I made plans about a week ago for my husband and I to spend the day out at the lake on Memorial Day. I thought it would be a good chance for us to spend some time together, because he’s going to be working a lot of overtime the next several weeks. He agreed and I’ve been looking forward to this. Today his mom called and wants us to come to her house tomorrow for a cookout. I’m upset because we’ve had our other plans for a week, and she thinks she can call the day before for a cookout? Of course he wants to go, but I want to stick with our original plan. (We can’t do both as his mom lives a few hours away.) My husband knows I don’t want to go to his mom’s and now he’s acting mad at me. Who is in the wrong here? Should I give in and just go to his mom’s even though I’ve been looking forward to going to the lake?

As a guy I can say that most of us usually think about events and everything in our every day life as a money sign $$$$. With that said, I can tell you that if given the option to go the lake and spend money buying all the food and supplies or going over to mom’s and not have to spend a penny, not to mention the fact that there’s no labor involved, I would definitely take the second option.

Another thing you must take in consideration is that most of us guys usually consciously or unconsciously have what we call “plan A” “plan B” etc. So in this case he may have just agreed to go to the lake because there were no other better options available at the time. So the minute something better came up he took it, that simple. In all reality is a no-brainer and if you think about it, going over to his mom’s also saves you the hassle to have to buy everything that you need and have to cook it too. On top of things, if you were planning on making your husband cook everything, then it’s no surprise that he wants to go over to moms. You mention that he has been or will be working a lot of overtime which might one more reason why he wants to just relax this Memorial Day weekend and do as little work as possible.

Really, what you need to do is sit down and have a conversation with your husband and really find out why he wants to go over to his mom’s instead of the lake. Now, keep in mind the possible reasons I just gave you and know that if you guys are not very well financially or have big expenses coming up, then it might be a smarter choice to go over to the in-laws and eat for free. With that said, if he has already given in to your demands and called it off with the in-laws, then at least be kind and don’t expect him to do much work when he comes along to the lake against his wishes. He has already told you what he wants to do and now everything he’s doing is to please you and avoid a fight. In the future just know that we always look at things from a financial perspective and that’s usually the basis of our decisions. We rarely want to throw away money when is not necessary.