Live Q & A Transcript
12/7/2023 - Travel with infants (by car)
I am Andrea, a postpartum doula and Certified Lactation Counselor and I am here to talk about lactation, postpartum and just parenting in general. Originally my plan was to talk about traveling with infants in general and then as I started thinking about it I realized that there is a lot to talk about. So right now I am going to talk about car travel with infants and then next week I am going to talk about airplane travel with infants.
My experience in the last 8 years of having children has been that my husband and I have lived 8 to 12 hours away from family, driving distance. We have traveled many times with 1, 2, 3 children in the car under the age of 8, so we have a lot of personal experience with this. One of the main things to plan for especially with an infant, we are talking less than 6 months, less than 3 months, is that they need to stop every 2 to 3 hours to feed whether they are breastfed, fed human milk in a bottle, or fed formula, they need to eat often. If you get a baby that sometimes sleeps longer stretches that is great and we are going to talk about that a little bit at the end. But usually infants need to stop often and you know it takes 15 to 20 minutes to feed the baby and then change the baby and then an outfit change and then some spit up and then another outfit change and then maybe you need an outfit change. All of that is going to take a little bit of time. So setting realistic expectations is important, you might need a 45 minute stop every 2 to 3 hours. Also there are some ways to make things a little bit faster. You can have your partner pump the gas while you go inside to use the bathroom and they can get the baby out of the car seat and ready to feed. Then you can order food and you can eat while they start the feed with the baby and then you can trade off. That way you are getting more things done at once and you can cut maybe 5 or 10 minutes off that stop.
For older infants if they are closer to 6 months or a little older, it is fine to have baby safe toys for them to chew on and grab. If you want them hanging down, make sure that baby can’t get tangled in the strings. Having teether toys, rattles, things that make noise, light up toys can all be helpful. But generally babies under a year have a hard time in the car. Usually they are either sleeping or they are screaming, so it is also important to be mentally and emotionally prepared for that. Sometimes you get a miracle baby who is happy and awake in the car seat. You can also try blasting music to distract them or help them fall asleep. One of my children really liked Shania Twain, so we would blast that and they would fall asleep, so that is what we listened to for several months of car rides. Find what works best for your family. You might want to take this time in the car together to talk to your partner or listen to your own music before your kids start to tell you that you aren’t allowed to listen to what you want to listen to because they have their own strong musical preferences. So you can try to enjoy that time together as a couple as well. Or if you want to split things up, you can try to put one adult in the back, get some little puppets or toys and sing songs and play games with the baby. It is definitely worth a try.
Those are some of the main things to think about when traveling by car with an infant. Also remember to have extra diapers, an extra change of clothes for you and for the baby easily accessible. Not in your suitcase under a packnplay in the truck. But also consider not just having your normal diaper bag, but an extra bag with extra clothes and diapers in the car. I like to keep that stuff in the car all the time, so if I suddenly realize that my diaper bag is empty, I already have extra diapers, extra outfits, extra socks for all of the children in the car. That can help relieve some of that stress, if you accidentally forget to refill the diaper bag.
The last thing that I wanted to talk about is that if your baby is awesome and decides to sleep longer stretches and you are able to do a 3 or 4 hour stretch of driving, that would be great. However, if they do that and you are feeding human milk whether you are pumping or feeding at the chest, you will want to make sure that you express milk. Especially in those early weeks, less than 3 months even up to 6 months, you want to make sure that you are taking milk out every 2 to 3 hours, so 10 to 12 times a day. If that is the case and your baby is sleeping and you want to keep driving, it is ideal if you are the passenger. You can use something like this, a Haakaa, which creates suction, so it works like a pump to remove milk. Or you can use something like this which is a manual or hand pump. This does the flutter effect of the baby trying to get a let down and this is the slower sucks. You can express milk with a cover in the front passenger seat of the car while the car is driving. If you have a battery powered pump or one that you can plug into the car you can use that as well, if you want to do a full pumping session. But these other options can be really convenient for car rides if you are traveling and you don’t want to pack an entire pump and you don’t really need a full electric pump on your trip. Also if you are traveling and you want to go see a movie or go on a date night or for a little walk and you want to leave your baby with just a couple ounces, the travel pump options can be helpful. Another option is that you can hand express milk and use the hand pump or Haakaa as a way to catch the milk.
Those are some of my tips about car travel. I would love to hear about any tips that you have. I know that lots of people travel by car with infants and every infant is different so there are always lots of great ideas to learn from other parents. If you liked any of these suggestions or have any other questions about car travel, let me know in the comments or send me a message. If you have any other questions about lactation, pregnancy, postpartum, parenting, please send me a message or leave a comment. I’ll talk to you all next week. Bye!
My experience in the last 8 years of having children has been that my husband and I have lived 8 to 12 hours away from family, driving distance. We have traveled many times with 1, 2, 3 children in the car under the age of 8, so we have a lot of personal experience with this. One of the main things to plan for especially with an infant, we are talking less than 6 months, less than 3 months, is that they need to stop every 2 to 3 hours to feed whether they are breastfed, fed human milk in a bottle, or fed formula, they need to eat often. If you get a baby that sometimes sleeps longer stretches that is great and we are going to talk about that a little bit at the end. But usually infants need to stop often and you know it takes 15 to 20 minutes to feed the baby and then change the baby and then an outfit change and then some spit up and then another outfit change and then maybe you need an outfit change. All of that is going to take a little bit of time. So setting realistic expectations is important, you might need a 45 minute stop every 2 to 3 hours. Also there are some ways to make things a little bit faster. You can have your partner pump the gas while you go inside to use the bathroom and they can get the baby out of the car seat and ready to feed. Then you can order food and you can eat while they start the feed with the baby and then you can trade off. That way you are getting more things done at once and you can cut maybe 5 or 10 minutes off that stop.
For older infants if they are closer to 6 months or a little older, it is fine to have baby safe toys for them to chew on and grab. If you want them hanging down, make sure that baby can’t get tangled in the strings. Having teether toys, rattles, things that make noise, light up toys can all be helpful. But generally babies under a year have a hard time in the car. Usually they are either sleeping or they are screaming, so it is also important to be mentally and emotionally prepared for that. Sometimes you get a miracle baby who is happy and awake in the car seat. You can also try blasting music to distract them or help them fall asleep. One of my children really liked Shania Twain, so we would blast that and they would fall asleep, so that is what we listened to for several months of car rides. Find what works best for your family. You might want to take this time in the car together to talk to your partner or listen to your own music before your kids start to tell you that you aren’t allowed to listen to what you want to listen to because they have their own strong musical preferences. So you can try to enjoy that time together as a couple as well. Or if you want to split things up, you can try to put one adult in the back, get some little puppets or toys and sing songs and play games with the baby. It is definitely worth a try.
Those are some of the main things to think about when traveling by car with an infant. Also remember to have extra diapers, an extra change of clothes for you and for the baby easily accessible. Not in your suitcase under a packnplay in the truck. But also consider not just having your normal diaper bag, but an extra bag with extra clothes and diapers in the car. I like to keep that stuff in the car all the time, so if I suddenly realize that my diaper bag is empty, I already have extra diapers, extra outfits, extra socks for all of the children in the car. That can help relieve some of that stress, if you accidentally forget to refill the diaper bag.
The last thing that I wanted to talk about is that if your baby is awesome and decides to sleep longer stretches and you are able to do a 3 or 4 hour stretch of driving, that would be great. However, if they do that and you are feeding human milk whether you are pumping or feeding at the chest, you will want to make sure that you express milk. Especially in those early weeks, less than 3 months even up to 6 months, you want to make sure that you are taking milk out every 2 to 3 hours, so 10 to 12 times a day. If that is the case and your baby is sleeping and you want to keep driving, it is ideal if you are the passenger. You can use something like this, a Haakaa, which creates suction, so it works like a pump to remove milk. Or you can use something like this which is a manual or hand pump. This does the flutter effect of the baby trying to get a let down and this is the slower sucks. You can express milk with a cover in the front passenger seat of the car while the car is driving. If you have a battery powered pump or one that you can plug into the car you can use that as well, if you want to do a full pumping session. But these other options can be really convenient for car rides if you are traveling and you don’t want to pack an entire pump and you don’t really need a full electric pump on your trip. Also if you are traveling and you want to go see a movie or go on a date night or for a little walk and you want to leave your baby with just a couple ounces, the travel pump options can be helpful. Another option is that you can hand express milk and use the hand pump or Haakaa as a way to catch the milk.
Those are some of my tips about car travel. I would love to hear about any tips that you have. I know that lots of people travel by car with infants and every infant is different so there are always lots of great ideas to learn from other parents. If you liked any of these suggestions or have any other questions about car travel, let me know in the comments or send me a message. If you have any other questions about lactation, pregnancy, postpartum, parenting, please send me a message or leave a comment. I’ll talk to you all next week. Bye!
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