Recently, I took my 1-year-old daughter to San Francisco to visit old friends. It was her first time crossing multiple time zones, and I worried that the change would have us all up at 4 a.m. reading Baby’s Day 14 times in a row. So I asked my online parents’ group how to prepare.
The tips were many and varied, but I followed a few of them to great success. When I returned, I called up Christopher Tolcher, MD, a pediatrician in Los Angeles, to get his take.
Marrying medical expert advice with mom expert experience, here are my eight tips for happy, sleep-filled travels with your young child.
1. Schedule for success. If you can, plan your flight or drive to maximize napping and arrive at a good transition time. For us, that meant leaving at 9 a.m. EST, so that our daughter napped on the plane. Then, by the time we were settled into my friend’s SF bungalow, it was time for her second nap (by the California clock), so we put her down and then kept her up until her normal bedtime PST.
2. Get outside or in bright light right away. “Sunlight affects things like melanin secretion,” says Dr. Tolcher. “It tells the body it is time to be awake.” After our daughter took that first California nap, we got her up and out to the playground and stayed there till dinner time. Dr. Tolcher also recommends a lot of stimulation (like swings!).
3. Immediately switch to the new schedule. Do what you can to keep kids awake until it’s bedtime in your new location; this will help them adjust more quickly.
4. That said, let children nap when they need to. This came from the moms, and it’s good advice. If your kid is tired, let them nap. Later you can get them back on the right schedule, but no one will be happy if you force a sleepy kid to keep his eyes open. Dr. Tolcher recommends keeping naps to a two-hour maximum for kids under 2. Wake them for anything beyond that. We had to wake our daughter from that first nap, and she was mighty groggy, but the playground perked her right up.
Next page: How to make a kid at home
Comments (2)
yeh right.. great post, Thank You
Very much helpful dispatch but there are some burden where I resolve not agree. But blanket its completely good.