Thud refused to sleep for the first 14 months of his life and it was torture. But getting on a plane for five hours was the very first time I considered drugging my child.
It was our first time flying with a toddler. We were off to Fiji with our extended family and we were so excited. Until we got on the plane…
He wasn’t even that bad. I’ve seen worse. It’s just that we were so…. trapped. And in public. And there were eyes everywhere, looking at us. Disapproving faces judging our inferior parenting skills.
It started as we were walking on to the plane. The looks. The terrified side-eye from young couples as we walked towards them, followed by the epic sigh of relief as we kept walking. It turns out that having a toddler sit next to you on a plane is about as appealing as sharing a row with a morbidly obese man with offensive body odour.