How much vacation time does your husband get each year? If he has enough time, he could do one vacation with you and one with his son.

If he only has a few vacation days (say a week or two)each year, then maybe every other year he can do a trip with his son.

You don't have to vacation with your SS. As long as you are not trying to prevent your husband from vacationing with his son, no one should have a problem with your decision.

I'm in a similar scenario as you...no bio children, SS is 16 but his dad and I got together when he was about 12. He is an okay kid also, but is similarly terribly annoying. It doesn't get better just FYI. He is just as annoying now as he was when he was 12. I honestly can't stand him but I remind myself a lot that it could be worse so I tolerate him. Anyhoo...onto the topic. I'm fully disengaged so we do not vacation with the skid. Vacation is our time away together. If DH wants to take his son on vacation, I encourage them to do so. They usually do something once a year in the summer. We have gone to see DH's family all together a couple of times but I don't consider seeing family a vacation. As far as the in-laws, DH needs to tell mom to back off, and particularly, you should release any guilt right now. My guess is that MIL doesn't have any idea what it's like to be step-parent so she doesn't get to dictate how you feel or what is right for you. Honestly it's none of their business. And you don't need to explain ANYTHING. If MIL brings it up say "Our vacation decisions are between us" and walk away. If she tries to guilt DH, he needs to stand up to her and say "Mom, thanks for your concern but this is really between wife and I". She doesn't get to dictate how you spend your time, what you spend your money or how involved you are with skid. Period.

MIL doesn't get a say in how y'all choose to spend your vacations. They are your once yearly chance to bond as a couple, and that is all the explanation I'd offer her.

If possible, I'd let your DH either do a father son short vacation, or if you ever get a chance just do a quick overnight vacation on a weekend. I do think it's important that your SS has a chance to make memories of doing things/going places with his father, just like it's important for you and your DH to have the same chance as a couple.

As long as MIL isn't trying to force the OP to vacation with the kid (or fund his vacations), I don't think there's anything wrong with her encouraging to figure out a way juggle vacations with the OP and separate ones with his son.

We alternate child-free vacations and family vacations (We have joint 50/50 custody. ugh!). I just live for the child-free vacations!

Hi Asset!

Yeah. I had similar feelings: https://www.steptalk.org/node/228465

For me a holiday with the step child is not a holiday.

Cheers, M

This is a tough one. Our struggles with this issue were from the opposite view. My wife did not want to take vacation unless SS could be with us. I was not entirely against this perspective at least not at first.

Eventually I got tired of having to miss family trips with my family or with friends because SS was on SpermLand visitation. I finally informed my bride that I was done foregoing activities and trips when SS was on visitation and that I expected her to participate with me. If we did something that we though SS would enjoy while he was in SpermLand we could do it again with him at a later time.

That turned out to be a workable strategy. We also just started telling the SpermClan when their visitation could start (primarily this had to do with summer visitation) and we went on vacation then sent SS to SpermLand when we got back. Not exactly compliant to the CO which stipulated that the SpermIdiot would inform us 60days in advance of any visitation he chose to take. We flipped the script on him and told him when his visitation could start. Winter and Spring visitation were more limiting in start times as defined in the CO. Our winter visitaiton alternated between even and odd years. On even years it began the day school let out and ended on Dec 24 when SS had to be returned to us. Usually the SpermClan would refuse that visitation because it was rarely more than a few days in length and the cost of their half of the ticket for only a few days with SS was prohibitive for them. During odd years visitation started on Dec 26th and SS had to be returned to us on the day before school started. We eventually forced the issue and required SS to be home on the Friday before school started. Since the SpermClan is challenged in the ability to read department and obviously never read the CO they never questioned the Friday return policy that we held them to.

For the most part after the first few years under the CO we did what we wanted when we wanted. We just made sure that we did not deny the SpermClan their full visitation time. We took control of the when not of the how long.