I’m going to put this right up front: if you’re never going to have kids, if your kids are over 5, or if you just don’t want to know what is coming, PLEASE skip this post! I am certainly not discouraging you from traveling with young kids, but I DO want you to be both mentally and logistically prepared. Just like there are some things out of a horror movie about childbirth you can’t know unless you’ve been there (ladies, back me up on this one), one aspect of flying with young children gets glossed over by travel guides: how much babies POOP flying.
Sure, the guides might say “bring a change of clothes” or “don’t forget not to carry on some diapers and wipes!”, but they fail to mention the obvious: air pressure changes cause gas, and children’s bodies are sensitive to the changes. Add the stress of jet lag, dietary changes, lack of routine, and plain old stress and you have a perfect storm for a blowout.
Diaper changing is not fun in the real world, but THEN you have to manage it on an airplane, in a lavatory, which may or may not have a changing table, with one hand on a squirming (by now likely screaming) bundle of joy and the other frantically trying to locate the diaper rash cream, which is buried in your carry-on underneath goldfish crackers, crayons, and all the other cr@p the book told you to bring on the plane to placate your child!
Deal Dad learned early: on our very first flight with Deal Kid, aged three weeks. Confidently he strolled down the aisle with DK, his spare supplies all ready to go for a change. Fifteen minutes later he returned disheveled, battle-scarred, and needing a drink. Apparently Deal Dad forgot one of the rules of infant, um, movements: they are never-ending. So as Deal Dad was mid-change, Deal Kid projected full force all over the mirror, sink, and lavatory like a machine gun. Deal Dad did his best to frantically clean up the battle damage while still holding to Deal Kid. (NOTE: NEVER touch anything in an airplane lavatory!)
My flight into Dante’s inferno came courtesy of Air France. I’ve never written this story down, but told it at a dinner with some 20-something frequent flyer friends at Chicago Seminars last year. By the end of it, a couple of them were seriously considering getting neutered. So be warned!
Just after Deal Kid turned 2, I took him solo for a week to Marbella to meet up with my parents, who were living in Europe. We had a lovely vacation, but the jet lag really took a toll on DK and he got a nasty diaper rash to boot. By the end of the trip, he was not sleeping well at all because every time he got a tiny bit wet, the rash would put him in pain.
To come home, I had an Air France flight from AGP-CDG, a three hour layover in CDG, then CDG-IAD. This was 2005, before the fancy new terminal. In Malaga I gate checked my umbrella stroller because I knew I’d need it for the layover. Besides one change mid flight, the two hour flight to Paris was uneventful.
Forever burned into my brain: the word for stroller in French is “poussette”. I know this because “Ou est ma poussette?” was the question I asked when I got to Paris and discovered my stroller had been checked all the way to Washington! To be honest, the stroller wouldn’t have been much help in the old Charles de Gaulle as I’m sure many of you remember…there must have been ten flights of stairs (carrying a now tired, cranky, and wet-rashy 2 year old and a wheeled bag that couldn’t wheel) between the domestic terminal, security, and the International waiting area. The one thing I managed to do in the three hours besides change diapers was buy a bottle of red wine at duty free.
And now to Air France 28…AKA the 8th circle. Deal Kid had the window and I had the middle seat in coach on an entirely full flight. We settled in and Deal Kid fell asleep…whew, I thought. This was the calm before the storm.
As the plane ascended and my ears began to pop, so did Deal Kid’s intestines. This is what I, and the surrounding four rows, heard:
PPPPPPHHHHHHHFFFFFFFTTTTTTTTT
“Mommy! Poop! AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!”
(me standing up, whispering) “excuse moi, Madame”
(Walk 17 rows to lavatory, Deal Kid screaming whole way, change diaper, return to seat)
(me sitting down, whispering) “excuse moi, Madame”
This entire process took about 15 minutes.
Unfortunately, this didn’t happen just once. It happened EVERY HALF HOUR, like some sort of deranged cuckoo clock:
PPPPPPHHHHHHHFFFFFFFTTTTTTTTT
“Mommy! Poop! AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!”
(me standing up, whispering) “excuse moi, Madame”
(Walk 17 rows to lavatory, Deal Kid screaming whole way, change diaper, return to seat)
(me sitting down, whispering) “excuse moi, Madame”
The Poop clock’s battery ran out an hour before landing. Upon landing, getting through immigration, retrieving my bag and poussette while still holding on to Deal Kid, I let go of the Duty Free bag…spilling red wine all over myself. A perfect ending to a perfect flight.
And that, my friends, is the real poop.
