Big hugs to you, OP. What a terrible situation you're in with your husband and children. It boggles my mind how terrible other posters are being.

Your DH sibling sounds intractable and sulky. The grandparents understand. The baby is too young. The other young children might be momentarily perplexed by the change of tradition, but if they were being raised by decent humans, could understand that a serious situation was happening. Plus, the distraction of Christmas would be enough.

Yes, of course the grandparents *should* be able to host a holiday as they please in their own home. But this is not a normal year. One of their sons is seriously ill. Adjustments need to be made.

Anonymous wrote:OP do you still have your house? Did you sell? Is this move with the grandparents permanent?

We have lots of decisions to make. DH literally came home two weeks ago, so we are still figuring everything out.

We do still own the other house. There are complicated reasons that I won't go into why we can't just go back for a night, and why moving there doesn't make sense.

OP do you still have your house? Did you sell? Is this move with the grandparents permanent?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't the grandparents want to do what is best for their own son's health? I am surprised no one seems that worried about his well-being vs some Christmas tradition that is not a great idea in the age of COVID anyway.

The grandparents were fine with the original plan. They are also fine with the plan of going to either this sibling's house, or to the other sibling's house and having this sibling come too. They didn't like my hotel plan very much. They are still holding out hope that there is a plan that will make everyone happy.

OP it seems pretty clear that the grandparents just want everyone to be happy and to spend time with all of the family and your moving in with them/setting these conditions is what is preventing them from being able to host as normal. You’ve been very clear about how you’re going to put your family’s needs first, but it’s not your house and you’re putting your in-laws in a very unfair position after they’ve been generous enough to open their home to you.

Well no. If we lived in our own place, we would spend the night there, so it wouldn't be any different from if we go to a hotel. If us going to a hotel leads to DH's sibling being upset, then I would assume us staying at our own place would too.

Do you really not get that saying fine we’ll pack up and move to a hotel if you insist on also coming to stay with the grandparents is on a completely different level than simply choosing to opt to stay at your own home for the holidays? The former comes across as passive aggressive and basically puts you in-laws in an unwinnable situation.

Anonymous wrote:One of the best things about living near your family is that you don’t have to share a house on Christmas Eve. You get to sleep in your own beds and then still see people without being grouchy about the fact that you were all crammed into a house together.

Apparently this particular sibling does not feel that way.

I agree, I used to let my kids do the cousin thing, because they didn't get to see each other that much. Now we see them a couple times a week, so I was kind of surprised that they weren't happy to wake up at their own house. My guess is they were fine when it was presented (they seemed to be, and they don't hide their emotions) but when they told the kids the plan the kids were like "but our cousins!"

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't the grandparents want to do what is best for their own son's health? I am surprised no one seems that worried about his well-being vs some Christmas tradition that is not a great idea in the age of COVID anyway.

The grandparents were fine with the original plan. They are also fine with the plan of going to either this sibling's house, or to the other sibling's house and having this sibling come too. They didn't like my hotel plan very much. They are still holding out hope that there is a plan that will make everyone happy.

OP it seems pretty clear that the grandparents just want everyone to be happy and to spend time with all of the family and your moving in with them/setting these conditions is what is preventing them from being able to host as normal. You’ve been very clear about how you’re going to put your family’s needs first, but it’s not your house and you’re putting your in-laws in a very unfair position after they’ve been generous enough to open their home to you.

Well no. If we lived in our own place, we would spend the night there, so it wouldn't be any different from if we go to a hotel. If us going to a hotel leads to DH's sibling being upset, then I would assume us staying at our own place would too.

One of the best things about living near your family is that you don’t have to share a house on Christmas Eve. You get to sleep in your own beds and then still see people without being grouchy about the fact that you were all crammed into a house together.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't the grandparents want to do what is best for their own son's health? I am surprised no one seems that worried about his well-being vs some Christmas tradition that is not a great idea in the age of COVID anyway.

The grandparents were fine with the original plan. They are also fine with the plan of going to either this sibling's house, or to the other sibling's house and having this sibling come too. They didn't like my hotel plan very much. They are still holding out hope that there is a plan that will make everyone happy.

OP it seems pretty clear that the grandparents just want everyone to be happy and to spend time with all of the family and your moving in with them/setting these conditions is what is preventing them from being able to host as normal. You’ve been very clear about how you’re going to put your family’s needs first, but it’s not your house and you’re putting your in-laws in a very unfair position after they’ve been generous enough to open their home to you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If fatigue and stress are triggers you need to be living in your own place. You can't be serious with this. There is no world in which your DH is less stressed by living in his parents house.

Get it together OP and don't ruin Christmas for everyone I clueing your own children.

Living with two senior citizens, his own parents, who love and help care for him during a major health crisis is not stressful. It sounds like the husband, who was recently hospitalized for two months, can't work. So one working patent IF the grandparents can provide free childcare, since the husband certainly can't do that full timre.

But sure, get their own place. Why didn't anyone think of that before? You're a freaking genius.

Right so two senior citizens have already sacrificed their own retirement to care for their son/grandchildren and now they are also expected to give up hosting their other children/grandchildren as well?

Oh, FFS. Grow so very much up.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If fatigue and stress are triggers you need to be living in your own place. You can't be serious with this. There is no world in which your DH is less stressed by living in his parents house.

Get it together OP and don't ruin Christmas for everyone I clueing your own children.

Living with two senior citizens, his own parents, who love and help care for him during a major health crisis is not stressful. It sounds like the husband, who was recently hospitalized for two months, can't work. So one working patent IF the grandparents can provide free childcare, since the husband certainly can't do that full timre.

But sure, get their own place. Why didn't anyone think of that before? You're a freaking genius.

Right so two senior citizens have already sacrificed their own retirement to care for their son/grandchildren and now they are also expected to give up hosting their other children/grandchildren as well?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You lived rent free for 2 years....stay in a hotel..dont be selfish

Where did I say we don't pay rent?

I'd be thrilled to stay in a hotel. Sibling has said that if that happens they won't come because there's "no point" if the cousins (my kids) aren't there.

Leave your kids with them and have a night with your husband.

On Christmas Eve? Not only no, but HELL NO.

OP here, while I might have thought the above, I want to clear that wasn't me.

But no, I'm not going to give up spending Christmas with my own children, so that their cousins can.

No, it was me, arn I'm sorry, OP, had you're getting so many absurd non-solutions. A significant portion of unhappy people come to DCUM for the express purpose of crapping all over OPs and telling them how wrong they are, no matter the topic.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't the grandparents want to do what is best for their own son's health? I am surprised no one seems that worried about his well-being vs some Christmas tradition that is not a great idea in the age of COVID anyway.

Most likely they think one night is not a big deal. This isn’t a one room cabin. OP’s husband can retire to his room any time he’s feeling too tired/overwhelmed.

+1 If DH is that disturbed by the noise he can stay in his room with noise canceling headphones…it seems pretty outlandish that simply being in the same residence as the cousins is going to cause his health to deteriorate. OP and family are just set in their ways residing with the grandparents and don’t want to have to adapt to accommodate other family members.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You lived rent free for 2 years....stay in a hotel..dont be selfish

Where did I say we don't pay rent?

I'd be thrilled to stay in a hotel. Sibling has said that if that happens they won't come because there's "no point" if the cousins (my kids) aren't there.

Leave your kids with them and have a night with your husband.

On Christmas Eve? Not only no, but HELL NO.

OP here, while I might have thought the above, I want to clear that wasn't me.

But no, I'm not going to give up spending Christmas with my own children, so that their cousins can.

Anonymous wrote:If fatigue and stress are triggers you need to be living in your own place. You can't be serious with this. There is no world in which your DH is less stressed by living in his parents house.

Get it together OP and don't ruin Christmas for everyone I clueing your own children.

Living with two senior citizens, his own parents, who love and help care for him during a major health crisis is not stressful. It sounds like the husband, who was recently hospitalized for two months, can't work. So one working patent IF the grandparents can provide free childcare, since the husband certainly can't do that full timre.

But sure, get their own place. Why didn't anyone think of that before? You're a freaking genius.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You lived rent free for 2 years....stay in a hotel..dont be selfish

Where did I say we don't pay rent?

I'd be thrilled to stay in a hotel. Sibling has said that if that happens they won't come because there's "no point" if the cousins (my kids) aren't there.

Leave your kids with them and have a night with your husband.

On Christmas Eve? Not only no, but HELL NO.