Parents: What is the longest time you would feel comfortable leaving your children for a trip?

[Anonymous]

4-5 nights

[Anonymous]

2 weeks, but only if DS were staying with my parents.

[Anonymous]

DH says 3 nights max

[Anonymous]

At that age, maybe 3 or 4 days. A week would be way to long for me.

[Anonymous]

I can't believe you'd ask this question. Three weeks? You'd leave a toddler with family members so you and DH could vacation for three weeks? Why did you have children? Are they accessories to your life?

Egads. We always take our children with us. Always. We've taken a nanny with us when they were very young (as your kids are, OP) because she was part of the family, but we've never left our children at home with relatives or anyone else even overnight.

Really, children aren't dogs. Oh, and BTW, we don't leave our dog at home either. We take him with us when we go on vacation.

[Anonymous]

2 nights, but my kids are 2.5 and 8 months.

[Anonymous]

My son spends two weeks every summer with my mom and his cousins in the country. He started going three years ago when he was 5. He has a blast, and I thing the country living is really healthy for him. My husband and I overlap a few nights. His 5 year old sister is joining him for a week this year.

[Anonymous]

Three weeks is too long for me, but I am equally dismayed by those who say a weekend or not at all. We've left our kids with grandma when we take a long weekend every now and then, and a week every few years so we can go on a vacation by ourselves.

[Anonymous]

We don't generally go on two week trips with or without kids (I did longer trips premarriage, but DH isn't the best traveler). We just did a 5 day trip. DD is almost 2, and we flew my mom and sister in to be with her. I missed her like crazy, and she asked for me a lot. Apparently she had a really tough time whenever she'd wake up in the morning or from nap and I wasn't there. When I returned she gave me the cold shoulder for about an hour. DH, on the other hand, received a warm welcome from her when he got up an hour after us.

[Anonymous]

People need to relax. My parents live abroad and are old and my dad is sick. As such, I need to travel to see them. A ticket there isn't cheap so to make it worth it, I've had to leave my kids for a week/ten days. Granted I left them with DH but I can easily see a situation where he would have had to join me without them for a period that long. Yes, I prefer to be with them but it is costly. And they're too young for such a long international trip of that short of a length.

[Anonymous]

Only 127 7-yr olds were sent to boarding school in england last year. Times they are a-changing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People need to relax. My parents live abroad and are old and my dad is sick. As such, I need to travel to see them. A ticket there isn't cheap so to make it worth it, I've had to leave my kids for a week/ten days. Granted I left them with DH but I can easily see a situation where he would have had to join me without them for a period that long. Yes, I prefer to be with them but it is costly. And they're too young for such a long international trip of that short of a length.

That's an entirely different situation than a three week vacation. And a young child is usually more attached to his/her dad than other "relatives".

[Anonymous]

Depends on how well I trust the caregivers. 2 weeks would be fine with my capable, experienced, loving MIL. 2 minutes is too long with some of my other relatives.

[Anonymous]

In theory long weekend. But at that age, not at all.

[Anonymous]

I have a 4 month old and 2.5 year old. The 2 year old - 2-nights. 4 month old - I was away from her 1 night when I went away with older child. No way would I want to leave for 2 weeks! Maybe at 5 I could do a week but not sure since we're not there yet.