Is it normal for a young adult to take a teddy and a comfort blanket on a plane?

[YourAmplePlumPoster]

Seen this a few times while travelling. The staff just stick the fluffy toys and blankets in the overhead locker so defeats the object. Maybe just try biting the seat in front of you to calm your nerves or take some valium. I'm a nervous flyer so just havd a couple of drinks.

This all day long. Depression and anxiety are glamourised so much on social media that kids feel they need to have something to feel ‘special’. I work with kids who are essentially healthy and well adjusted, yet they crave attention so much. Carrying a teddy or similar makes them ‘interesting’ in their eyes and thus they do it. Many bring blankets to school to keep themselves cosy. It’s unusual but happens a lot. Only seen it happening in the past couple of years.

Edited to add that those who really struggle with anxiety and/or depression rarely act like this; they’re the ones who really need the help that we of course provide.

Perfectly put

Everyone is different!

I’m waiting at the dentist as I write this morning, and I’m starting to think a teddy-bear is needed, as it’s so scary. 😐

Being resilient and brave as maybe the Suffragettes were or Grans and Mums getting through wars and the battles of seventies feminists is no longer respected. It's actively despised. Judging by this thread. Maybe it explains why children are being sent to school at age 5 in nappies, unable to talk and not being fed at home.

Your dentist is not going to kill you.

Please don’t judge others for what they may carry around or wear.

I work with an adult in his 20’s and his LD are not visible- he carries around a baby doll in a baby carrier.
As a child his mom never let him have dolls as they were girls toys. He was taken into care as a teen and has always since then had a doll as his support workers have allowed him to make his own safe choices.

My autistic adult DC takes plush jellycats on flights. The staff never take them away. On a few flights, staff even moved them to where there was an extra empty seat and the jellycats got their own water and chocolate. They are not a nervous flyer, they are nervous about being trapped in a tin can with hundreds of people cheek by jowl for hours.

How true. The genuinely mentally ill have their resources and services cut and then there is a scandal where an axeman or a knife man goes on the rampage and the tabloids ramp up a hate campaign against them.

Taking a plushie on a flight as an adult is not performing mental illness. It is a form of self care that prevents mental illness. ND children who have their needs met are going to be healthy and well adjusted adults capable of knowing what they need and having the courage to brave old fashioned and ignorant stigma against harmless things like taking a plushie on a flight with you.

Nothing prevents mental illness more than medication. Without medication my son would be a raving lunatic who either kills or is killed through suicide. Teddies are not a substitute for meds.

And actually, they do not want attention, they want acceptance. They want to widen the window of social norms to include the way they need to navigate the world in a way that keeps them as calm and regulated as a NT person automatically is kept because everything is already designed for a NT person’s needs over an ND person’s needs.

They don't need teddies. They need meds. But meds are bad, m'kay?

Drugs do not prevent mental illness, they are one line of treatment for mental illness. Most mentally ill people require more than drugs to stay stable.

ND is not a mental illness. How can you know so little? Is your child very complex or not ND?

No most young adults wouldn’t take a Teddy or blanket on a plane.

Kids yes but not adults 18+

My DS 14 with learning disability and asd loves his blanket and teddy but wouldn’t dream of taking it on a plane as he’d be embarrassed. So no NT adult needs to take one. To add he doesn’t go to mainstream classes. He’s in a specialist until catering for children with SEN and EHCP’s and there is only 9 in the class such is the need.

Can they? Of course they can! But no it’s not normal

😂🤣 bloody hell

It’s not death I’m afraid of.

Being brave means doing something you fear

it doesn’t mean - making that harder than it needs be to just fit in with societies ideas

so one could suggest that taking the bear and saying sod you to societal norms is exactly what the suffragettes might do - they rejected the norms that were based on nothing

and I am not sure what that had to do with children in nappies. Getting out of nappies has benefits for the person and society ( although all those adds for pee pants suggests we are not as advanced there as we should be) . It’s a slippery slope argument that doesn’t bear 🤭 up to any logical analysis

I suspect the suffragettes were strong on logic too

Well my kids and grandchildren were out of nappies at 2, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not understanding if people’s needs. There is a happy medium here.

Your son has schizophrenia, which is rather different from anxiety.

That explains it in a nutshell.

Do you not think that shows something very wrong with society though? He has an object that could provide comfort but he feels he can’t use it because of others?

why should anyone care what safe, legal options people use to find comfort?

Would you rather he feels embarrassed or wants to be treated like every other passenger? Most flights are 3 hours tops unless you're flying long haul. Sometimes it's not a bad thing to say suck it up or get on with it. I had a phobia about flying years ago but I refused to let it defeat me so I just did it. Now I don't have the phobia.

I understand what you’re saying and in general I wish people were more understanding and sympathetic of those with disabilities.

Regarding the bears/blankets, DS is aware enough to make that decision himself. Having his bear wouldn’t make the situation any better, but it would make it worse as he’d feel self conscious.