Long-running traditions can get complicated as people move into different stages of life.

For example, the trip that worked perfectly when everyone was younger doesn’t always work the same way once marriages and children enter the picture.

That’s what this group of friends discovered while planning a two-week trip to Australia.

For years, these vacations had been treated as adults-only getaways, and nobody had ever questioned it. But then, two members of the group announced they planned to bring their children along.

Suddenly, a trip everyone had been looking forward to turned into a debate about whether the tradition should change.

Read on to see how everyone feels.

AITA for not wanting my friends’ kids to come on our vacation?

I’ve had the same group of very close-knit friends since Middle school. We are all 34 years old now.

Every 5 years or so, we go on a 2-week international trip together. It has always been implied that this is an adults-only trip, and this has never been an issue.

Our next trip is about a year out, and we’ve all decided to go to Australia.

Suddenly, some of them wanted to bring their kids.

After this was confirmed and we started planning, one of my friends (who has a 5 year old and a 2 year old) said, “I’m bringing the kids on this trip, seems like there are a lot of fun things for them to be included in!”

Her husband is also part of the friend group, and he’ll be joining as well.

My other friend who also has kids (a 4 year old and a 1 year old) promptly said, “Great, then I’ll bring mine too!”

In the past, these friends has left theirs kids with their parents who live both live nearby, so they have childcare options.

Unfortunately, no one else wanted kids to come on the trip.

Those of us that don’t have kids, the majority (6 out of the 10 of us), side-barred and decided that we do not want kids going on this trip. It’s a very expensive vacation, and we’ll need to use our entire paid time off for this and don’t want to spend it on kids activities.

We do everything with their kids and love them, and we have never asked them to exclude their kids on anything until now.

When the kids are around, all of the attention and conversation ends up being kid-related. This is ok and something we’re used to, but we would not like this to be the dynamic of a 2-week international vacation.

They are trying to reason with the parents, but things are not going well.

We brought this up in a delicate way, but the parents of the group are now very offended and are saying, “So, if we can’t bring the kids, we’re uninvited?”

We are now sort of at a standstill. It won’t work for us to all go and “do separate things.” The kids will inevitably be at every dinner and every outing. We’re holding our ground, but it’s been a tough situation.

We are discussing a potential compromise where we cut the trip down to 1 week, and go somewhere closer. The more the “no kids” people chat about this though, the less we want to settle for a trip that we don’t want to go on.

AITA?

Yikes! There must be some sort of compromise they can find.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man whose friends say he’s privileged for wanting to eat at nicer restaurants.

Let’s see if the readers over at Reddit have any advice.

According to this comment, two weeks is a long time to be away from your kids.

Yet another reader who thinks two weeks is a little long when you have kids.

Probably not, but it’s true.

This reader would never use all of their PTO on a trip without their kids.

This is a tough situation, but it’s easy to see where everyone is coming from.

The problem is that these friends aren’t talking about the same vacation anymore. The parents are picturing a family trip, while everyone else is picturing the adults-only getaway they’ve been taking for years.

Once young children join the trip, the entire vacation changes. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s a different trip than the one everyone thought they were planning.

At some point, it’s probably better to be honest about what everyone wants instead of pretending both versions of the vacation are the same thing.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man whose friends say he’s privileged for wanting to eat at nicer restaurants.