I (30F) am engaged to my fiancé John (30M). His family spends a lot of time together—holidays, weekends, and frequent get-togethers with all the siblings and grandkids.
John’s dad retired this past May, and we already had a retirement party for him. Now his parents have planned a family vacation in November to celebrate his retirement again. They rented a large house out of state and invited everyone—siblings, spouses, grandkids, etc.—for a full week: Saturday to Saturday.
John and I were clear from the beginning that we probably wouldn’t stay the entire time. I’ve always expressed that Thanksgiving is an important holiday for me to spend with my own family, and John told his parents early on that he wasn’t sure we’d stay the full week because it was a long trip. We decided we’d attend the trip from Saturday through Wednesday, then head home so we could spend Thanksgiving with my family.
Since then, there’s been some subtle pushback. His parents have said things like, “It’s just one Thanksgiving,” or asked if John could stay even if I left. They’ve also said this is the first time the whole family is doing a trip like this in years and it might not happen again.
I understand they’re excited about the trip, and we’re not trying to skip it—we’re planning to be there for five full days. But I don’t think it’s fair to expect every adult to give up a full week of their own time and holiday plans, especially when we made our intentions clear up front.
AITA for not wanting to stay the full week, even if it’s disappointing to his parents?
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I (30F) am engaged to my fiancé John (30M). His family spends a lot of time together—holidays, weekends, and frequent get-togethers with all the siblings and grandkids.
John’s dad retired this past May, and we already had a retirement party for him. Now his parents have planned a family vacation in November to celebrate his retirement again. They rented a large house out of state and invited everyone—siblings, spouses, grandkids, etc.—for a full week: Saturday to Saturday.
John and I were clear from the beginning that we probably wouldn’t stay the entire time. I’ve always expressed that Thanksgiving is an important holiday for me to spend with my own family, and John told his parents early on that he wasn’t sure we’d stay the full week because it was a long trip. We decided we’d attend the trip from Saturday through Wednesday, then head home so we could spend Thanksgiving with my family.
Since then, there’s been some subtle pushback. His parents have said things like, “It’s just one Thanksgiving,” or asked if John could stay even if I left. They’ve also said this is the first time the whole family is doing a trip like this in years and it might not happen again.
I understand they’re excited about the trip, and we’re not trying to skip it—we’re planning to be there for five full days. But I don’t think it’s fair to expect every adult to give up a full week of their own time and holiday plans, especially when we made our intentions clear up front.
AITA for not wanting to stay the full week, even if it’s disappointing to his parents?
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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I refused to stay for a full week family vacation over Thanksgiving with my
In laws and they think it’s rude that I won’t miss Thanksgiving with my family just this once
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Contest mode is 1.5 hours long on this post.
NTA, your in-laws should have checked the schedules of the people they wanted to invite before just assuming people could clear a week for something they weren’t involved in planning if they were going to be so emotionally invested in it. And if it is just one Thanksgiving then isn’t this just one family get together and unlike Thanksgiving they get to schedule those
I am generally a proponent of swapping off holidays between houses each year / instance. But if you’re doing five days with one family, it feels perfectly reasonable to spend one day at the other family. NTA
NTA. If you were to leave the trip mid stay with no prior notice I would consider it disrespectful. But the fact you made it clear they should really just respect your wishes.
NTA
They do not have exclusive rights over your spare time.
You and your fiancé are adults and have every right to choose where to spend holidays.
NTA. You’re showing up for most of the trip, and you let them know way ahead of time. Wanting to spend Thanksgiving with your own family is totally fair. It’s not like you’re bailing last minute, you’re just setting a boundary, and that’s okay. They’ll be fine.
NTA….I hope your husband is backing you up.
John needs to tell mom and dad you are coming from Saturday until Wednesday and then will be leaving. If there is anymore pushback, you will not be attending at all. And if there is any grief when you are there, you will be leaving earlier than Wednesday.
NTA Every host gets to set the parameters for an event and issue invitations. Every invitee gets to decide whether to accept any invitation and for what extent of a multiday event they will participate. If the host insists that every guest must stay for the full length of an extended event, they have to accept that not all invitees want to do that and will decline.
ETA: “Thank you for inviting me, but I have already accepted an invitation to attend Thanksgiving elsewhere. I can understand if you don’t want me to come for only part of this second retirement celebration and appreciate your extending that invitation to me.” Anyone who expects someone to break a commitment already made to attend another special event is an AH.
NTA – You have offered a reasonable compromise between their desire to host their entire family and your desire to spend the actual holiday with your family.
>His parents have said things like, “It’s just one Thanksgiving,”
Just a heads up on this, once you are married you are going to probably have to figure out how to split holidays between your and your husband’s families. Only ever going to one family’s place for a particular holiday can build up resentment in the other. “It’s just one Thanksgiving” can turn into “She can’t even spend one Thanksgiving with us?” after a couple of years. It can even build resentment in your spouse as they may want to sometimes spend that holiday with theirs. My own sister-in-law was like this when she married my brother, and after a few years he got pissed over it and it caused some issues in their relationship (which they have since fixed).
NAH. We calling asshole over subtle pushback now?
NTA but when you get married, it’s not uncommon for couples to alternate holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving with both families. Maybe stay the whole week and next year, spend Thanksgiving with your family only?
NTA. Set the precedent now.
NTA. Y’all will have to get ok with disappointing some member of the family at some point. It’s just inevitable. You will never be able to be everywhere they want you to be at holidays. As long as everyone’s communicating, adults should be able to respect each other’s situations. Unfortunately, though, families get used to having things this or that way and sometimes the change when a new relationship comes into play is hard for them to adjust to. Boundaries are your friend here. Set them, stick to them. Same for your partner. If the fam is generally made up of decent people, they will eventually come to understand the new dynamic.
NTA – their argument is moot becuase you ARE going to be there, for hte ‘rare’ time everyone gets together all in one place for a vacation. The fact you’re not staying 8 days and ‘only’ 5 is insignificant and they shouldn’t be making a huge deal of it, especilly given how much of your time they already get, from the sounds of it. Need your fiance to step up and reiterate the importance of YOUR family as ranking just as highly as HIS family. They can’t expect to monopolize your time.
I promised myself that I was not going to be that mother or mil that guilts kids into spending holidays. I just make it super easy and fun to spend time together. No pressure from this corner.
Info: what do you normally do for holidays? where did you spend thanksgiving and Xmas last year? Is it now your parents ‘turn’?
Why not split the difference, have your fiancé stay with his family and you go to yours?
Info: are you saying in your post that every Thanksgiving needs to spent with your family?
I’ve always been curious about these kind of families. I don’t like mine enough to spend that kind of time with them. Guy at work goes on one of these with his wife’s side of the family and says it’s okay, mostly because the kids entertain themselves, and it’s usually on a beach ha. But couldn’t imagine doing something like that. NTA
NTA. Thanksgiving isn’t just for one family, when both families are important to a husband and wife.
You could ask if they’re asking you to give up Thanksgiving whether they would give up the week of Christmas. You can tell them that you would come and visit on New Year’s.
I don’t think they understand what they are asking.
Sounds like you and your fiancé spend a lot of time with his family and the Thanksgiving trip would give you an opportunity to spend some time with your family?
Your fiancé’s parents need to push themselves back a bit from their children’s lives and let them make decisions about their free time. NTA absolutely
NTA. “frequent get-togethers with all the siblings and grandkids” — you’re spending too much time with them already. That’s feeding their delusion that they’re the center of the universe and of course no one else’s family would ever matter to anyone.
None of this is going to improve if you don’t take a giant step back every time they lose their manners. If they complain about how 5 whole days on top of the massive amount of time you already spend on them just isn’t enough, cancel and don’t go on that trip. Tell them that since the trip is causing them so much stress, you’ll bow out and see them another time. Do the same every time they raise a fuss.
Nta. Thats an insane amount of time to spend with in laws. I like mine but no way I’d want to go on a family trip that long. It’s rude of them to expect to monopolize so much time off. It’s not actually relaxing to spend that much time and you deserve some down time and time with your family too. 5 full days is plenty,
Nta not everyone can take a full seven days off to spend with one side of the family. You’re still going to the vacation house for several days
NTA those parents sound selfish and entitled. They expect everyone to give up their lives for a week with no regard to the plans others may need to execute. You go spend Thanksgiving with your parents and don’t let them come between you and your family’s holiday plans. Set that boundary. Know that this will be your future with your fiancé.
NTA. MIL here! When our daughter (my “stepdaughter “) got married, and our other children moved away, hubs and I started hosting a family Thanksgiving and Christmas the Saturday before! Everyone can come and still meet other obligations! And we end up getting more time without stress! Some of the kiddos still come for the actual day so for us it’s been a win!
What you offer is a compromise. This is the magic word when two families are connected through a marriage/companionship. NTA. This is a template of what should be done always
NTA and do not cave. Your family is equally important. Going for 5 days is already more than enough.
How about doing Thanksgiving with his family on Wednesday or your family on Friday.
My dad used to work a lot on Thanksgiving so we’d do it on Friday. It doesn’t really matter. My kids are older now, and we’ve done our full Christmas on Saturday or Sunday before.
NTA. You told them ahead of time what worked for you. Ask them if they offered an invitation or a summons.
NTA. You were clear about what you were available for. If the comments bother you, please feel free to say “I don’t want to hear any more about this, and I won’t engage with this topic further. We are happy to spend the time we are spending with you all. If what we have to offer is not appreciated we can see about redistributing our time with people who respect our choices.”
I’d just ignore them, stop explaining and do what I want.
ETA judgement NTA
“It’s just one Thanksgiving,”
Then they shouldn’t mind too much, should they? NTA.
Tell them if it’s an issue of you leaving early, they maybe it would be better if you didn’t go at all. That the compromise is staying part of the week. Don’t engage with them. Any reasoning will be met with more pushback. Just say, “No. We will be leaving on Wednesday as we already said. Please don’t continue to ask, or we will reconsider coming at all.”
YTA if you have to spend every Thanksgiving with your family. Do you alternate holidays with your families? NTA for splitting the week. Holidays should be split fairly when you are married.
NTA, you already plan on being there for most of the trip so they really shouldn’t be trying to guilt you about spending three days with your own family.
INFO:
Do your husband and you spend every Thanksgiving with your family?
Get ready for a lifetime of this, LOL. I’ve seen this play out in my family many times with several couples. Some family members (hi mom!) seem to think that holidays REQUIRE the presence of their children, even if those children are adults with partners and have other family to see as well.
You need to stay out of it, 100%. What needs to happen is for you and your fiance to come up with a plan that the both of you are comfortable with for this holiday and ALL holidays, and then stick to it, with HIM informing his family and HIM dealing with the pushback and HIM being firm. You handle YOUR family and he handles HIS family but you stand FIRM on the decisions you made as an independant adult couple.
He is 30 years old. He’s not going to be at every holiday anymore. He’s getting married. That’s what happens. Sometimes you will be there on the actual holiday and sometimes you won’t. He needs to get his family to stop treating him like a child and to recognize that you and him and the family now and he will not be able to attend every event for the whole time, anymore. They are no longer the top priority.
If it’s true that they don’t ever do a full week like this, and he’d really LIKE to go, then you can agree to stay the full week THIS HOLIDAY, but make it clear that you won’t see them at ALL on Chistimas then. You have to make it CLEAR or you will be doing this at EVERY damn holiday. Make a stand NOW, it will make life easier when you when/if you have kids. And again, your partner is the one who has to tell his family. “Separating is not an option as we choose to spend our holidays together as a family, since we are our own famiy now. We were hoping to split holiday weeks between the extended families, to get time with everyone at every holiday. If you insist on us spending all of thanksgiving with you that’s fine, but it means we will spend the ENTIRETY of the christmas holidays with the other family and not see you at all. Is that what you want? Or would you prefer to see us for a shorter time at both holidays?” Your PARTNER needs to explain that there are TWO holidays, that you have TWO families now, and that this is what the future will look like. There will be pushback, passive agressive comments, and subtle manipulation. Stand firm.
NTA
It’s called sharing.
Of course you need to spend time with your family, too.
And you are engaged, so, so does your fiancé
Your fiancé ‘s parents are going through a period of adjustment. Let him handle them. As long as he protects the nest , you are good. If he lets them overstep, then you have a problem.
Nta. I wouldnt go at all. If they cant respect that huge amount of effort you both qre willing to go through, i wouldn’t put in the effort at all you already celebrated his retirement
“Mom, Dad, you’ve gotten our plans, further attempts to alter them with not so subtle pushback won’t be accepted. You can either respect our boundaries or you can expect less and less interactions with us.”
John needs to make things clear to his family., that’s one hundred percent his duty. If he cannot back you up here he’ll never back you up and if that’s the case you should reconsider your marriage.
Just ignore the comments and any whining and do what you plan to do. I find people tend to back off once they realize you don’t care about their whining and fee fees. At least that’s been my experience. Be light and airy and smile while not caring what they think, It’s an art. 🙂 A good mantra is Just because someone is upset doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong. Let them feel their feelings. And when you marry you want to also have some holidays in you and your husband’s home and to not travel anywhere. Establish your own holiday traditions. Everyone will have to get used to it.
NTA. In other comments you previously established Thanksgiving is with your family, and Christmas Eve with his, based on both families preferences on those holidays. Knowing that they booked a 7 day family holiday to celebrate for a second time, FIL’s retirement That is perfectly acceptable. You were upfront about only staying 5 days of the 7 in order to keep your commitment to your family (Thanksgiving). What’s not cool is asking you to skip Thanksgiving (“its only one Thanksgiving) with your family, or suggesting your SO skip it to stay the remaining days. That makes them the AH’s.
It’s selfish and disrespectful to your parents, to you and your relationship (asking their son to let you go without him). They need to get used to sharing and accepting that your family is just as important as theirs. It’s just bizarre that they are behaving this way.