AIBU to be surprised by a five-year-old given cola in a bottle?

[Freshtona]

On a flight the other day and a child of about 5 was having total meltdown and was given a baby bottle with Coca-Cola to calm them! The parents had bottles of coke with them to top it up!

I think child was ND, but regardless of that, why would anyone give that to a 5-year old child??? I try not to judge other parents and my own DC aren't strangers to sugar but cola is not allowed. The caffeine and sugar would surely make meltdowns even worse, not to mention the effect on teeth.

YANBU 5 year old should be able to drink out of a can by that age 👍.

Some ND children would starve to death without their safe foods

The OP who actually saw the child said in her first post he appeared to be ND so that’s what I was basing my response on. Not sure why you know better than the OP who presumably observed some unusual behaviours that this was just a badly behaved child!

The ND kids won’t starve - yeah they will. My son is underweight and under a paediatrician. He genuinely will go many days without eating ANYTHING. I genuinely think he’d have died from “failure to thrive” in another time. Now it’d be neglect to let him lose any more weight and following drs orders we do give him safe foods - judge all you want until you’ve lived it you’d not believe just how far some children will go.

They shouldn't be addicted to it at that age in the first place.

If a 5 year old is drinking from a baby bottle I'm assuming they're SEND and the parents want a quiet flight.

That wasn’t clear.
What you are talking about is stopping a hypo.

True enough she did think this child might be ND.
I think I was responding to the poster before who pointed out that there will be children who are not ND who are given coke etc. Which is true.
ND or not I think coke for a five year old is making a rod for a parent’s own back. If they want Coke is because they have had it long and often before a flight. They are used to having it.

@ThisOliveKoala I have worked with probably 3000 autistic people in the last 25 years and every single last one was completely different from the first. I also have 4 autistic children myself and 2 would survive on nothing but milk to drink without being fed their safe foods. Even when weaning them, they’d refuse to eat my purées, but would have the ones my friend would feed her ds. It’s because mine was using fresh vegetables and fruit so would taste different each time they would have it. Like when you get a strawberry and sometimes they’re sweet but others sour, when you have processed baby food it’s heated to such a high temperature it’s basically syrup, which is why every batch tastes the same, making it safer for a child to eat. Even now they’re older, they’re extremely difficult to feed and even though I love to cook, the most they’ll accept from me is toast some days. It’s shit. But if I did try and force foods they’d genuinely starve.

Would I give it to my child - no, but I try not to judge other people.
Tbh even if I saw a 5 year old having water in a baby bottle I would assume ND and mind my own business.
I wouldn’t give my child a tablet or smartphone but if we had a flight booked I would consider it.

Not read all comments but studies have shown that caffeine can have different impacts to NT people than ND people.

Whereas caffeine is a stimulant for NT people it can be calming for ND people causing a sleepiness/ calming effect.

So without knowing the exact reason it is possible if the child was ND as Op suspect d the drink was given to calm the child during the flight.
And therefore make the flight more comfortable for the rest of the passengers

Unfortunately there are many parents who are basically stupid 🤷🏻‍♀️ why on earth you would give a small child cola regardless of how it is served is mind boggling.

People with adhd aren’t affected by caffeine and nicotine in the same way as neurotically people. Nicotine is currently being trialed for Tourette’s therapy to reduce tics etc and nicotine is a calming thing for me. Oddly I’ve never been addicted to nicotine and could stay and start smoking whenever I fancied when I was younger. Catering also doesn’t really attract me and call even mage me a bit sleepy. There is every chance that these parents know this and Cola can actually help to calm their kiddo. I don’t agree with the Cola aspect being delivered in a bottle but who am I to judge?

Cola is hardly a safe food … they have to be given it in the first place to even know it exists!!

100% agree … if you don’t give them junk in the first place then they don’t know it’s an available choice.