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Baby care tip # 54 – Avoid feeding a heavy meal during road trips

Never do this, period.

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Written By: Debjani Arora | Published : April 4, 2018 5:23 PM IST

Every mother has her own mechanism to deal with the nitty-gritty of parenting. Since every child is not the same so there is never a one-size-fits-all solution to our parenting problems. Mothers have to devise their own methods or guidelines to take care of her child s needs and deal with the little one s discomfort. And everyone has at least one or two stressors for which they have to take guard and be well planned to tackle the situation. My stressor is road trips with the little ones as the elder one suffers from motion sickness. Even though right from six months of age she has been taking trips with us her motion sickness never settled. Here are hassle-free tips to travel by air with an infant.

While taking road trips I used to worry that my kid s meal times will be disturbed and she might go hungry for long hours. So, I used to stuff her with food before we started off. This didn t go well with her. Invariably she would throw up as soon as we started the journey and sometimes at places where we didn t have facilities to clean or change. Of course, I travelled with spare clothes and towels, but while climbing a hilly terrain or so it would become difficult to stop the car at an inn to change or clean. For a while, I gave it a thought and read up articles on the internet to deal with my child s travel sickness. Here are tips to have a smooth travel with your toddler.

Then here is how I devised a plan to counter it:

  • First things first, when it comes to travelling always make sure that you make your child eat nutritious food, but light like a bowl of vegetable soup or oats porridge.
  • Avoid a heavy meal right before the journey. Ideally, make sure that you feed your child a heavy meal or a full course meal at least two hours before the journey starts.
  • If it is a morning journey give her a fruit or few crackers before starting the journey. Never allow a child to go on a road trip empty stomach as it might make her feel giddy and nauseated.
  • Avoid feeding while on the move. Give your child a snack when you take a break and offer a meal only after you reach the destination.
  • If your child feels hungry during the trip keep crackers or a light snack like idlis or poha ready.
  • If you have a child whom you are still nursing, it is best to breastfeed during the journey and avoid any types of semi-solid or solid foods. However, make sure you burp your baby after the feed to ensure smooth digestion.
  • If travel sickness is becoming too much to handle then talk to your paediatrician about it and ask for medications, always keep it handy while travelling.

These simple steps can help you deal with motion sickness to some extent. If you have other tips share with us in our comment section.

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