Travel with Children - WWYD toddler won't settle to sleep on night flight

Just travelled with my just-turned 3 yr ORD-CDG and I couldn't do anything to get her to sleep until 4 hrs into the flight which was her 9 PM bedtime. The lady sitting next to me was very nasty about it but what was I supposed to do. It wasn't like she was crying just talking to me, snacking, doing puzzles and coloring. And she was louder when I put the headphones on her and tried to get her interested in a movie. We were sitting in the middle three and I had her sitting in my lap on the aisle so there was her sit open between myself and the lady. What do you say or do when a seatmate starts saying nasty comment to you? I usually try to take the later night departures so she sleeps quickly but this time it was with miles and we left at 5 PM.

Nasty comments come from nasty people.
Kids will be kids and from your account it seems the child was within normal guidelines of behavior for a 3 year old.

What do I do?
Tell her to stuff a sock in it, more or less.

Honestly, I'd probably be curt and explain that I don't take parenting advice from random strangers in airplanes.

What do I do?
Tell her to stuff a sock in it, more or less.

Honestly, I'd probably be curt and explain that I don't take parenting advice from random strangers in airplanes.

Ditto.

She wasn't crying, she wasn't invading the lady's space and it's none of her beeswax if the child isn't sleeping. You and your child have as much right to be on the flight as she does.

I had passengers complaining about crying babies when the parents weren't doing anything/much to stop it. Someone once complained about me overscolding my children on a flight. (Bad habit from living in France where parents constantly ride their children over ever tiny detail). Those are legit, although they shouldn't complain about my childrens' behavior afterwards (they didn't!) From what you described, IMHO, I think you just got unlucky with your seatmate.

Unless you were sitting next to me in C or F. Then Id be super-pissed-off!

I don't mind kids (or adults) talking, as long as they use their 'inside' voices.

I've been annoyed with kids (and adults) who talked so loudly (and continuously) that even my noise-isolating headphones couldn't block them out.

I would offer her a set of the complimentary headphones. :td:

Sounds like you and your kid were doing great. Lots of people---kids and adults included---don't sleep on over-night flights, and it can be rotten if you do and get seated next to one. Unfortunately, there's not a lot to be done if it's a full flight. If it wasn't, she could have always asked to be reseated (which would have the extra bonus of giving your kid more space).

Unless you were sitting next to me in C or F. Then Id be super-pissed-off!

Not sure what the cabin has to do with it. The same issues often arise in C, and them's the breaks. F is less of an issue, since the larger and more private seating generally insulate you from awake (but relatively) quiet neighbors.

What do I do?
Tell her to stuff a sock in it, more or less.

Honestly, I'd probably be curt and explain that I don't take parenting advice from random strangers in airplanes.

Word. Tell her to go pound sand.

There are some gender issues at work. I think a dad is much quicker to push back - the rare times when I've gotten any grief about flying with Toddler Flavorflav, I give it right back 10 times as hard.

At the same time, I think people are quicker to run their mouth to a woman traveling with a child than to a man. I would even argue that people are much more solicitous to a dad traveling solo with child than to a mom. Part of the old story about how dads who leave work early to catch a little league game are sainted while moms who leave early to take junior to the doctor are ripped for not pulling their weight at work.

Veered OT a bit. But like the poster said, tell your neighbor to stick it.

Definitely tell the neighbor to mind her own business. Your child wasn't acting up, she was just being a normal (sounds like pretty well behaved) child and you were doing your best to make sure any impact on other passengers was minimal. That's all you can do.

Call the Steward(ess) and ask for a scotch.

Call the Steward(ess) and ask for a scotch.

and if the child isn't a scotch drinker ask for a brandy.

Not sure what the cabin has to do with it. The same issues often arise in C, and them's the breaks. F is less of an issue, since the larger and more private seating generally insulate you from awake (but relatively) quiet neighbors.

I assumed the commenter was being facetious.

Brandy and Scotch, lol...

And for the record, I don't think you (OP) did anything wrong. The other passenger was clearly being overly sensitive. Also, that the child went to sleep by around 9pm is great. I've flown HNL-ORD where my daughter (not quite a toddler) was irritable the entire redeye flight back home. She didn't sleep, so neither did I. Rather, when I wasn't trying to get her to fall asleep in our seats, we spent much of the flight either by the restrooms or in the galley hanging with the flight attendants. Best way to avoid bothering other people.

Without hearing the other pax' side of the story it's hard to make a call. No offence to OP but other people may not see things the same way.

Next time tire your kid out before flights by minimizing day nap and consider benadryl.
Did you try to switch seats with your kid and take a middle? Also what do you mean by "nasty comments"?

I do find it rather amusing how people respond to posts presenting one side of the story be it "I am a tired road warrior who can't get a break because of all these little brats misbehaving and their parents who couldn't care less" or "my innocent child is just sitting there quietly but the evil neighbor gives me those nasty looks".
Anonymous message board is a wonderful thing. :D

Without hearing the other pax' side of the story it's hard to make a call. No offence to OP but other people may not see things the same way.

Fair. Unless you were there you don't know the full story. In this case, though, I have no prior reason to disbelieve the poster.

Next time tire your kid out before flights by minimizing day nap and consider benadryl.

Some of us choose not to medicate our kids (just as we don't medicate ourselves) and instead get on the timezone of the destination. Often, that means not sleeping on the flight. Whether one chooses to sleep on a flight is personal preference, and there is no "right" answer, no matter what the age.

Also, even if sleep is the desired outcome, minimizing the nap may not be the right way to get there. This is not a parenting forum, but you might search for "sleep begets sleep" if you want to inform yourself on the (pseudo)science and debate on this issue.

When we fly with our kid, I usually apologise in advance for any potential disturbance in a light-hearted manner. If the kid misbehaves, I try my best to calm him down. The combination of these steps usually prevent any kind of negative comments from fellow passengers even if they are not happy about this situation. So far, I have not had a situation where I would have to push back. Oh and by the way, I agree that being a dad helps :cool:

The flight left at 5PM, am I reading that correctly? What kid is going to fall asleep for the "night" at 5PM, regardless of what time you are scheduled to arrive in CDG. Yeah I understand you have to reset your internal clock so you don't miss the eleventy billion tour stops that you can't miss, but for chrissakes....I don't blame the kid one bit.

Some people will be in bad moods. Some people don't like kids. It's just like that. They will not be happy about being next to the best behaved child in the world. They may having something truly horrible going on in their lives and are just nasty to the world. I had some really difficult passengers that turned out that they had a recent death of someone close, or a family emergency...

They're on our flights and there's nothing we can do about it, and nothing we can do to help. I'm not saying that we don't have the right to speak out, especially if our child is not causing a disturbance.

Yep, I have never been able to wave a wand and "make" my kids fall alseep at an unatural hour. It's just not going to happen.

I think that most parents are terribly embarrassed and do their best to control their kid's behavior when in all fairness - as previous posters have said, a child is a child and is going to behave like one.

On a recent long haul business class fare, my little one got up around 4 am and started sobbing gently (just thanks to the new surroundings, the dark space, and a bit of insecurity.) I immediately picked her up, took her to the galley and comforted her - still one irate passenger got up and snapped at me and only stopped when I snapped right back telling them to get over it and that this was a 3 year old child. I came this close to telling the fellow passenger to go to hell... and to take his private jet the next time. But I decided to focus on my little princess instead of wasting time with Mr. Snapdragon.

Passengers DO tend to be more intolerant (rude?) in business and first re: kids - assuming that just because they have paid so much more, they deserve peace and quiet. Its logical in their mind, it does not mean they are right or that they have any place in making you feel responsible.

9 times out of 10, people are either accepting or even downright helpful. Dont forget that. And most certainly, dont stop flying in F, J, or any other class just because you feel bad about your kid.

Then again, there are other parents who just dont give a damn about their kids raising a storm on flights - now that's something entirely unacceptable... :P

Next time tire your kid out before flights by minimizing day nap and consider benadryl.


I'm looking at my bottle right now, and here's what the directions say:

"Children under 2 years: Do not use."

"Children 2-5 yrs: Do not use unless directed by a doctor"

I think it's irresponsible to advise someone to use a product in a way that may not comply with the indicated dosage/instructions.

I'm looking at my bottle right now, and here's what the directions say:

"Children under 2 years: Do not use."

"Children 2-5 yrs: Do not use unless directed by a doctor"

I think it's irresponsible to advise someone to use a product in a way that may not comply with the indicated dosage/instructions.

Most certainly check with your doc if you haven't done so already. I think I discussed it before kids turned one.
In general all pediatric medications will have a note of this nature as clinical trials are not normally done in that age group. Off label use however is very common (infrequent use that is) with obvious common sense dosage, frequency etc precautions.

My kids stopped napping around 18 months old. My younger daughter especially has never needed much sleep. So at 5 pm she wouldn't have been hollering at age 3 but she would never have gone to sleep. She would have been talking and making normal toddler/preschool noises. The few relaly long haul international flights we took when our kids were that age we tried to depart as late as possible.

My kids weren't big nappers either. The oldest and youngest dropped them early. Of course those were the two more active children. The calmer, middle child slept a lot more (giving into some logistical problems but not to get OT).

I don't give antihistamines only because Benedyrl sent me to the emergency room, completely passed out, at age 7. My nurse mother and doctor father couldn't revive me ("boy does walking in the ER with a child drapped over your arms gets you fast service" my mother later quipped). We flew a lot so luckily, it never happened on any of our transcons. My sister and mother also have problems with antihistamines so I simply can't give them to my kids, with that "genetic history".

Twice, I also saw kids go hyper-wired on flights. One set of parents said they had never given it to their child. I did nicely point out that perhaps an airplane is not the best place to try out a new med. I also mentioned that the same drug had sent me to the ER... The other girl was around 6-7 years old and had been given it before but she had never gone hyper. It was in business but her neighbors were very understanding. They just thought she was a super-active child. None of us told them that she had been given an antihistamine.

I have seen children given drugs to make them sleep and it did work. Please talk to your doctors and don't give it on a flight less than 5-6 hours. Also, don't give it until you take-off (in case of an emergency evacuation or more likely, you have a delay or cancellation). Try it at home first.

I also don't think parents should be pressured to make their children sleep on all flights, at any time. It's unreasonable to think that say, a child on a transcon in the daytime should sleep the whole time. That would mess up their schedule and quite frankly, it's not necessary.

No one should complain about a quiet, occupied child or even a child who walks up the aisles from time to time (keeping in mind that they aren't disturbing those they pass), even on a night flight.

I like what one mom said "It's not your fault if the person behind you can't afford his own, private plane..."