how to keep a 21-month-old quiet during a long plane trip

In My Humble Opinion
21

Seconding (thirding?) Brynda’s recommendation of lots and lots of tiny surprises that you can spring on the kids as needed for distraction, entertainment and comfort. Snacks, little books, small toys, maybe even a loved toy that they don’t know will be along.

Wear the kids out with as much exercise as possible before boarding the plane. Create a defined space in the waiting area for running in small circles, doing jumping jacks, doing sit-ups, marching in place, somersaults, whatever their level of coordination allows. You can make it a game of Simon Says to keep them focused. For E, do whatever you can to help him burn off energy.

One of my favorite things to do with a little guy is to stand with my feet apart, bending over with my arms wrapped beneath the toddler’s armpits and around the front of the chest. Now it’s time to help him jump – just a little lift to make him jump higher than he can on his own. Slowly build until the kid is jumping really high. They use lots of muscles doing this and think it’s great fun. Check with the flight attendants to see if there’s a place where they’d be OK with doing this on the flight, or if it would be Ok for your sons to walk down the aisles of the plane.

Good luck. Hope you have a great visit.

22

Actually they do. Tylenol PM uses diphenhydramine HCl as the sleep aid.

23

Snort

Arnold, I brought my two year old son to AZ years ago - it was like a three hour flight - and I did the goodie bag thing. That lasted all of an hour. The little bugger figured out that if he started with me I’d give him something to stop - we were out of goodies by the time we flew over Topeka. :rolleyes: The portable DVD would have been a big help had they had them back in the day.

Hope you all have a wonderful and safe trip!!

24

Speaking as a very frequent flier, I’d rather you drug your baby to the gills rather than inflict a wailing infant or toddler on all your fellow passengers for 13 hours. I realize that, yes, babies cry, and virtually all parents with small children on plane trips are doing the very best they can, but that doesn’t mean that “quiet and calm” is not always preferable to “screaming.”

I don’t have kids, but I well remember my efforts to entertain a toddler on a plane back in the day when I was a nanny. I second (or third or fourth) the suggestion that you let the toddler walk around as much as possible. You can parade after him up and down the aisles and people will understand. Show him stuff, out the window, in the bathroom, in the galley. (Not getting in the way, of course.)

I also second (or third or fourth) the suggestion that you pull stuff out bit by bit, and include some new toys and books in the mix.

I also suggest you get your older son to help you. Ask him to help you brainstorm how to keep the baby occupied during the trip, and have him help you pack the baby’s bag with toys and snacks and things. If you can get the older kid to invest in the problem on the side of the grown-ups, he may be more willing to help you entertain his brother during the flight. He also may be better behaved himself, since he’s “helping” with the “baby.”

25

Yup. If they really want to see the baby badly enough, they’ll get on a plane to do it. The kid himself is obviously not going to remember the trip, so why not wait until later when he can actually enjoy visiting a new country? If the relatives need financial help to make the trip, just take the cash you’d spend on your own tickets and split it up among whoever wants to come.

If you really feel you must go, and you want to use the Benedryl, try it out a few days before you go. Just because he got sleepy from it in the past doesn’t mean he’ll react the same way again now. As a little kid, antihistimines made neither sleepy nor excitable, but as I got older I started getting the ‘wired’ effect pretty badly. I can’t take any of those types of meds now - they make me feel like I’ve chugged a pot of coffee. I can’t imagine being stuck on a plane feeling that way - you’d have to peel me off the ceiling on arrival.

26

Actually, instead of inconveniencing your fellow planemates, I think the most considerate solution would be for you to drive.

27

Across the Pacific? :eek:

28

Don’t be ridiculous. After they get past the bridge to Hawaii it’s a long haul to Asia. They should drive across the Atlantic–much easier.

29

Sedating drugs should be avoided in infants and toddlers, as already has been pointed out. They’ve not been demonstrated to be safe or effective for this purpose in this age group, and the side-effects may range from troublesome to disastrous (including death).

So just say no to diphenhydramine for infants and toddlers for sedative purposes.

30

There’s a little novelty toy that my kids adored at that age. Oooh, whaddya know, found it on the first try. Quiet, flashy, has a button to push.

Good luck!

31

My wife and I have done this several times with kids of the same age from the far east and Central Asia to South America.

Personally we had a disaster once with the benydryl route, never again on that one (tired cranky kids who can’t sleep, not good)

On the car chair, you need to check that it has an FAA approved label, if not, it is not approved for use on an aeroplane.
We bought one of these http://www.lillygold.com/sns.html
Small enough to get down the aisles of an aeroplane and hellaciously useful at the airport.

ETA Small cushions or some such if you cannot use the car chair as the seats are usually not comfortable for small kids to lay down on.

Lots of books, colouring and drawing things, obviously favorite teddy bear. Toys keep em limited as a pile of toys can be more hassle and cause the kids to want to swap every 5 minutes, and you don’t have a lot of space in the seats either to clutter up.
Sweets and treats (stuff that does not melt) - especially for the take off.

Lots of walking up and down with the kids.

Do not under estimate your needs , try and schedule sleep between you and your partner as tired cranky parents are pretty useless at entertaining kids. We tried taking 100% responsibility (ok give or take a little) for one kid each, so if it slept that was youir chance to sleep,and when it was awake, you were on call. We also tried one sleeping whilst the other handled both, if they were asleep during your shifty you were lucky.
We found the former worked out best (obviously with some give and take, if one sproggo is not sleeping well then the plan could be modified). We also did a bit of staggering of sleep the day leading up so we we on slightly different body clocks. Either way agree on something before you get to the tired and cranky point.
Avoid coffee, you need to be able to sleep when the opportunity arises, it doesn’t help stay relaxed either. We found most airlines were pretty good at keeping one adult meal hot so the parents could stagger the eating and minding of the kids. Do not underestimate the flailing limb ability of a small child to send drinks cups flying. Sippy cups even for the older one maybe :slight_smile:

Spare clothes - in case of major vomit moments etc and a ton of sterile wipes.
We found the kids could get pretty sweaty when sleeping in the car chair.
On the flip side, aeroplanes can get pretty chilly, a several light layers is the key

Good luck and stay chilled - happy relaxed parents is probably the best way to keep happy relaxed kids.

32

If I was doing a lot of traveling, I’d invest in that as well.

Since my trips are shorter, I’m going to try this gizmo on our Thanksgiving trip to see if it works. I like that it lets me push my luggage and the kid with one hand, and it costs only $15.

33

Me and my wife recently got back from taking our 18 month old boy to Lima Peru (wife is Peruvian). We used a DVD player that I equipped with a 12 hour battery to entertain him and dosed him with Benadryl for the final 2.5 hours when it became obvious that Thomas the Train simply was not going to keep him quiet any longer. I bought him his own seat and we did not use a car seat.

34

This thread is immensely helpful! I’m taking my son to India with us in December - he’ll be 20 months old by then. I think I’ll try lollipops, portable DVD player (he never gets to watch TV at home and he LOVES it) and lots of little things to open. I’m extremely leery of the Benadryl, though - but that’s just me. I would prefer my child be knocked out completely, of course, so we scheduled our flight to leave the U.S. at about 5 p.m., so he should hopefully only have three hours of wakefulness, then 10 hours of sleep and one more awake if the flight lands on time. Fortunately, it’s a straight shot from Newark to Bombay, so if he follows his regular sleep schedule (fortunately (for this trip anyway), he’s very accustomed to sleeping on us), he’ll be awake a total of about 4 hours (three before and one after). Of course, I have to assume it won’t happen like that - something always goes wrong, but I can dream.

I can’t wait to read more people’s suggestions.

35

Actually, the main goal is for him to get there and back alive. Keeping him quiet is a secondary goal, that I attempt to achieve out of consideration for my fellow passengers. From my own point of view, I (like most parents) am inured to the wailings of babies and can support them with equanimity.

I wish I could say that I cared enough about my fellow man to adopt your solution (I’m sure there are car ferries from Alaska to Russia, right?), but I really don’t.

36

Thanks for the article Qadgop the Mercotan. It seems to be saying that antihistamines for sedative purposes can have bad health consequences for sick children, but didn’t say that it can also have bad health consequences for healthy children, unless I read it wrong. I mentioned in the OP that our pediatrician actually recommended it. My personal experience was that benadryl was effective for the purpose of sedation of infants.

37

It baffles me that someone’s response to:

can essentially be, “Well, I tried it once and it worked, so the CDC doesn’t know what it’s talking about. Also, my doctor told me to.” Doctors aren’t perfect, and have been known to give bad or outdated advice on occasion.

To answer the OP, we’ve gone on a few cross-country flights with infants and toddlers, and I’ve found that the best way to keep a toddler happy is to have 1) a nice selection of snacks and drinks available, 2) a few new toys to maintain their interest, and 3) a favorite pillow/blanket/stuffed animal from home to help them sleep. Also if they are small enough, bring their carseat on the plane with you and install it in the seat; they’re probably used to falling asleep in the carseat, and this familiarity will work in your favor. Also consider renting one of those portable DVD players with a toddler-appropriate movie or three.

We’ve (knock on wood) never had a screaming child on a flight, and I’ve never drugged them up with antihistamines, either.

38

I can’t thank everyone individually, but there are many great ideas in here! Merci beaucoup. I’m making a list of things to remember so far. More suggestions are welcome.

[ul]
[li]goody bags with wrapped presents[/li][li]passing out earplugs to fellow passengers[/li][li]don’t be afraid to bribe them for quiet[/li][li]suckers to help with the change in air pressure and to keep them occupied[/li][li]chamomille and apple juice[/li][li]exercise before getting on the plane[/li][li]exercise if you can while on the plane[/li][li]box him up in a kennel (not!)[/li][li]have older brother help (the problem now is that he wants to help too much and we’re always telling him “maybe E doesn’t want to play with that toy right now!”);[/li][li]light-up spinning ball[/li][li]lots of colouring books[/li][li]stagger sleep patterns and agree in advance on awake schedule for parents[/li][li]check car seat for FAA approval[/li][/ul]

Shagnasty, thank you for the horror story. Now I will be able to say “our trip wasn’t so bad.”

39

Is it too crunchy to recommend breastfeeding?
Does wonders whenever they do anything to the cabin pressure.

Ours will spend most of the flight with his nose pressed to the window, so he’s usually well behaved on planes. He’s been on a couple coast-to-coast flights to visit grandparents… and variously (when the window failed): lactating breasts, some flashy-lights spinning fan-thingie, a DVD of kids shows (Blue’s Clues?), blueberries and goldfish crackers (replace with whatever food works for your kid), matchbox cars (warning: inconsolable screaming in the car when he realized he started with three and now had two). Spread all that out on 6 flights from about 10-months 'til about 28 months. Not in any particular order.

40

This will not be his only trip. I typically go every other year to visit the family. The frequency of trips has actually gone down having two very young children.
As far as having the family come here, if there was less of a disparity in family members, then I might consider that, but here there are many more people in Switzerland than there are in the USA, so it doesn’t make much sense for 10 couples / families to come over here vs. one family to go over there. And I want to go there too. Many of the relatives are getting old and between each trip (now that I’m not going as often) one of them has passed away.