Am I being unreasonable?

[Jaunty]

5 minutes ago, yogacat said:

But that's your respective family's choice to operate as you choose. There's a lot of moving parts here, but generally, it might not have been the uncontroversial "no brainer" that it would be for 2 single people earlier in a relationship.

But the OP is not comfortable with it!  

Do you actually know people who would be fine with this?   

[yogacat]

10 minutes ago, Jaunty said:

But the OP is not comfortable with it!  

Do you actually know people who would be fine with this?   

Yes, I do. I think I mentioned earlier that I traveled with a best male friend and a female best friend 10 years ago or so. The female in the group and I are very close friends - we've known each other for over15 years. She was already in a long term relationship and I was single. Her long term boyfriend had no issues with us going away together. They've been together for over 20 years now. 

Now you don't know me from Adam, so 1 person's experience is unimportant, but I'd like to think that we're not all idiots and we know our friends...

I will add to that statement. I would NOT dream of going on vacation with a man who I had any romantic attraction to, if I was in a relationship. 

I get your discomfort and I would too. HOWEVER, with everything you mentioned about how illness had affected his life and your relationship, it might be right for him to focus on his son for this vacation.  

Whether you go or not, his illness and current relationship with his kid is obviously important to him. If that doesn't fly with you, then you should end it.  

[rainbowsandroses]

2 hours ago, yogacat said:

I think I mentioned earlier that I traveled with a best male friend and a female best friend 10 years ago or so. The female in the group and I are very close friends - we've known each other for over15 years. She was already in a long term relationship and I was single. Her long term boyfriend had no issues with us going away together.

Yoga, I apologize I think I might be missing something.  From what is quoted above, you, your best male friend and best female friend all traveled together, a group the three of you.

It's understandable why your BFF'S boyfriend would not have a problem with it, you (her best friend) were also going to be there NOT just her and your best male friend alone, the two of them.  

You were all traveling as a group, can you not see the difference?  I dunno, again maybe I am missing something but I can.

Do you think her boyfriend would have been OKAY with it if you were NOT going to be there, and it was just her and your male friend traveling alone?

Anyway, in this case, OP's boyfriend and this woman are traveling alone together.  Yes his son will be there, which sounds very cozy and quite intimate imo. 

Like an intimate family vacay in which OP (his girlfriend) was excluded despite her telling him she could get the money to go which HE shot down.

I dunno, again unless I am missing something, there is a world of difference between those scenarios.

That said, I think the most important factor is that OP expressed to him she is uncomfortable with it, twice.  The first time he turned it back on her saying she couldn't afford even after she told him she could.

The second time, he responded by saying "someone" is going to be disappointed.

If he chooses to go, then obviously he cares more about his friend's feelings than his own girlfriend's and to me THAT is a big problem!

 

 

 

 

 

 

[rainbowsandroses]

To add to my last, kids are amazingly resilient and flexible.  He and his son could still have a wonderful time together without going on this extravagant vacation abroad in which the OP, his girlfriend, is excluded.

There will LOTS of opportunities for his son to "see the world" when he's older and can actually appreciate it.

IMO, the "doing it for his son" doesn't hold water.  Again, there are tons of stuff he and his son can do without taking this trip to the exclusion of his girlfriend knowing it's going to bother her/hurt her.

 

 

 

[Jaunty]

6 hours ago, yogacat said:

 

I will add to that statement. I would NOT dream of going on vacation with a man who I had any romantic attraction to, if I was in a relationship. 

 

It's frustrating that everyone seems to be missing the point.   As I have said a few times, I DO NOT CARE if his bff is a woman.   I don't agree with the often repeated claim around here that men and women can't be friends.   I have great and important friendships with women, including my ex wife, and I am in a committed relationship.   I have done some things with my ex and our daughter, without my partner (who was definitely invited but she had her own reasons for demurring).  There is nothing wrong with that.

There WOULD be something wrong if those two women had not forged their own friendship, and also if my ex was actively campaigning against my relationship with my current partner.  Hell yes there would be.

The kid is just a red herring in this story.  I can guarantee that no parent who is in any way an adult would think that this was the way to fulfill their promise to their child.  By ditching the woman that is supposedly his "life partner"?  Who'd been paying the bills through his illness?  What a bizarre thing to model for a little one.  

 

[Vesna]

5 hours ago, Jaunty said:

It's frustrating that everyone seems to be missing the point.   As I have said a few times, I DO NOT CARE if his bff is a woman.   I don't agree with the often repeated claim around here that men and women can't be friends.   I have great and important friendships with women, including my ex wife, and I am in a committed relationship.   I have done some things with my ex and our daughter, without my partner (who was definitely invited but she had her own reasons for demurring).  There is nothing wrong with that.

There WOULD be something wrong if those two women had not forged their own friendship, and also if my ex was actively campaigning against my relationship with my current partner.  Hell yes there would be.

The kid is just a red herring in this story.  I can guarantee that no parent who is in any way an adult would think that this was the way to fulfill their promise to their child.  By ditching the woman that is supposedly his "life partner"?  Who'd been paying the bills through his illness?  What a bizarre thing to model for a little one.  

 

This above quote is exactly the point of the matter. Well said Jaunty.

[Batya33]

9 hours ago, rainbowsandroses said:

To add to my last, kids are amazingly resilient and flexible.  He and his son could still have a wonderful time together without going on this extravagant vacation abroad in which the OP, his girlfriend, is excluded.

There will LOTS of opportunities for his son to "see the world" when he's older and can actually appreciate it.

IMO, the "doing it for his son" doesn't hold water.  Again, there are tons of stuff he and his son can do without taking this trip to the exclusion of his girlfriend knowing it's going to bother her/hurt her.

 

 

 

I was going to share something related- kids want lots of stuff.  We give them what they need of course - you know food/water/shelter/health care/education but when it comes to wants it -depends, right? So with vacations we went against the grain and didn't uber-focus on "kid friendly" because we wanted him to see the world and had that opportunity because of my husband's business travel.  This meant he was whining about wanting a souvenir in Europe just as we were entering a church that said in big letters QUIET -and at 7 years old -he saw  the sign and thankfully complied.  The church was not kid friendly at all - he would have "wanted" us to buy him the souvenir and skip the centuries old artwork I'm sure and - as his parent I knew it was better to show him not only does he not rule the roost but he was going to thank me someday for all these cultural experiences (yes he did enjoy it!).

I wanted to go on fancy vacations as a child like a number of my friends got to do.  There wasn't the money/budget to do so.  The end. So my first plane ride was at almost 16 to an international teen tour -which my grandparents paid for as a gift to me and in my senior year of high school my parents scraped together $800 to send me to Spain with my spanish class for a week in Madrid.  Back then that was a lot of $$! I knew full well -in an age appropriate way -what was possible and what wasn't.  I knew others had more $/ability for these vacations and others had less. 

This helped me in my personal growth and attitude -attitude is gratitude.  This child for sure isn't spoiled -I've seen no indication -or entitled - but yes you can tell an 8 year old "you wish you could go to [Disney/a cruise/a worldwide  tour of Legoland or baseball stadiums] and right now we don't have enough money to be able to do that.  We do have enough to take you to [insert day trip or maybe an inexpensive overnight -go to like a hotel with the free breakfast where  your son can help make waffles and it will be just as good as something fancy or longer]

Also it's very often who the child travels with or sees that matters-this woman is not his mother, not married to his father -she's just the wallet/benefactor/generous friend.  He won't relate to that in that way -she'll be his dad's friend and the dynamic likely won't be the same at all if it was his dad and him alone or perhaps -if he's ready to interact with the OP -the OP as well.