Why I Drug My Children on Airplanes, Says Mum

 

Somewhere high above the Atlantic, I caved in. It wasn’t so much the fact my daughter, Flo, then one, had been screaming since take-off three hours earlier.

Or even that, crammed into my economy-class seat with this bawling bundle, I had yet to pour myself the calming snifter I yearned for, open a miniature packet of pretzels or even go to the loo.

I was held hostage to the relentless, nerve-jangling wailing of my inconsolable infant. And so were the other 300 passengers.

It was the looks of hatred on their faces — glares saying: ‘Can’t you do something about that dreadful noise, you ineffectual mother?’ — that made me reach, in desperation, for the bottle in my handbag.

It wasn’t vodka. This was something that held the promise of a few hours of peace; the chance to eat dinner without having the contents thrown around. It was what was going to save me from a lynching at 37,000 ft.

One spoonful of a sedating medicine was all it took to knock out Flo. She slept for hours, blissfully drugged.

Who would have thought that for many people, this simple decision to sedate my daughter with an antihistamine was a dangerous abuse of my parental power? But many mothers, like me, believe it’s common sense.

The rights and wrongs of sedating babies on long-haul flights is a controversial war that is being waged on internet parenting forums, fuelled by the huge rise in families seeking long-haul destinations over Easter in the desperate search for sun.

Culled from DAILY MAIL

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