Should baby drink Coke or go thirsty?

[FoundDoveInaSoaplessPlace]

We are travelling in SE Asia with a baby and toddler.
Yesterday our planned journey of a 2 hour drive and 30 minute ferry took a total of nine hours. Because of the road delays ( road works and further on a bad accident) we missed the ferry and had to get into a small local boat.
It was hot and humid all day but we got through it ok until the final leg on the boat. Our 12 mo baby got very thirsty and the only drink left was a new bottle of Diet Coke. Baby got extremely agitated and our friend poured some into her bottle as I was holding onto our toddler.

DH who was holding her refused to give it to her and said she would have to wait for clean water. She screamed for 15 minutes until she wore herself out and fell asleep. It was dark and the sea was choppy so I couldn't stand up to give it to her.

DH is extremely anti sugar but AIBU to think that he could have put his principles aside on this one occasion?

Thank you. Sorry - think my post was a bit "me, me, me" but I was so cross that people would be so irresponsible.

She's lots better. They thought she had meningitis hysteria but thank God it seems like it was just a horrible virus combined with a horrific reaction to her last set of jabs. Terrifying.

If it was a car ferry it's quite normal not to be allowed to move out of the passenger bit while it's under way.

We are travelling in SE Asia with a baby and toddler MISTAKE #1

we missed the ferry and had to get into a small local boat MISTAKE #2

the only drink left was a new bottle of Diet Coke MISTAKE #3

It was dark and the sea was choppy so I couldn't stand up to give it to her WTAF?

I don't think I'd trust you to travel in SE Asia with my dog, tbh.

The remaining water was in a bag at the front of the boat (stupid I know but I had two navy bags and kept the wrong one by my side)and when it started to get choppy I couldn't risk walking to get it. The boat was small and my toddler needed me.

A car ferry is not so small that it is impossible for an adult to walk in choppy weather to get a bag (note: the excuse is that the water was in a bag at the front of the ferry. Not that it was in an inaccessible car)

Big fat hairy bollocks.

That is all I have to say.

Thanks for that image Mymble

Babies and small children can succumb quickly to extremes of temperature - heatstroke, dehydration as well as hypothermia.
Any fluids are better than no fluids. Thank goodness your baby was fine. Not giving her a drink in such hot conditions could have been dangerous.
Yes, Diet Coke is not great stuff - caffeine/toxic artificial sweetener. And mostly water. But we aren't talking about weaning her on Coke as many do in countries like Mexico.

I don't mean to sound like I am judging or being horrid but it does sound like you were very unprepared for that trip yesterday. When it's a hot day anywhere with a baby you should ALWAYS make sure you have enough fluids with you to cover yourself in an delay situation.
It's just part of being a parent to have every situation that might happen prepared for when traveling

How long were you on the boat for? If you had water with you before you got on the boat then was the baby actually dehydrated or did it just see a bottle and throw a fit? If this is the case I wouldn't have given it coke either.

But my aibu was whether DH could have relaxed his no sugar for children policy just once?

BUT THERE ISN'T ANY SUGAR IN DIET COKE!

What an interesting username you have op in light of yesterday's media request.

So to answer your question seriously what you of course should have done is drunk the coke yourself and then breastfed the child. Isn't that what any mother would have done?

You should have taken the chicken first, leaving the fox with the grain, fetch the grain and take the chicken back with you, swap the chicken for the fox, finally go back for the chicken and reward yourself with the coke.

Yeah. I was confused about the car.

As far as I can tell they drove to a port and either left the car there and got on a small boat, with the woman carrying 10 litres of water in a blue bag, which she accidentally confused for a different bag and stowed in the wrong place which she then couldn't reach because she couldn't move around the boat because it was choppy. At this point I am envisaging some sort of fishing boat style thing, because that sounds small enough to make moving around dangerous in poor weather.

Or they drove their car onto a smaller ferry and left the water in the car while they went upstairs or wherever... but in this scenario I am confused by how there would be no access to any other drinks at all... Or why they couldn't move around...

Technology is brilliant

small river ferries in se asia are nothing like small ferries in europe.

Doubt the car was on the boat. It's typical and easy to arrange private car transfers in Asia.

The OPs description sounds like many a journey I have made in the region, although not with young children. One particularly memorable small boat trip through fog at a 45 degree angle in the stormy water... Conditions were great when we boarded and boat was not listing.

Sounds like you are deflecting your anger and guilt about the situation onto DH when in actual fact you've both parented in an inadequate and risky manner in this instance. Whether or not Coke is bad for babies is actually the last thing you should be arguing about here.

What part about Diet Coke containing no sugar does your H not understand?

Personally I would have left the DC Ruth H and friends and crawled, if I had to, to get the water you had in your bags b

I find coke very thirst quenching and in an emergency would certainly have given it to a baby. A one-off won't hurt.

But why on earth do people take young babies on these sorts of trips anyway? Stick to somewhere like France or Cornwall and go on the exotic trips when they're more than awkward baggage and might actually remember and appreciate the trip.

Btw the op does clarify that it was not diet coke but regular coke in a later post.

Which lifestyle section do you write for? If it's a posh one, couldn't your husband have squeezed the juice out of some freshly ground quinoa seeds and mixed it together with an avocado skin for extra flavour to give to the baby? If its one of the crappy newspapers, the baby would have enjoyed some Haribo to chew on along with the diet coke

Seriously, is this a windup? You took a baby and toddler on a small boat (small enough that you had to wear life jackets throughout the trip) where the weather conditions were so rough that you could not move from your seat to get some water from the front of the boat?! Meanwhile your hero of a husband is more worried about giving sugar (from a sugar-free drink) to your baby than getting himself up to the front of the boat to get the water?!

Which way's the irresponsible parent step?

Oh and now that you have reached your destination in SE Asia, you have found time to join MN and tell us all about it?!

Btw, in case anyone's interested, apparently if you're marooned at sea, and all you have is alcohol, it is better to drink the alcohol than nothing, providing it's under 13%.