Road Trip at night

snysilver · October 2014

At the end of the month, we are taking a road trip that will take about 8 hours. We will be doing most of the driving at night, hopefully DS (18 months) and DD (3 months) will sleep most of the time.
I'm a little worried about DS sleeping that long in his car seat though. His head usually slumps way forward when he sleeps in his seat. Normally I wouldn't worry too much, but we will be in the car for such a long time, I'm a little concerned.
Has anyone tried those little neck pillows or anything similar and found them to be helpful? Or have any other recommendations for the trip? I don't think we could recline his seat any further back that it already is, it's already pressed against the driver's seat, and I'm just not sure what else we could do.
TIA!

caseylynw · October 2014

I recent made an eight hour over night trip my self. I would suggest a rolled up nursery blanket instead of a neck pillow. You dont have to buy anything and you can keep moving it as he moves his head. Ive tried a ton of other solutions and this one worked best for me. DS always got annoyed at the neck pillows and such

Heavensent72 · October 2014

I am lucky that when we get in the car my son falls asleep right away. We live in Illinois and over the summer we took a road trip to New Orleans it was like a thirteen hour drive I just made sure that my son (22 months at the time) and daughter (9) had on comfy clothes like jogging pants and t shirts and they each brought a blanket and pillow but for the most part my son just slept and got breaks out of the seat to get his diaper changed and when we stopped to eat. It was his first real trip and he actually did really well. Better than his much older sister!

Bizzy80 · October 2014

Are you sure the car seat is installed properly and at the correct angle? He shouldn't be slumping forward like you describe. Also, the back of the car seat should not be pressed against the driver seat. I would double check the angle to make sure it is installed properly according to manufacturers instructions.

ASmallWonder · October 2014

I'm a car seat tech and bizzy is right. With rare exception, you need to be able to slip a piece of paper between the front seat and the car seat.

snysilver · October 2014

@Bizzy80‌ and @ASmallWonder‌, thanks for the advice. There's plenty of room behind his seat when I'm driving, but my husband is 6'3", and when he moves my seat back to drive, there's no more space. Maybe I can make an appointment with the car seat expert at our police department to check it out before the trip. It didn't even occur to me that the problem might be the seat installation.

ASmallWonder · October 2014

The potential issue is two fold - it could impact the seat's ability to move in a crash. Movement at the head of the seat is part of what helps the seat and rider ride down the crash forces. If you have advanced airbags your car manual will talk about not hanging anything from the vehicle's seatback and wedging a car seat there falls under that rule. An airbag could deploy or improperly deploy and cause injuries.

At his age head slump isn't a serious concern like it is in newborns because he has the neck strength to change positions if he needs to. But checking to make sure the seat is properly reclined is a good idea. I'd really hesitate to use a neck pillow. It absolutely can't go behind him and if you put it in front of him, I do worry about his face ending up smooshed in it.

Bizzy80 · October 2014

Car Seat for the Littles on Facebook is a great resource for all car seat questions if you are unable to get somewhere for a check. If you post a picture of the problem or question you have they have a group of car seat techs that can help make sure you have a proper install.

ASmallWonder · October 2014

^ Yup, that's where I spend my time

JENandJEH · October 2014

msspeedymarie said:

Aside from the great advice about car seats, I'll ask, have you done night time highway driving with your LO before? Mine HATES it - I think the headlights bug her. She cries nonstop and won't go to sleep. We have to stop, put her to sleep, then drive again. Just a heads up of something to be prepared for. Good luck!

I will echo this, kind of. We've never done a full overnight drive but we've left home around 5pm and timed it so that we would arrive around 1am and just transfer him into a bed. Much longer than that and he wakes up MAD that he can't get comfortable in the car seat and just wakes up DS1 and makes everyone miserable.

We do 10+ hour drives quite often with my kids and only do the night drives if DH can't get off until mid-day or so for us to leave. They do great (and both did great from a very early age) during the day. We have toys that are road trip only toys and I keep a lot of snacks ready. We also let them watch movies which they love. Plus, unless we're driving to visit family and know that grandma and grandpa will let us catch up on the sleep we lost while driving overnight, it makes for a miserable first day of our trip when the kids are up at normal time and we're running on very little sleep.

snysilver · October 2014

Thanks everyone. We do definitely need to make the trip at night, DH & I just don't have enough time off of work to wait to drive the next day & still spend enough time there to make the trip worth it. My brother & his GF can help us with the kids if we are too exhausted... although I do have a 3 month old, so I don't think I'll be getting much less sleep doing this than any other night!
DS has fallen asleep in the car at night plenty of times. Evem tho we haven't done long highway driving at night, I know he can at least fall asleep on the highway. Plus, if it's all falling apart, we are prepared to stop along the way & find a motel for the night if we have to. Better to drive part way at night & then the rest in the a.m. than lose a full day to driving.

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