to go.
I’ve been married more than 20 years and I can count the number of times I’ve visited my in laws on one hand. They live in a very distant, very inconvenient area and frankly I just don’t want to waste the vacation time to go. I don’t have anything against them, I just don’t really see the point of going to sit and stare awkwardly at people I hardly know, in a place I really don’t want to be. Much like your husband may feel, I feel like the plane flies both ways and they could have visited us just as easily: if they don’t make it a priority why the hell should I?
I’m fully in support of my husband going whenever he wants to, and bringing the kids with him. I’ve even paid their airfare to do so.
There’s no reason you can’t just go yourself. Marriage isn’t a three-legged race where you have to do EVERYTHING your partner does.
don’t blame him for why you haven’t seen your family. he doesn’t control your finances from what i read . you chose to be with him because that was the easier option. now stop seeing his family and go see yours. simple.
Stop making all the effort and go on a tropical family get away without him
You don’t need your husband’s permission to go see your family. Go without him. If he controls the finances and won’t allow you to purchase tickets then you need to leave.
Not to be captain obvious here….but just go without him?
Go alone. Don’t see his parents, tell them why.
I live an hour from the train station and 5 hours from the closest airport and don’t expect my family to visit me often and they don’t expect me to visit them often. Go visit your family by yourself if you don’t mind the travel time.
Go.
Without.
Him.
He doesn’t like your parents, so he’ll never go.
You’re also a grown-ass woman who doesn’t need permission to visit her parents.
Don’t waste your breath trying to convince him to go. Just go.
My parents moved a thousand miles away from me. My husband and mother had a falling out right before they moved and I think my mom was just overwhelmed by moving after living there for 30 odd years. My husband didn’t react to her bc he was a very laid back guy. Anyway every year a friend and I would pack up my 2 daughters and one of her’s and drive down to visit them for a week. My other week vacation was just our immediate family vacation. My husband didn’t want to go and I understood. After my girls started their own families. My one daughter, her infant son and I flew to visit them. My husband never went and I was fine with that. My parents are gone now, but I’m glad they had a relationship with my girls and got to meet their great grandson. Since my husband passed I now live with my youngest daughter, SIL and grandson and my oldest and her 2 don’t live far. Every so often the 3 of them come and stay for a weekend. They all lived with my husband and I when our grandchildren were born and I miss not seeing the 2 kids every day. We’re all very close and I don’t know what I’d do if they lived far away.
INFO: are you incapable of visiting your parents without him??
I certainly would have no desire to visit someone in the middle of nowhere who also has no desire to visit me
What else are your parents shitty about? That nonsense on it’s the child’s job to visit the parent is a red flag. What a preposterous and self absorbed “rule.” So, what’s their deal?
Stop complaining!!!
Stop visiting his parents and gifting them.
Go an visit your parents alone. Buy them gifts and have fun.
On the one hand, even if it’s pretty inconvenient, it’s reasonable to expect your spouse to come with you to visit your parents a bit more often than only once every 6+ years.
But on the other hand:
1. Your husband has at least made the (not insignificant) effort to go see your parents once in 6 years, whereas your parents have made that effort *zero* times. So why are you putting all the blame on your husband, the one that has made at least *some* effort, and putting none on your parents who are making none? That seems like a pretty unfair double-standard.
2. Is there some reason you can’t go visit them on your own sometimes? Maybe its not ideal, considering the travel is pretty extensive to do solo, but it’s still doable. So why not? Why again is husband catching 100% of the blame again?
This may be harsh, but is it perhaps easier to be mad at and blame it all on your husband, rather than confront the idea that your parents refuse to make any effort to come see you?
I would definitely go without him.
But I’d hesitate before ascribing assholeish motives to him. A 4-hour flight followed by a 4-hour drive *does* sound long to me – and that’s not all of it, unless you live right by the airport. By the time you factor into it all the tedious getting to and through the airport, hiring a car and all that, by the time you arrive it’s been the best part of a waking day travelling, and I can imagine that’s hell on a bad back too.
The flight and a 30-minute boat trip doesn’t sound as bad (although there are still logistics that make the full trip length way longer than 4.5 hours), but … is he as confident as you are that his back problems will be sorted by then? Living in pain easily makes people grouchy, and perhaps he fears he will commit to this trip and then find himself suffering after all.
Also, someone’s relatives are not them. My mum hasn’t gotten along with either my ex-husband or my current boyfriend. I thank my lucky stars that my bf doesn’t equate me with my mum and still loves me even though my mum is a bit nuts. It’s best for all of us if I keep them apart, but I’m so glad we don’t let that drive a wedge between us.
Just adding my two cents in here. My wife and I drive 10 hours once a year to visit my family, while her mom lives with us. If she was to ever tell me that she was not going to drive the 10 hours anymore to visit my family I would say that’s fine I will be back in a few weeks an go alone.
Why can’t you go on your own?
Your parents “expect” their kids to visit why? Is it because of all they’ve done for you?
Maybe your husband doesn’t like them. If their expectation I stated above is really true, it could be the seed of his dislike.
I had a parent who expected that, and he was a Narcissist and everything was about him. Perhaps your parents move far away from their kids to get you to go farther for them, and the tropical island is a hook.
Just another take.
Go without him.
And sorry but 4 hours in a plane with a bad back that has just been fixed (guessing surgery) is an eternity in hell, so I wouldn’t want to go either.
You know there’s a pretty simple solution, go without him. He probably thinks you won’t do it. Prove him wrong and just go. Tell him fine you don’t want to go well it’s not going to stop me I’m going anyway. Okay I’m booking this date to this date I’ll be gone a week I’ll see you when I get back. Now he’ll either hem and haw and go oh I didn’t realize you were serious, or I didn’t realize it was that important to you okay I’ll go with you. My husband doesn’t like to travel he likes to stay in state or not go more than 4 to 5 hours from our house. He won’t go up to visit my family and they’re only 4 hours away. Do I never see my family? No, I go without him. At first he hated it but he’s come to terms with it and knows I’m going to do what I want. I’m fine with him not going I actually have a pretty good time and it gives us a little break from each other. I think every relationship needs that now and then. But I do not let his unwillingness to go anywhere to stop me from going. Heck I went to California couple years ago, the next year I went on a cruise. All things he didn’t want to do so I left him at home. He has since said he wants to go on a cruise but of course now he’s back pedaling on that. He wants to go out of a certain Port which unfortunately is closed for the whole next year. So I have to wait till 2025 but I’ll be dragging him even though we’re going to have to go on Carnival which I really didn’t want to do cuz they’re the only ones to go out of this port. But I’ll give them a try, if they suck I guess I’ll never do Carnival again. If he refuses again then I’ll go without him and I’ll go with one of my kids.
I do disagree with your parents attitude though that your kids are obligated to visit you. No they’re not, their kids are dealing with all sorts of stuff like trying to make money and pay off their house or make their rent and most parents at this point already have their home paid off and don’t have a ton of bills and they certainly aren’t raising any children, or at least they shouldn’t be. My parents weren’t super close, 4 hours away, but I would visit them and they would visit us. It’s a two-way street. I get when they’re on this island they probably won’t ever want to leave it but while they were living where they were living yeah they should have a little better attitude and put some effort into visiting people instead of saying you have to come to me you’re the child you’re obligated to visit your parents. No you’re not. And if you have young children it is so much harder to travel that’s when parents need to get off their little butts and come to you cuz it’s a heck of a lot easier for the two of them to travel then you travel with your kids all the crappy need to take with you if you end up taking stuff with you that you usually use and just trying to keep the kids happy and having a smooth hopefully good experience when traveling. But that doesn’t always happen.
Start going once a year without him. Stop going with him to visit his parents.
I’m a mother-in-law and a grandmother. We go to visit our kids, because they’re in the busiest time of their lives, with jobs, a home to take care of, two kids who have weekend activities throughout the year. I don’t understand your parents’ refusal to visit you. It’s ridiculous. Especially when they chose to live in such an far away place.
When he visits his family, make him take the kids (if you have kids), and enjoy a staycation yourself.
And it’s high time your parents visited you.
why can’t you go without him…?
Why can’t you go without him, I don’t see the issue here?
I don’t visit my in-laws. Husband goes without me.
Free day with no kids. He gets to see his parents with our kids.
Win. Win.
You can go see your parents when he wants to see his. Problem solved
Leaping into the comments that say go without him.
Why can’t you get on a plane and visit your parents? He doesn’t want to go. Why is that your problem? Go see them yourself, tell him all about it when you get back.
Go by yourself, what are you waiting?
Go without him. I have been married for 22 years he visits his mother without me I visit my family without him. We spend 24/7 around each other. We run a business together. I look forward to my holidays without him.
Where do you live that you can’t go visit your parents by yourself. Does your husband control the money. If you can’t go visit your parents and he doesn’t want to go then under no circumstances are you to visit with his parents. I think this is a bunch of BS if you have your own money book you and the kids a ticket and go visit your parents. What’s he going to do to you if you go visit your parents