Flying with terrified 5 year old?

Love2love

My son has been on more flights that I can count but the last time as we were walking up the steps to board he became hysterical! I found it very hard to calm him down (staff ignored what was going on) but basically I had to just keep talking to him and distracting him. Once we were up and levelled out - he calmed somewhat.
That was just over a year ago and we're flying again in May. He is very excited about the upcoming holiday but today I mentioned the plane and he freaked a little bit so I am worried about the flight.

Is it cruel to force him to face his fear or is it better to get him over the fear now before it develops further?

I have this fear myself and I have to take medication in order to fly (I am aware that he must have picked his fear up from me even though I tried to hide it from him) I would actually hate for someone to force me into facing my fears especially when it involves possible death. Will forcing him to fly affect him psychologically? Or am I completely overthinking this? What to you guys think?

CrazyRabbit

Talk to him & ask what part of flying make him a little nervous. Is it the noise, turbulence or fear of crashing etc? When you've identified the exact fear, you can address it and offer comfort and reassurance.

Tell him that airplanes are the safest way to travel. It's so incredibly rare for them to crash, that it's more likely to be trampled to death by a Hippo!!
Explain that airplanes have 2 engine but can fly perfectly fine even if one stopped working. Even if both failed, most planes can glide in to land like a bird.

Tell him what all the various noises are & that they are normal.

Oh, and it's possible that flying the last time made his ears hurt. That happens to me, especially during descent. Not really sure how to stop that.

Some info/advice:
http://voices.yahoo.com/helping-child-overcome-fear-flying-2131156.html

Motorist

Tell him that he's more likely to die driving to the airport than on the plane itself.

Tell him it's really annoying for tired, fellow passengers to here a screaming child.

Short of that disrupt his sleeping pattern so he's too tired to care.

Or show him Top Gun and instill a love of flying in this young, impressionable one.

Sleepy

Is there anyone else flying with you that you could have accompany your son?

He's almost certainly picked up on your irrational fear and now believes there's something to be scared of.

I'd second Motorist's suggestion: let him watch Top Gun. He'll ignore most of the movie beyond the first 10/15 minutes, the dog-fight practice and the final confrontation (i.e. the bits with the planes) but it could instill a love of flying in him (hell, that's what the US Navy made the movie to do!).

Additionally could part of his worries be related to his ears popping? Our kids didn't like that so much until they were told that the best way to stop your ears from hurting on a plane is sweeties.

iguana

Top Gun? For a child with an existing fear of flying? A movie where one of the lead characters is killed in an air accident? That's just about the worst idea in the world.

OP here is a website with details of dealing with fear of flying in children; http://www.travelismorefunwithkids.com/travelismorefunwithkids/2009/06/how-to-overcome-your-children-fear-of-flying.html

There are also books that may help with it; http://www.amazon.com/Jet-Kids-Taking-Fear-Flying/dp/0615137571

And lastly there are fear of flying courses and hypnotherapists which claim to help with a fear of flying. Not all will be suitable for children but there are quite a few which are. It might be an idea for you to both go along to a class/session and deal with it together.

Ayla

iguana wrote: »

Top Gun? For a child with an existing fear of flying? A movie where one of the lead characters is killed in an air accident? That's just about the worst idea in the world.

I agree - nothing like giving a 5-yr old mind some tangible visuals for what it would look like to explode mid-air and die in an air crash :rolleyes:

Unfortunately - as we all know - giving statistical evidence for why we *shouldn't* be afraid of something is rarely enough to make us lose an irrational fear (that's why it's considered irrational). OP, I think you need to dissect the situation with him - find out what it was about this one flight that freaked him out. Had he experienced something on the previous flight (i.e.: ears/sounds/scary people) that he was afraid of re-living? Did someone carelessly say something to him at some point that he's only now registering? Or maybe he's only now actually reaching the age when he can comprehend what it means to be thousands of feet in the air - maybe a visit to an air museum would help as he could see up close & touch planes to confirm their stability?

Sleepy

No 5 year old boy remembers Goose's death in Top Gun. They remember the gorgeous planes doing exciting things.

iguana

Sleepy wrote: »

No 5 year old boy remembers Goose's death in Top Gun.

They do if they are terrified of flying.

spurious

I wouldn't be mentioning the plane at all. I certainly wouldn't talk about what a safe way it is to travel. All a five year old will hear is the word 'crash'.

I'm not a parent admittedly, but I would have loads and loads of things to do - DVDs to watch, nice things to eat, toys to play with, puzzles to do. He will certainly pick up on any parental fears.

Could you possibly book a front row seat where he cannot see out any windows?

Motorist

iguana wrote: »

Top Gun? For a child with an existing fear of flying? A movie where one of the lead characters is killed in an air accident? That's just about the worst idea in the world.

OP here is a website with details of dealing with fear of flying in children; http://www.travelismorefunwithkids.com/travelismorefunwithkids/2009/06/how-to-overcome-your-children-fear-of-flying.html

There are also books that may help with it; http://www.amazon.com/Jet-Kids-Taking-Fear-Flying/dp/0615137571

And lastly there are fear of flying courses and hypnotherapists which claim to help with a fear of flying. Not all will be suitable for children but there are quite a few which are. It might be an idea for you to both go along to a class/session and deal with it together.

Just fast forward Goose's death so :rolleyes:

Love2love

Thanks for the replies everyone and the links were very helpful. I don't think I would be able to sit through Top-Gun myself knowing someone dies in it

I am going to wait for him to bring the topic up himself and then try to find out what exactly is causing the fear and tackle it that way. Thanks for the help peeps!

GarIT

I would just ignore the plane completely, make it seem like it is just a normal everyday thing and don't draw attention to it or make a fuss about it at all.

About the ears thing, while you are flying there is less air in your ear then normal, as you are flying your ear gets used to this, when the plane is descending there is a sudden rush of air into your ear which can cause pain and a temporary loss of hearing. The two most common ways to stop it are to suck on a hard boiled sweet, it wont help if you open your mouth, you have to keep your mouth closed and then the sucking creates high pressure in your ear which stops the rush of air inwards or you can close your mouth and pinch your nose closed and gently try to breathe out of your nose and that will put high pressure on your ears internally stopping the rush of high pressure from the outside from affecting you.

Ashbourne hoop

As someone else said bring loads of things onto the plane to occupy/distract him. If its the ear thing, a dose of neurofen/calpol helps with this.

cbyrd

If it's ear pain which can be severe, i suffer and so do 2 of my girls.. then a dose of sudafed for children an hour before you fly.. if the flight is more than 4 hours you'll have to take it on with you and give another dose.. it really works. I take the sudafed tablets and i don't even get the ear popping anymore. i used to have horrific pain for 2 days after a flight and it put me off flying for years..;) otherwise i wouldn't wait for him to bring it up.. try subtle ways to bring it into conversation and get to the bottom of it before he has too much time to work it up in his head

Motorist

cbyrd wrote: »

If it's ear pain which can be severe, i suffer and so do 2 of my girls.. then a dose of sudafed for children an hour before you fly.. if the flight is more than 4 hours you'll have to take it on with you and give another dose.. it really works. I take the sudafed tablets and i don't even get the ear popping anymore. i used to have horrific pain for 2 days after a flight and it put me off flying for years..;) otherwise i wouldn't wait for him to bring it up.. try subtle ways to bring it into conversation and get to the bottom of it before he has too much time to work it up in his head

Or you could just try swallowing during initial ascent and descent which opens up the eustationary tube. Problem with sudafed is it will keep you awake for the flight.

Procrastastudy

Clip around the ear...

Seriously - if you let the airline know - and they are nice you might get a chance to look in the cockpit before take off. If that doesn't get a five year old on a plane with very little crying etc then I dont know what will.

I would just ignore it as much as possible regardless as its probably just a way of getting attention. Dont make a big deal out of it - thats one of the reasons the staff were ignoring it.

cbyrd

Motorist wrote: »

Or you could just try swallowing during initial ascent and descent which opens up the eustationary tube. Problem with sudafed is it will keep you awake for the flight.

Swallowing won't work on the sinus swelling.. never had a problem with it keeping me awake and i recently flew to California...there is no amount of swallowing will cure this.. years of trying to master it didn't work..my brother dives and has shown me tricks...they don't work on me...sudafed does...and i suffer it the whole way through the flight.. its the cabin pressure.. the take off and landing are just worse cos the popping starts