Family monopolizing your free time?

jc2406

I rarely post but was looking for advice regarding your family time (you, DH, and child) when you are not working. DH and I come from very big extended families which means a majority of our weekends throughout the year are filled up with birthday/graduation parties/weddings/showers etc. I am going back to work next month FT (Mon-Fri) and I know that I will want to spend any free time I have with my son and DH. My DH currently works the same schedule so our weekends together as a family are going to be more important than ever.

Along the same lines, some of the comments made by inlaws regarding their time with our son are starting to bother me. They currently live an hour and a half away and complain that they only get to see DS once every couple of weeks. When they do visit, they spend the night, and always ask when we are going to visit them. I know they are excited over their first grandchild. However, I am so emotional over going back to work that I honestly don't have much sympathy for anyone complaining about the time they get to spend with my son. In a little over a month my time with him will be minimal at best! My parents live about 10 minutes away from us but they don't get to see him any more often than my inlaws because of their work schedules. The difference with them is that they don't complain about it or try to make us feel bad.

How do you balance all of this? I'm afraid all of our free time will be monopolized and I will never have alone time with my DH and son. I wonder if this is a valid concern or if, once we get into a rhythm, will it not bother me to spend our weekends sharing our time with others i.e. going to birthday parties, visiting grandparents, grandparents spending the night etc.?

kgb1411

You have to tell people that you can't make things sometimes.  Besides being family time, weekends are the time that you get to do laundry, go to the grocery store, clean your home, etc.  Just tell people "I'm sorry, but we are really busy with the new baby and can't make it to the shower/birthday party/etc."  If your family is anything like mine, they will gossip about you, but ehh...it just gives people something to talk about, and they'll forget about it.  They're your family, and they will love you anyway.   

EastCoastBride

Well, first, you need to talk to your DH about this.  If you aren't on the same page, then this will be an even bigger issue.

But ditto the PP too - start saying "no" to stuff.  Sure, people will be upset at first, but thats because they are used to you going to everything.

But even w/ family- all of that stuff isn't mandatory.  You are allowed to put your lives first sometimes. 

And also decide on how often you're willing to have guests.  You dont' have to host overnight guests every month.

duchess0727

It will all balance out at some point but it is tough.  We found that some of it was all talk and many times our parents would end up with weekend plans so even though they claimed they wanted to see the kids, they ended up being busy.  But my advice is when they do come over to see your son, use that time (and free babysitting) to go run your errands - hit Target, the supermarket, etc.  Or if your ILs want to stay over, use that night to have a date night with your hubby.  That way you will be able to really enjoy the time you have with your son and not have to drag him on errands, plus you'll get some well-needed alone time to help your marriage.  Try to make it work in your favor.  It all works out and trust me it's worth making the time for grandparents because my kids loves both sets of grandparents and it makes it so much easier when we need to leave them to go out.

Printergirl

We've had to deal with this a lot this past year and now my new year's 'resolution' is to focus on our family and not worry about what the extended family thinks (while not being rude, just not committing every weekend to them to make them happy and us miserable).

We live 2.5 hours from both families (same town) so we visit them about monthly (more in the summer months) and for the entire weekend when we visit. It is exhausting and we get nothing done at home on those weekends but DS gets lots of grandparent/cousin time. When we aren't visiting we get guilt trips about them not seeing DS however no one makes the effort to come to us. So, obviously it isn't that important for the family to see DS unless we are coming to them. I'm not willing to spend 2 weekends/month traveling on top of work and our life in the town we live in.

MIL has a HUGE extended family/friends group that is always having wedding/baby/shower/bday/something celebration. If we went to everything we'd never be home. So, we are picking the important things (nieces and nephews, siblings come first) and doing those. If the other things fit into a weekend we are in their town we'll go or stop by, if not, we'll send a card. My theory is they miss things that we invite them to ALL.THE.TIME so us missing things once in a while should be accepted.

This summer we had a show down with MIL as DH's cousin's fiance's wedding shower was planned for the busiest weekend of the summer for our hometown. My SIL's and I opted not to go bc of how much was already going on. MIL was p*ssed and made sure we knew it. Since then I've not given two sh+ts about what she thinks. She literally threw a fit bc we didn't go even though we had said for months it was a bad weekend for all of us.

So, get your calender out now, mark the 'must do' things that you want to do and make sure you book some free weekends for just your family. You will be glad you did!

Bella427

If you're the assertive type, just tell them you can't make it.  If your family is full of guilt trippers and you hate confrontation, just tell them the baby is sick.  Super easy excuse. 

Pesky

The easiest excuse in the world?  "I'm so sorry but we already have plans.  Have fun!"  They don't need to know that your plan is to take your LO to the park or go grocery shopping as a family.  As for your ILs, if it's really bothering you, talk to your DH and if you all are on the same page, get him to say something so they lay off, if only for the interim until you all get in a grove.  And maybe make a plan to go and see them in a couple months or something.

shouldbworkin

I don't know, I kind of consider time spent with extended family to be time well spent with my DH and kids, too.  They're there with me, they're interacting with our loved ones with us ... it's enjoyable to me.  I wish I could do it more, but my errands get in the way. 

As for your ILs, tell them to come up more often and let them babysit so you and YH can go out alone a couple times a month.  That is really important too. 

jc2406

Thanks everyone! Some of your suggestions will be really helpful. I'm just getting so bummed out about missing time with my son!