2800 Miles and Still No Sleep

If you know me personally you would know that there have been some sleep issues with my son Aidan for a long time. This is never so evident as when we travel. He doesn’t sleep in the car like a normal child and there is almost no way that he will shut his eyes on an airplane. When we went back to home this summer we had to deal with the normal issues, the 4 hour time difference, the new surroundings, the sets of Grandparents and Great-grandparents, and the cost. It is a big deal to head home.

In order to save us a huge amount of money (this was the first time going home to Nova Scotia that we had to pay for a seat for Aidan) we ended up taking an evening/over-night flight. We were a little apprehensive, especially knowing our child’s seeming inexhaustible manic energy when he doesn’t go to bed and the proper time. We know that on a usual night the window is anywhere from 7:15-745 pm. If you miss the window things just go bad. So 10 hours travel time, the missing of the bedtime, and reaching our destination by 7 am local time (3 am body time) we knew we were in for an interesting time. We were right.

The first flight between Vancouver and Edmonton wasn’t too bad and we weren’t too worried about getting Aidan to sleep. We had a few hours in the Edmonton airport between flights and we figured we would get into his pjs and let him play until we got on the plane. (Ok we thought we might give him some GRAVOL and hoped that might give him the push he needed to sleep on the plane, but he was having none of it.) That went out the window when we realized that the play area was cordoned off for repairs and the rest of the airport was stuck in the seventies. So instead Aidan ran around the airport pulling his Thomas the Tank Engine bag. I have to admit he was just about the cutest thing around especially when he got tired of waiting for the plane and decided to go down the gangway anyway.

Aidan was really good on the plane to Halifax but maybe slept about 1 hour the whole time. When we got to NS we hoped (again in vain) that when we got to the house he would sleep. Wrong again! It was at least another 5 hours before he finally fell asleep. We then did the 2 hours asleep four hours up dance for the next 36 hours or so. Oh How I wish we had a child who slept anywhere. 🙂

Any tips for the travel weary?

This post is part of the Parent Bloggers Network “Pack Your Bags, Pick the Place” Blog Blast sponsored by PickPackGo.

This entry was posted in Aidan, Parent Bloggers Network, travel, vacation. Bookmark the permalink.

2 Responses to 2800 Miles and Still No Sleep

  1. Pingback: The Parent Bloggers Network » Pick the Place, Pack Your Bags, and Let’s Go! - Family Vacation Blast With PickPackGo

  2. Jenny says:

    Benadryl?

    I feel ya, sister. My daughter gets the same way when we travel. It kills me.

Comments are closed.