Spending Time with Family

MtnLvr109 · October 2013

I'm just curious and want to get a general consensus......How much time do you spend with your family and your in-laws on average per month if you live near one another?

WendyGR · October 2013

we visit my mom and dad for Sunday dinner every other weekend or so. We see his parents (divorced) maybe once a month. visits are a couple of hours.

smbenevides1989 · October 2013

I refuse to see my ILs (long story) but H visits them once a month, if that, just to bring my DD over for a quick visit.

We currently live with my parents (please no bashing - just getting back on our feet after a few financial mishaps). But we are all extremely close, so seeing them all the time is not really an issue. Actually, my H talks and hangs out with my parents better than his own parents, and we still have our privacy and no one buds in our business.

arhayden1 · October 2013

We go over to my parents almost every Sunday for diner with the whole family, there are exceptions to this from time to time. Also see them a day or two other durning the week at my nieces sporting events-many times this is me on my own most of the time unless DD wants to see the nieces. His parents live out of state so not much there unfortunatly

michele215 · October 2013

We see my family once a month and his like every other month. I would like to see family more often, but schedules get full quickly on our end and theirs. My father recently passed unexpectedly and I hope that we can increase our family visits as I wish I spent more time than I had with him.

Spin313 · October 2013

We are about 5-10 minutes from my dad and 15-20 minutes from my mom. I usually see them both once a week...but I am a SAHM so I take my DD to see them, or they watch DD while I volunteer at DS's school.

We are about 30 minutes from DH's parents. We mostly just see them for holidays and birthdays.

SURFERxGIRL · October 2013

We live out of state now but we try to talk on the phone with DH's family every weekend to catch up (his mom will also randomly text me during the week just to say hi and get my opinion on something), and I talk to my mom and kid brother about every other day at least.

When we lived in state we lived about 5 minutes away from our in-laws and 10 minutes away from my mom so we saw eachother pretty often. DH is the most stable male role-model my brother has so my brother would actually come over 2-3 days a week after school and DH would spend time with him (usually helping him with homework, but sometimes just hanging out). Usually on those days my mom and brother would stay for dinner.

Most weekends we spent at least some time at DH's parents' house. Our nieces and nephew live with them so we'd go help out with the kids and just hang out. Sometimes if MIL needed a break or had class and couldn't find a babysitter she'd drop the kids off with me and then after she and I would just sit and have a glass of wine and chat.

We'd see DH's brothers maybe once a week or so, but our schedules usually didn't work out too well. DH's younger brother worked only a block away from our house so depending on his shift time he'd come over and hang out for a bit before going home (conveniently he liked to come over around dinner time, lol)

neverblushed · October 2013

This can be a big issue for recently married couples. My DH and I had to work our way through this with our families at first, but now we've been married for a pretty long time, and things are where we want them. If everyone stays sane, it gets better over time.

My parents live about 10 minutes away; DH's parents live about 30 minutes away. All of our siblings and their spouses live within 90 minutes of us. It could be a very tense/demanding situation, but over the years DH and I have worked hard to set boundaries. Also, my oldest SIL did a good job breaking my ILs in and establishing that they had to share her with her H's family.

It probably averages out to seeing them about once every month or 5 weeks, but that's an average. Weeks at a time might go by without seeing them, and then we'll see on side or the other for a few weekends in a row. We tend to see my family more during the summer. We vacation with them for 2 weeks every year. And we tend to get together with my family "just because" more. My parents stop by to say "hi" more. When my kids were small, they babysat a lot.

We do a lot of stuff with DH's family around holidays, especially Christmas: we all go together to get our trees, BIL/SIL have a party, Christmas Eve is a big bash at our house. They make a big deal out of Mothers/Fathers Day, while my family couldn't care less about those days. Birthdays are big in their family, but a bunch of them are in August and September, so we just do one party.

Let me put it this way: we have a distinct life as a family apart from either of our extended families. We're close to both families, but no one is in our business all the time.

Ilumine · October 2013

There is no "rGeneral Consensus" amount of time, there is only what works for YOU as a couple.

The issue is working together to get to that place with an open mind and heart so you can see where your partner is coming from. AND ensuring that you are making your decisions based on what you genuinely want vs what your family wants/expects.

Spending Time with Family

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