Wife wants to buy plane ticket for her parents

[purekoryo]

I've only described our situation and perhaps only a fraction of my wife's ways. I love her dearly and again as I have stated before have much better qualities in her; that's why I married her. She has plenty of friends. all of them have come up to me personally telling me how great of a person she is. I take full responsibility showing only a fractional part of her, but do not ever judge a person like that again, especially f you haven't even met them.
By the way, my grandfather was a very high ranking officer in the Korean War, my stepfather retired after 21 years of service and my mother endured the difficulties of a military wife without a support system and definitely isn't something to brag about; it was just about adaptation to the given situation and environment.

Again, I will gladly pay my mother in laws ticket to stay here for couple of weeks and thank my mother for willing to spend a month helping my wife.

Originally Posted by runswithscissors

I didn't read all that subsequent stuff but what I see not mentioned is that the OP said the in laws wanted to come see the baby and stay A COUPLE WEEKS.

Two weeks is NOTHING.

He could pay an RN to come help her for much much less if it were about THAT.

My guess is she wants the nanny since the parents were only WILLING to come for two weeks.

Like I said, she'd never survive being a military wife. Snowflake.

WAIT. I take that back. A Military wife would have other friends in the same position to HELP. I guess the OP wife has no friends. Not surprisingly.

[SOON2BNSURPRISE]

Originally Posted by RamenAddict

We are talking about a brand new infant here. Not a long-term solution. I don’t know what it’s rant has to do with the OPs problem of leaving his wife alone to care for two children when one is a newborn. Military towns still offer some level of support to others, which I think is what the OP’s wife wants. That is not unreasonable. She is not asking for help for a lifetime. She is asking for help for a few weeks. To help with a newborn.

The wife either wants her mom or a nanny. When you have a nanny that turns into a much longer gig than a few weeks or months.

My mom, like most I knew growing up, did it on their own. I don't know what kind of support they had but I never saw anyone coming over to help out.

[Ian_Lee]

Originally Posted by purekoryo

I've only described our situation and perhaps only a fraction of my wife's ways. I love her dearly and again as I have stated before have much better qualities in her; that's why I married her. She has plenty of friends. all of them have come up to me personally telling me how great of a person she is. I take full responsibility showing only a fractional part of her, but do not ever judge a person like that again, especially f you haven't even met them.
By the way, my grandfather was a very high ranking officer in the Korean War, my stepfather retired after 21 years of service and my mother endured the difficulties of a military wife without a support system and definitely isn't something to brag about; it was just about adaptation to the given situation and environment.

Again, I will gladly pay my mother in laws ticket to stay here for couple of weeks and thank my mother for willing to spend a month helping my wife.

I read your posts again. You said that you can afford plane tickets for both parents-in-law, but you only want to pay for one because of principle.

IMO it is not worth to argue with your wife over $1,500 if you can afford it.

If you live in some cities with large Korean population, i.e. L.A., it may be easy to hire a house helper who is new immigrant from Korea to help your wife out, i.e. cooking meals and doing house chores while your wife is looking after the toddler and baby, temporarily caring for the baby when your wife drives the toddler to preschool, etc. The cost may be affordable.

[asliarun]

Originally Posted by purekoryo

I've only described our situation and perhaps only a fraction of my wife's ways. I love her dearly and again as I have stated before have much better qualities in her; that's why I married her. She has plenty of friends. all of them have come up to me personally telling me how great of a person she is. I take full responsibility showing only a fractional part of her, but do not ever judge a person like that again, especially f you haven't even met them.
By the way, my grandfather was a very high ranking officer in the Korean War, my stepfather retired after 21 years of service and my mother endured the difficulties of a military wife without a support system and definitely isn't something to brag about; it was just about adaptation to the given situation and environment.

Again, I will gladly pay my mother in laws ticket to stay here for couple of weeks and thank my mother for willing to spend a month helping my wife.

Please don't take offense. Like you said, people will only draw conclusions based on the information given. As such, it is obvious that people will draw different conclusions and interpreations.

Ultimately, there's a lot of well meaning advice and suggestions on this thread. Please just focus on that.

[asliarun]

Originally Posted by vidyap7

Boy, is this so familiar. My DH grew up poor while I grew up middle class on the surface. My Dad struggled day and night building his own business with my Mom's help. So, they "seemed" to have a lot of money on the surface. FIL didn't work and MIL worked as a teacher to support the family.


We both are in the US but born and brought up abroad to Asian parents. He paid for a house for his parents back in home country when we didn't have a home of our own. He paid for a lot of things for them and his older brother and his family. However, he expected my parents to pay for private school for our kids. This, inspite of both of us working and making 6 figures each. I was brought up with the values that you provide for your own family and don't expect monetary help from parents or others. I refused and our kids went to public school.


He had the same attitude when my parents were coming to US as the OP. Saying they should pay since they have money. Atleast in my case I was working too, so I refused. I want to show my gratitude to my parents. I want to thank them for all the years of taking care of me and giving me a great engineering education, paying for my marriage and my initial trip to USA.


OP, your attitude to your wife's family smacks of entitlement to me. Why should they pay to come and visit your family? Your wife is the one inviting them. You seem to think that because you grew up poor you are somehow morally superior. Your inlaws seem to be working. You don't mention your Mom working. Maybe the inlaws have money because they worked? Atleast in my case I have more of a work ethic, moral values and sense of what is right or wrong than my DH or his family. Just because they were poor, my inlaws and DH seem to think that the world owes them now. While I know the stresses my Dad went through to keep a small business going. The hard work it takes to be successful, etc.


You married your wife for a reason. Don't let these kinds of things come between you. Don't just pay for your inlaws' tickets, but be gracious to them when they visit. Don't harbor resentment.

That sounds quite horrible, to be honest. Kudos to you for being firm. But honestly, this is toxic behavior on the part of your husband and you need to make him aware of this. If he treats his parents generously, then absolutely needs to do the same for your side of the family.

This whole unequal treatment business of boys family and girls family thing is extremely sexist and archaic and ultimately toxic. The only way to get rid of it is to call it out when it happens and have zero tolerance for it. Not in a strong silent way but in an insistent even loud way so it is absolutely clear to the other person that there are some very hard non-negotiable lines in any given relationship that cannot be crossed and have to be respected 100% all the time.