Grandparents on holiday

We always took my grandmother on holiday with us. It didn't arise with my mother because we were all living in Cornwall and didn't really go away on holiday. I hoping my children will let me tag along if I'm left on my own.

I find my family's holiday plans exhausting just hearing about them - I don't think I'd want to go with them! I do like to see their photos though.

We’ve always had holidays with our kids and GC and now the GC are grown up they insist we book every Summer for a seaside holiday just like when they were young the eldest GC bringing their children so they have the experience too. We are now 4 generations all together and we always have a great time. Granny, Mum, sons and daughters and Great Grandchildren
Of course we all take holidays apart but that seaside trip every year is magical.

Whilst it’s nice to be included in the odd day out (and if shared holidays make everyone in your family happy, then great), I believe that it is important for them to prioritise time as a nuclear family sometimes.

I still remember the holidays ds and I took when he was small. They truly are some of my most treasured memories. A few days of not having to worry about the mundane but essential tasks of parenting. I just got to enjoy him. As a grandparent I get to enjoy the ‘fun’ parts of my dgs every time is see him, I wouldn’t feel right taking some of that special time away from his parents by making them share.

Personal opinion aside, I don’t really understand how it would work to be honest. Me and dil’s mother & father are all ‘on our own’ so to speak. I’m not sure it would be fair to expect my ds & dil to plan their holidays to accomdate us all.

I couldn’t begin to keep up with my energetic children and grandchildren on holiday. I really wouldn’t want to go with them. I don’t like beach holidays, which children love. They also go on city breaks, which I do enjoy, but I couldn’t cope with the amount of walking they do, and anyway we’d probably want to do different things. Much better to keep to our own tastes and pace.

We already have a thread on this subject, it started this morning

My grandchildren always go on holiday with my DILs family. Next year they will be doing the same but hopefully having the opportunity to have a week away on their own as a family as well.

Would love to go on holiday together but not sure it will ever happen under the circumstances. So I count my blessings on what I can enjoy with my grandchildren and their parents

Multigenerational holidays work well when people don't all have to do EVERYTHING together ALL the time, and people can go off alone or in smaller groups to explore then come back together in the evening for meals together.

One side of our family do the opposite and its exhausting: say you really want to see a monument on top of a hill.... they wont let you go alone but also will complain about the hill...
....every activity has to include everyone (after a 45 discussion about whether or not it'll suit everyone) which means that the people who like to relax don't get to, and the people who like to be active get held back

Another stupid suggestion form another stupid minister.

^Grandparents should be taken on family holidays, ......
.... communities had a "moral duty" to stop the elderly feeling abandoned.^

His comments are vile and ageist, talking about the older generation as if we were some millstone round the necks of our children, inert and inactive, unable to do anything for ourselves.

Has this blinkered idiot opened his eyes when outside the office and noticed how many fit healthy older people there are quite capable of organising their own holidays, glad at last to have holidays with out being encumbered with children.

Yes, some elderly people are lonely for all kinds of reasons but sweeping suggestions like take your old people on holiday is just a joke, and not a very funny one.

It is grossly insulting to older people.

My parents are better-travelled than I am! They teach a course on scientific writing for non-native speakers of English. They've taught the course all over the world, in North America, South America, Europe, and Asia.

Both my sets of GPs travelled a fair bit in their old age. Dad's parents are gone now, as is Mum's father. Her mother has Alzheimer's so taking her on a holiday is not an option. She's at a moderate-stage level.

Agree wholeheartedly MOnica.

We travel quite a lot and have arranged a couple of family holidays with the whole lot of them. Once in a shared house and once camping. We paid for the house/pitches so it was really us taking them not the other way around. I supposed he meant really old people.

We’re trying to arrange another joint venture, but as the DGC are getting older and have differing interests its proving exceedingly difficult.

If you want to go on holiday with your DC EllieBrum, have you hinted as much? Or even asked outright if you could all go away together sometime? (After all they’d have a built in babysitter!) They may think it’s something you’d not want to do so haven’t suggested it.

NfkDumpling that's a good point - I should probably suggest or arrange one for us rather than waiting for an invite

Thanks for letting me know petra, I must have missed that in active

We took my mum with us every year after dad died. Well I say took, she made a large financial contribution to wards the holiday. She loved the seaside caravan holidays when the children were little and was happy to babysit in the evenings. The children loved nannie coming too. The great thing was, she was never the needy type and was happy to do her own thing if she didn't like what we had planned.
Once the children were grown up and before dementia took hold we would take her to Warner Hotels with us.

It obviously depends on so many factors. There is no way that everyone abroad takes GPs on holiday. If you don't see much of each other during the year then a week or two or enforced closeness will end in disaster.

Makes me smile that grandparents might be ' taken' on holiday. Its my experience the gp's do most if not all the paying.