DIFFICULT! How do i tell my brother he is not welcome if he brings his kids!!?

Question

This is an very tricky dilemma & i hope someone can advise! My brother wants to visit me ( im overseas) with his family for a week in february. ME - live with boyfriend in a lovely house - its nice ONLY because it has to be representative for our work (we are not flashy ) - we run a business each from home. Visitors come 9am - 8pm most days & we work from 8am till 1am every day . My brother & wife allow kids to be 'free' ie run riot. On previous 3 visits kids nearly burnt the house down / were caught stealing & had a bad accident due to carlessness! They let our dogs into street who they were nearly killed & as a family they are oblivious to the chaos around them. I currently have a kitten who is a house cat - i know it will get out if they come - the kids mess with our computers - they all ignore our wishes / rules.

SO HOW DO I SAY VISIT ALONE AND DONT BRING THE WIFE OR KIDS DIPLOMATICALLY !
What can we do = we dont have TIME let alone energy for this crazyness :(

Its not my belongings - you dont understand - its the fact the kids have tried to light the fire on each visit and been caught with flaming newspapers in the lounge. My animals are not furniture -they are my famiyl to and they all ignore our requests to close doors. The boys have stolen cash fomr my wallet on 2 visits. The deleated some important informtion fomr my laptop by taking it out of my office while i was seeeing a customer. ...need I say more ! :((((( the parents have no control and my house and computer etc is my livelyhood. They have repeatedly NOT left these things alone and I cannot lock them away. This is why its so hard. I dont want to say anything horrible to them because i love them all but i dont want them in my home anymore because they are a liability but i also DONT want to upset them or cause any ill feeling.

sorry about spelling mistakes :) gah!

FYI - Im in europe - he is in the UK - they would visit me for a week so its not a cse of one night kids free sadly - its a week of us being 110% responsible for them as they dont speak the language - also they never bother sorting out health insurance so the last time they were here and the kids had a bad accident WE paid their hospital bill cos they have no money! useless...

Answer 1

I had a kinda similar situation at my wedding. I simply told my sister that children were not invited. She was irritated at first, but did come and actually had a great time because she didn't have to chase around her kids.

But this is a bit different. I think you need to remind your brother of his kids' past bad behaviour and tell him that it's simply not acceptable. From there, you have at least two choices. One is to tell him that he needs to book a hotel and tell him what hotels are close by. The other is to allow the kids to stay, but he must watch them closely. Tell him if they get out of control, he'll be asked to move to a hotel.

You have to be frank and honest. This is not rude and inconsiderate. What's rude and inconsiderate is how he allowed his children to behave in the past. Parents who are like this need to be taken to task. It's completely selfish and irresponsible, not only to you as their host, but to his children. He is not teaching them proper life skills and they will end up being the worse for it later in life.

Take care of yourself and your belongings by standing up for yourself. Don't be afraid or timid to deal with this. Someone has to!

Answer 2

Tell your brother that business is well right now and because of this, you feel it wouldn't be fair to them to have to be troubled by it. There is the possiblity that people could be there at any time so it would be wrong for them to have to be a part of it. Also you know that they would like to come to relax, so just up the street is a nice motel or hotel or something else and you will happily give them the information on it. This way they can come and go as they please without having to worry about bothering anyone. If he says anything, say you are also worried about the children because last time they did cause some problems including hte deleting of important information from your computer and accidents with the furniture that is not yours. So if they do come and insist on staying at your residence, the children are not allowed to come. If they still want to bring them then again the hotel up the street is nice adn they can stay there. Stand firm about it and do not let yourself falter.

Answer 3

There is a difference between them Visiting you and Staying with you.

I would let them know that it is not your house and from past viists your company has established guidelines for you to follow to have the house open for work. You need to tell them you can give them a set time when they can viist you during that week. But they can not stay with you, you can look around and give them suggestions for a nice hotel.

You can also, when they want to get together with you can do that someplace other than the house. You can make plans to meet at public places.

Answer 4

Wow! Well there is simply no way to say this without hurting his feelings. You could tell him to stay at a hotel and you will hang out with him and the children at local destinations. I would not want them to come to my home either. You do realize that the children are a reflection of their parents teachings... There are no bad children, there are bad parenting which leads to things such as this... Wow, obviously they are allowed to run wild... Good luck and God bless****

Answer 5

omg. i cant stand when parents do that. have control over you freakin children! I have two (ages 3 and 1) so I dont let them pester people. what you can do is talk with your bro honestley! just stress the importance of your house and work, that you just can't have nuisance and riot! and maybe if you give him that sort of reality check that he and his wife are to lax with his children he will reassess his parenting and give him time to improve. maybe then he and the children and wife can still can come. lay down those boundries! p.s. you otherwise sound like you have a fabulous life. =) good luck!

Answer 6

Rent a furnished holiday house nearby big enough for all of you, and tell your brother that you need to keep your main house quiet because of your business, so you thought the best idea would be if you all (including yourself and your husband) lived there for the duration of their visit. You could then visit the main house during the day without them being there, but your brother couldnt be offended because you havent avoided he and his familly.

Answer 7

He is your brother. Why is it such a big issue telling him you want a kids free night ? Talking between brothers should be easy. It's family, for God's sake.

Answer 8

i can understand your fear of having them stay with you. those kids sound very indulged. you can't tell him not to visit w/o his kids. you may as well tell him to cut off his arm. you can, however, you can tell him although you'd love to see him, there is really no way they can stay at the house due to the on going business and visitors coming in and out. he'll either get a hotel or chosse not to come.

Answer 9

Could you put them up at a close by hotel or tourist home? If not, board your pets for the week and put away valuables.
Your brother would be hurt if you exclude his family.

Answer 10

You can't. I understand that you're house is very important to you, but your brother and his family should mean more than a dwelling place. If you tell him to come alone, you'll cause a rift in your family. It would be better to just tell him that it isn't a good time right now and that you'll visit him.

Honestly, stuff is just that -- stuff. You can't have a relationship with a chair. You'll always be upset with yourself for causing a rift in your family.