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.
The most important thing is to talk to your partner and establish boundaries and expectations for your parents. Boundaries could be something like “We are only free on thursdays. Please call Tuesday if you’d like to have dinner.” Or you can losen boundaries like “we’re both off of work this week. Come over whenever you want”
When I think expectations, I think about my weekly call with my sister and parents once a week. I can expect that will happen. Maybe you could set an expectation like we’ll have a meal at least once every two weeks.