Flying with a baby

In My Humble Opinion
1

The holidays are upon us, and somehow I have to get to the other side of the country with a three-month old baby.

Not flying is not an option. The great-grandparents are in no shape to travel here, and they are going to meet their new grand-baby. We both have new jobs, so there is no leave time for ground transport. So it’s off to the airport we go. And with our budget, unfortunately, she’s going to be a lap baby for the flight. Thankfully, my husband is coming, so he’ll help wrangle her. It’s an early morning flight, so she she should start in a good mood, but it’s cross-country so it’ll be a long one.

How bad is this going to be? Any tips or advice? What do we need to bring on the plane? What do we need to bring for our stay (we are there a week). How do we do the whole careseat-stroller thing on the plane? She’s generally a good kid, but she does let her voice be heard when she is grumpy.

Thanks in advance!

2

Best advice would be to talk to your family doctor and/or pediatrician (do pediatricians work with infants, I’m not sure) and ask for his/her advice! I bet they have lots of tips for flying with a baby.

3

Flying with little kids is hard, particularly over the holidays. After doing it once, my wife and I always scheduled trips to visit grandparents on non-holiday times when the airports aren’t so crowded and crazy. So that’s my first piece of advice: Go in January instead.

Take your normal diaper bag, plus a carry on with several changes of clothes for the baby and one for yourself in case you get spit-up/pooped on. (I once got barfed on on a flight to Disney World … .)

When she’s a little older we found the best strategy for a long trip was alternating snacks and toys. Here’s some goldfish … here’s a coloring book … here’s some fruit snacks … here’s some Playmobil. Only switch when they start to get bored with the previous activity. It’s a lot of work, but less trouble than listening to them cry.

Little babies are harder because they can’t play as much. On the other hand, they do sleep more. If you’re lucky you can get her to conk out and spend more of the flight asleep. Try scheduling your flight to agree with her sleep schedule. And maybe keep her up a little longer before you get on board so she’s sleepy.

One advantage of buying a separate seat is that you can put the bucket in it. That means that the baby has a familiar place to sleep. But if you can’t do it, you can’t do it. Car seats get checked like luggage. Strollers get gate checked right before you get on the plane.

You’ll be carrying a lot of stuff. I’d recommend regularly double checking how many things you’ve got. “We’ve got seven pieces of luggage. One … two … three … four … five … six … where’s my purse? … ah … seven.” With your attention focused on the baby, it’s easy to forget and walk off and leave something behind.

4

I remember reading this a year ago and loved it. :slight_smile:

5

I don’t know, that would kind of piss me off. Now I have to hear your baby crying AND I can’t even be mad about it without feeling like a jerk?

6

The Hamster King offered you some good advice. It is, of course, safest for the baby, you, and the passengers around you to have her securely strapped into a carseat, but I realize it’s not always feasible. Take advantage of the offer to pre-board so that you can get settled in before you take off. Be prepared to nurse/offer a bottle on takeoff and landing - it helps to equalize pressure in her ears so they don’t hurt. And, although this advice is almost impossible to follow, try to relax a little. Your tension can make the baby nervous and more likely to fuss. I can say, as a fellow passenger, that if I can see parents are making a good-faith effort to keep the baby happy, a little crying isn’t going to ruin my whole flight.

7

My wife and I flew many times with our kids including trips to Europe and coast to coast jaunts. At 3 months old it is not that bad, you should get all your flying done now and in the next few months because as soon as the kid starts to move around it gets much much harder for 2-4 years. With an infant, it is easy as you can pick them up, rock them, bounce them, give them a bottle, give them a pacifier, give them mommy, etc… When they start to crawl and walk, they cannot understand that they are not allowed to move around and meltdowns occur. Regarding carseat/stoller, my opinion is you don’t need a car seat on the plane. If the plane crashes, you are all pretty fucked anyway. Just hold the child on your lap. On one trip we did to Europe with a 6 month old, we got a bulkhead seat with a cradle that attached to the bulkhead. It was brilliant!

Once the kids started crawling and walking, I would recommend not flying until you can reason with them.

8

Oh yeah, nursing on landing is a must!

9

As far as the baby goes, the best thing you can do for her is try to keep everything as close to normal, schedule wise, as possible. Do not keep her up “so she’ll be extra tired.” Do not be late and need to rush around the airport so she can’t eat when she normally eats. Do plan on nursing during take off and landing to help keep her ears open. Consider bringing a soft style sling, one that you can wear while sitting, like a Maya Wrap (I’m sure you know more “indigenous” style simple slings than I do!), so your arms and shoulders aren’t aching from all that holding.

As far as the other passengers go, realize that there will be some who are furious with you, even if she sleeps through the entire flight. Fuck them, you can’t make them happy, so it’s not worth your worry.

There will be others who will coo and love at the baby even if she’s screaming her little head off. Fuck them, you can’t make them unhappy, so it’s not worth your worry. If you’re okay with people holding her, bring lots of hand sanitizer and enjoy a break while people play Pass The Baby. If not, tell them you’re so sorry but she’s just at a Mommy Only stage and you don’t want to risk upsetting her.

The vast majority of people will be somewhere between - they will be wary and on guard, but won’t really get too upset unless it seems like she’s kicking up a fuss and you’re ignoring her. These people can be somewhat appeased by you doing visible things to try to soothe her. Get up and walk with her, jiggle her up and down, apologize profusely to those around you, swaddle her, unswaddle her…just keep doing stuff, even if you know it probably won’t help. You may be surprised that something new does work, but even if not, at least they’ll see you doing something, and sympathy will be with you.

This is, of course, assuming that she cries at all. She may not. This is actually my favorite age to travel with. They’re still light enough to carry easily, they can’t wriggle out of your grasp and run away, they tend to respond to stress by falling asleep, and humans are pretty hard wired to squirt out oxytocin in the presence of newborns, without unrealistic expectations for their behavior. Give me a 3 month old traveling companion over an 18 month old any day!

Put something distinctive on her car seat before you check it. Damn things all look alike when they come down the baggage carrousel.

10

WhyNot speaks wisdom. I want to underline one bit of advice in particular – don’t think that you can get her to skip a nap or otherwise show up tired and have that mean that she’ll sleep more on the flight. Overtired kids are less likely to sleep than kids on their normal schedule. For bonus fun, an overtired child will be tense, overstimulated, and slip easily into inconsolable hysteria.

This is really nowhere near the worst age for traveling. Bring along everything you need to keep her comfortable and fed (including two extra outfits from the skin outward and more diapers than you think you need), but don’t worry too much. Once kids start crawling until the point that they can understand that they need to sit quietly for a while, they are very, very challenging to travel with, but infants and older kids are way easier. You’ve got this!

11

3 month old was pretty easy - in my experience seems like the more tricky time is around 1-2 when they are very mobile but can’t be distracted for long, nor bargained with.

I did Oz-NZ several times by myself with an infant, and then infant + toddler and the anticipation is definitely the worst - but take the time to prepare and it should be better than you expect. They days of reading a mag or watching more than 5 minutes of the movie are long gone though!

I planned flights sort of around nap time - I didn’t bring a car seat or anything like that, preferring to have less bulk to haul around. I used a soft Mai tai sling which I could carry her through the airport in, and then let her sleep in. I nursed during takeoff to help with ear pressure (takeoff and landings worst for screaming episodes) and this plus timing would often send her to sleep.

I sometimes got the option of a clip on bassinette in front, but in all cases she had to be sitting on my lap for takeoffs and landings with a mini seatbelt (i didn’t have to pay for another seat this way).

On checkin I always asked for a seat away from other people (unlikely during the holidays) but this often got me a spare seat next to me where I could lay her down to sleep. If not, when she was sleepy I’d pop her into the sling, go and stand in a clear section of floor and jiggle her until she went to sleep. Then I could sit down. Aisle seat is best, can get up and away if need be.

I would bring extra nappies (got a flight delay of several hours one time), change of clothes, a pashmina or something to block out light and distraction, a chewing toy (again for ears), a couple of other quiet toys, a sleep comforter if the baby uses it, plus baby Panadol (painkiller) if you think the baby’s ears are playing up).

I struggled to eat the plane food with her close by (if you have a separate seat and car seat this would be easier) - so brought snack food I could eat so I didn’t get crazy hungry.

The flight crews were uniformly great, a single woman with kids gets a lot of breaks at least on Air NZ and Qantas flights. I got escorted through customs, helped onto planes, had pushchairs waiting for me at the gate, crew offering to carry the baby around for a bit etc. if you’re travelling alone make sure they know and someone should keep a little eye on you.

Above all, this is not going to be a relaxing flight. The baby will cry, but likely not as long as you think (or it feels!) Most people won’t care, they have their headphones in. What will bother people is you clearly doing nothing to remedy it. If you are managing the situation, doing what you can to get through the flight, it will all be fine.

12

Larger planes have a bassinette built into the bulkhead.
Get those seats. The bassinette is awesome, it comes with hooks and a net so you can basically tie the kid down when they sleep so they can’t fall out or get tossed by turbulence.

13

You do tend to need to book those in advance though - worth calling your airline and seeing if they are available on your flight now, don’t leave it until you get to checkin.

14

Breast-feed.

15

This is slightly off the subject, but that bit above isn’t technically true. Don’t most crashes happen on take-off or landing, when restraint is likely to be very helpful?

Now, with that said, even though so many people cannot assess risk, I would wager that airlines can, and they make their car seat policies accordingly.

16

I’ve done it a time or three. Once, we actually took TWO lap children. A 20 month old, and a 4 month old. It was fine.

There’s a changing table (folds down from the ceiling or back wall) in most any plane big enough to have a bathroom. Easy to miss if you’re not looking for it.

Baby girl will probably find the airplane noise and vibration soothing, believe it or not. If she’s usually a good shoulder sleeper, you can probably count on her being conked out for a good portion of the trip. Have a look at her blankie collection and pick out the ones that are warmest, snuggliest, and let in the least amount of light - if you do the fully covered shoulder snuggle with just a corner vented for air, she might not wake up as soon.

If she’s cranky, and she might be (can be hard for babies to get their ears to pop sometimes) just stay calm. Feed, if possible, or give her a pacifier to suck on. Maaaybe a bottle of watered down apple juice if that’s on the menu yet. My babies always seemed thirstier than usual on an airplane.

Oh, and be fully expecting baby girl to present you with a big poop during takeoff or landing (or both). Something about that altitude change just says, “Poop time!”. Take more diapers than you need. You never know when your flight will get diverted or you’ll sit on the tarmac longer than you thought, or baby will decide it’s a great day for diarrhea. Put some in several places. Not just the diaper bag.

17

Three months SHOULD BE pretty easy - next year will be much harder.

Nurse when taking off and landing - which kind of makes the car seat thing odd because you are most likely to need the restraint during take off and landing (most likely to have a survivable accident), but the car seat will also be handy for a long flight just so you don’t need to hold the baby the whole time and for turbulence.

If you booked as a lap baby, be prepared to play hold the baby for the whole trip.

There isn’t a lot of room to walk the aisle (the beverage cart seems to be out every time baby gets fussy) and with so little clearance, bouncing on the knee is difficult as well. Talk to a flight attendant about the best place on the plane to take a fussy baby - they’ll know the spot to stand and do the baby bop (if the plane is large enough to have a spot).

18

Yep. This was a lifesaver for me. I flew from Sydney to London (26 hours) when my son was seven months old. I breastfeed almost non-stop. Saved his ears and my sanity.

19

Cant speak to the validity of this event but I did read of one flight attendant snarkily suggesting it once and being fired for it (so inspect that juice before giving it to a kid or insist upon sealed canned beverages):

20

There’s a lot of good advice. WhyNot, as usual, gives good advice, especially concerning not worrying about what other people think.

As several people have said, what pisses other people off is when the parents don’t seem to be doing anything. We found that if one of our kids are being particularly fussy out in public, we got much, much better response from people if I, as the father, was at working hard to quiet the baby. Well, buying time while the kid settles down on schedule. People expect that the mother is magically able to do this, while they are much more sympathetic for fathers.

We’ve flown many times between Japan, America and Taiwan with our kids at different ages, starting at two months and up until now, with the oldest at 5 years.

Three months is on the easier side.

The best advice I can give is to make sure you get enough sleep before. Typically, trips are hectic and kids pick up on that. Even babies.

Get to the airport extra early and camp out at the gate early in the reserved seats. Since there are two of you and only one of the kids, you get to have down time as a parent. Be as relaxed as you can before the flight.

Be really nice to the flight attendant and ask what type of things are allowed for you to do and not do if the child is fussy. If they understand that you are on the same team, then they will be much more helpful. For example, ask if it’s possible for one of you to get food first so you don’t have to be juggling two trays of food and a baby. Also ask if you can take the trays up afterward.

If I can’t do that, I take an extra plastic bag and dump the stuff from the food trays into the bag so I can free up my lap.

Can you buy things or have your parents buy stuff for your kid at thrift shops? Borrow t-shirts for you and your husband? Spending $20 on stuff will help you reduce the amount you carry.