Long Distance Parenting - how do you split holidays?
CarolinaLady529
member
I'm a newbie, I've lurked mostly. DH and I are fairly new to being a BF, we've been married for less than a year, so I wanted to get opinions from people who have been there.
DH and BM are in the middle of their custody case, but its been put on hold since he has gotten deployed, so they have no formal custody agreement, we live out of state and she is the CP right now. DH is supposed to be returning a few weeks before Christmas, so before he left we were talking about our holiday plans. My family is from out of state, so we'd have to book plane tickets to visit for the holidays. He is given 4 days off at Christmas, from the 23-27 most likely and doesn't want to take any extra time off in addition to those days. Were expecting a baby, and have been planning on going to visit my family since finding out I was pregnant for Christmas this year. However, BM doesn't want SS to come with us to see my family. I suggested we fly home to see my family then during DH's days off, and then have SS come to our house for a week or so after we get back. DH wasn't in agreement because then he'd be missing SS's birthday, which is on Christmas Eve. Up until this year, we lived in the same city as BM, so seeing SS on his birthday and all other holidays was pretty doable, but now that we live out of state, I tried to point out to DH that its not really that feasible to expect this every single year. First of all, in order to spend his birthday & Christmas with him every year, we'd have to stay at a family member's house, and I'd kind of like to spend it at our own house sometimes. Secondly, I feel like its kind of unfair to expect me to never see my family on Christmas Eve or Christmas. I suggested that until there is a CO in place, that DH and BM figure out how to split the holidays, which I'm assuming is what most people do in these cases, so that they alternate who has SS for his birthday/Christmas one year to the next.
Am I being reasonable? How are holidays usually split when the parents live in separate states (were about 4-5 hours away from BM).
Re: Long Distance Parenting - how do you split holidays?
I think it is a little unfair to not see SS on his birthday/Christmas every year if able. He is your family also. Maybe you can start a tradition of having Christmas with your family a little earlier/later. It might work that you spend Thanksgiving with them and Christmas with DH, SS, and your LO.
This is how my court order reads. We have always lived out of state from each other.
My ex gets every spring break, We split summer vacation (6 weeks each) with him getting dd when school lets out, we alternate Thanksgiving holiday week (even and odd years) and we split Christmas Break with it alternating who gets the first week (even and odd years again). This is pretty standard language for a CO.
My dd's birthday falls around Thanksgiving, so each year one of us has her. Yes it sucks that we don't get to spend every birthday or Christmas morning with her but thats the deal when you divorce.
As far as taking your ss with you to visit you family during Christmas. If it is during your time that is awarded once the CO is in place, then there is nothing the BM can do. However without a CO in place she has to right to say no.
Hope that helps a bit and gives you an idea of what to expect.
I think it is pretty standard to alternate holidays/birthdays. My ex and I have a schedule and alternate odd/even with all the holidays and my dd's birthday. Like the other poster said, on your year then I don't see why you couldn't take your ss with you to visit your family. Sounds like your DH needs to get a CO in place, soon!
GL
We too are military. We alternate Thanksgiving and Christmas. And when it is our holiday, it is up to US to decide where we spend it.
We (when feasable) will go to MY family on the years we do not have SS. On the years we do have SS, it is up to DH to decide where we go.
We alternate holidays as we had already started doing before the most current CO. If it ever becomes an issue we'll fall back on the CO which spells out which holidays BF and BM get each year alternating from one year to the next.
That being said it was the same way when I was growing up and my Mum and Dad lived an hour apart from one another. I think it's pretty standard.
This. I mean, it sucks that he was born on Christmas Eve but it's not like you can give him a new birthday.
My stepdad's family does Christmas on whatever weekend works best for everyone to be at my grandmother's house. This is beacause some of them are in a blended family situation (us) and others have jobs that require them to work on or around Christmas (my uncle is a minister). We have had family Christmas as early as the first weekend in December or as late as the last weekend in December.
What's important is THAT you spend the holidays together, not WHEN you spend the holidays together.
I would be completely willing to go see my family earlier or later - my original intentions were to leave in the evening on Christmas Day and stay for 4 days or so, which worked great when we did it last year because then DH could still spend the whole day and most of the day with SS on his bday and Christmas Day. But like I said, DH doesn't want to take off the extra leave to do that this year - so it really limits us for when we could go see my family since those are the days he's given to take off.
I also understand that BM has the right to not let SS go with us, and I'm not going to argue with her on it.
I appreciate everyone's input! Believe me, I can't wait until we can get a CO in place...this has been such a long ordeal and it sucks that it was all put on hold.
DH was military at the time of divorce so has always been long distance from BM (when he got out she started moving around.) They alternate Christmas and Thanksgiving for the whole school break, and BM has been allowing on Tgiving years to allow SD to miss the 2 days of school so DH gets the whole week. I kinda like this set up because you get the child for the whole holiday, if you want to travel you can, you don't have to worry about returning the child at 2pm on Christmas, or during your thanksgiving meal. I think BM likes it too because she has traveled in the past when living away from her hometown.
Then we get every spring break (this is getting harder as she ages since the kids here are in school) and 6 week summers. So some years DH gets 8 weeks, and some 9.
We are 8 hours away from BM but used to be 12 hrs. Our CO is set up like this: Even numbered years we get spring break, 5 weeks in summer (starting after July 4th), and Christmas break. Odd numbered years we get 8 weeks in summer (includes July 4th) and Thanksgiving. SD1's birthday is in the summer, BM never sees her on her birthday, they celebrate when the girls go home at the end of the summer. SD2's birthday is around Thanksgiving. We celebrate on Thanksgiving weekend on years that we have them for T-day, and if it's a Christmas year we celebrate then.
For holidays where we have SDs, we spend those with DHs family. The holidays that we DONT have SDs, we spend with my family. So this year we have Thanksgiving with my family, Christmas with DHs family and next year it'll be flipped. I know you want to see your family, but honestly I don't see the point in SDs wasting a holiday on my family when they rarely get to see DHs family.