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What should I do about my parents moving closer. (lemmy.ca)

submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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A few years back my sister passed away, I'm now the only child my parents have left. They live a few hours away and have for as long as I have been with my partner (7 years).

My parents are planning on moving to the place we now live to be closer to me. This has my partner worried that they will be over often or I will be over at their house more often. Her parents are very far away so can only visit once a year.

My parents are not the kind of people to show up uninvited to anyone's house. They likely will come over once a month for dinner and I will probably go over by myself once a week.

We are both pretty private people so not having anyone over is just how we are and this potential change of more visits has her concerned that our privacy will be gone.

I am also fine with them not coming over often, I like it being just me and her but I do want my parents close when they have medical emergencies.

How do I approach this as currently she is a bit annoyed but taking a more "see how this pans out" attitude?

I don't exactly want to jump the gun and talk to my parents ahead of time to make sure they don't come over often because I don't think they will and it might sour their relationship to her if they think she doesn't want them over ever, even if I also don't want them over often.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

I mean, it's all about setting good boundaries clearly.

That goes for partner, parents, and you. Each of you (and your parents separately for that matter) can freely place limits on how often visitors are welcome.

And, as long as it isn't done in the wrong way, a couple can freely negotiate how often and how long the partnership can handle one partner visiting other family. Kinda weird for it to be an issue out of the blue like this post makes it seem, but that's only partially relevant.

By wrong way, I mean ultimatums and heavy handed coercion.

But, and this is where that partially relevant comes in, why is it such a significant concern that you'll go to their house too often/too long? That's a pretty dang specific worry, and I suspect that the answer to that question would lead to better suggestions on how to handle the boundaries involved. It really seems like that's a concern based in something important, whether or not it's realistic. Addressing that concern would likely be as or more important than any actual decision regarding visit boundaries.

But that's whatever, the goal as it stands is to work out what your partner and you each see as reasonable visitation boundaries, then (if they don't match) negotiating those boundaries until they're mutually acceptable.