Tips for flying with 3mo, beating jet lag and bringing bedtime forward

[sambababy]

Hello mumsnetters!
We are taking our 3mo DD to the UK from Brazil in 3 weeks time to visit family and I'm starting to get nervous.

1. the flight - any tips welcome. Thank goodness it will be a night flight but I'm still worried about flying with her, perhaps more because of expected evils from fellow passengers and those tiny stinky filthy toilets in which I'll have to change her.
2. the jet lag - she currently won't go to sleep before 11pm (we achieved 10:30 once!) which with the +4hr time difference will mean going to bed at 3am uk time aaagggghhh!! So I'm after any tips to help bring her bedtime forward in anticipation, and dealing with the inevitable jet lag. Currently we give her a bath around 8/8.30 (fitting it in around her last nap, feeds and getting our dinner) then take her to the bedroom where the lights are a bit lower, but she still feeds two more times before she will sleep. I swaddle her and rock her til she's asleep then put her in her crib with the white noise. Thank you in advance!

Bump

I say don't worry about anything in anticipation. The flight or the time difference. I'd just keep doing what you're doing and then deal with the flight when you're on it and then deal with sleeping in UK once you're here, iyswim. Babies are incredibly adaptable at that age and the fact that they sleep the majority of any 24hrs usually works in your favour.

Evening cluster feeding is completely normal at this age (i.e. what you describe your DD doing - having several feeds in evening before settling for night) and there's nothing you can do to change that, nor should you really try (they feed lots at that time for a biological reason). Chances are she'll shift everything earlier on to your new time zone within a few days.

Re. the flight - breastfeeding is your friend (if indeed you are bf). Not much you can do about tutting fellow passengers (other than give them evil stares back). If she's small enough, you could change nappies on your lap, avoiding the loos. Or on the floor in front of your seat if you have a bulkhead. And worst case, you spend a lot of the flight walking up and down the aisles with her.

Happy travels!

Hi Sambababy, personally I'd just go with the flow and not worry too much about routines/timing etc, you'll just drive yourself mad trying to work out time zones etc. Just watch your DD and when she is getting tired, get her off to sleep however you usually do - it sounds like she is rocked off so go with that. She is still very small and this is going to be a big adventure for her!

A couple of tips - take a sling or baby carrier if you have one, you'll probably be doing some pacing up and down the plane! If you're taking a buggy, ask to take it to the gate - sometimes you can take it right to the plane and then pick it up as soon as you land but depends on the airline and ground crew.

Good luck and enjoy - flying with a toddler is much much worse than flying with a baby so don't worry about it! Most of the people on the plane are more likely to be sympathetic than grumpy, many of them will have been there!