Tips for solo 2 hour drive with 9 week old?

[TwoKidsStillStanding]

All tips welcome, including “just don’t do it”.

I’ve been invited to a wedding when baby will be about nine weeks old (currently 5 weeks). However, neither DP nor our older child is invited - they’re obviously trying to keep numbers down and only family children/babes in arms are invited. Fair enough, it’s an invitation not a summons, etc, and I would like to go.

I’m now really nervous about the drive. I don’t mind attending the wedding alone with baby in the slightest - I’ll be with friends who will be happy to hold baby to give me a chance to eat/pop to the loo, etc, and the logistics of the day are straightforward (staying on site). It’s just the drive that I’m worried about. It’s mostly motorway but not loads of service station options, although enough to allow for at least two stops.

Any tips for solo driving with a baby?

Don't do it.
There's no way on earth I would make a 4 hour round trip to attend a wedding alone with a young child (let alone such a young baby) without DH to share the driving and the parenting duties.
It wouldn't be fun AT ALL.

From the NHS website:

*They found that while sat at this angle for 30 minutes – either stationary or when in motion – the babies' heart and breathing rate increased, and their blood oxygen levels were lower compared with lying flat in a cot.

The difficulty is knowing whether this would put the infants at serious risk – for example, whether their risk of stopping breathing goes up.*

I also read a study when DS was first born (but can't find the link right now) that there is a danger linked to the bloody oxygen levels depriving the brain, too. Though the study was small.

I think it's down to each individual parent whether they want to take the risk, however big or small that might be, of having baby in a car seat for a while.

Whenever I drive alone wit my DS, I've put the isofix into the front seat, turned off the airbags and pushed the seat as far back as possible. This has meant if he has cried for a dummy etc., I can easily pop it back in. It's made journeys much easier.

My DS has pretty good neck control by 9 weeks so I'd have been confident doing an hour journey, stopping for some lunch/a feed, then doing the other hour.

I couldn’t have done this as my babies all cried in the car & I hated it. Had an awful drive from London to Orkney when my eldest was 6w old - horrid. Stopped to buy a dummy in Carlisle but she wouldn’t take it! When I had my second & needed to drive from Manchester to Cornwall on my own with the kids, my lovely dad came down in the car with me & got the train back. Any chance you can find a wingman who would do similar for you?

I honestly think your friends are being really unreasonable. Ok so there is some kind of convention where they are not generally inviting the whole family, but we are talking about a newborn and a woman who has recently had abdominal surgery, and a long journey. I cannot see that I would even put you in that position for my wedding. People are so ridiculous about weddings anyway, their rules and their financial considerations put ahead of their guests’ convenience and comfort all hiding behind the convention of ‘my wedding, my rules’. Honestly, in your position I wouldn’t go. It’s a long journey that will need to be broken up, and having a newborn is exhausting. Some people would go, but I don’t think I would!

Token, you've quoted that very selectively! That study also says that it's mainly premature babies who have the issues with breathing.

Here's a source which confines the 30 minute limit to the first 4 weeks:

www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-37947841/car-seat-warning-for-infants-on-long-journeys

www.which.co.uk/news/2019/08/summer-bank-holiday-car-seat-warning/

If your baby sleeps in the car then it won’t be a problem. Just put him in, drive, maybe stop half way for a break and a feed/change (although if your baby is anything like mine he’ll sleep and not wake for feeds until you’re at your destination).

What would be the point of taking DP and other child as well? For company?

My main tip is that the passenger seat of a (obviously non-moving) car is actually a comfy place to breastfeed a baby. Bring snacks and a flask for yourself, and you don't necessarily need to go into a service station to do a feed.

Finding somewhere to change a nappy can take a bit more organisation, although if you have a car with a flat boot then you can do it there - we did this many times.

I took a 3 month old to the US for a wedding, and it was lovely to be able to hand him over to other guests to cuddle him while I got a break.

Is it just me that’s amazed at pp who think a simple journey is being turned into a military op?
Finding somewhere to feed, change?
Hello, your car is ample for this, baby changed on your lap or backseat, same for feeding, how do pp manage to go anywhere?

Thanks all - some of you have definitely made me more confident that this is doable! (The rest of you shared my parents’ horror that DP and DS weren’t invited and that I was expected to travel alone.)

I must admit, I think some of it is me feeling a little un-confident in general after baby - although the CS was an elective, it wasn’t inevitable from an early stage and the recovery has been tougher this time round. That coupled with the driving ban has made me wobble. I’m not normally bothered about baby logistics - I find people are very helpful and things normally work themselves out - it’s just the driving.

If I’d thought ahead, I might have looked into taking DP just for the journey. But I wanted to be able to stay at the venue, which is exclusive use for the wedding party and guests, so not really an option. Plus it would have meant him taking a day off work (it’s a weekday wedding) and us begging yet more favours from the grandparents.

It’s going to be fine, because I’ve decided it will be. He’s going to sleep the whole way bar a stop and definitely not poo on whatever breastfeeding-friendly dress I’ve managed to find. Right? Right?!

So people are having to take time off work to attend this wedding without their partners?!

The 2 hour drive will be totally fine. Assuming you’re a confident driver and your baby just sleeps in the car like most of them do. I personally wouldn’t even stop unless the baby was crying. Feed and change before you go and then when you get there. Your baby isn’t a tiny newborn anymore, so 2 hours in a car seat is fine.

Wedding with a baby is less fun. We took DD when she was 10 weeks. She was fine, slept, hung around in the pram and enjoyed being cuddled by everyone. I had DH with me though and it was still tiring, mostly due to having to cart around all the baby stuff and being up half the night in a hotel.