ARC Altantic crossing with baby- feasible or stupid?

[onesea]

Let me just check facts:
Your both doctors, so know enough about what can wrong with child, unless major illness better of with you than most parents,
Crew have invited you anyway,
Moderately Experienced sailors,

You know your case better than the rest of us:

Yes increased danger to baby sailing across Atlantic but is it significant?
You are doing the ARC not a long distance solo passage,

I do agree with the idea you make a cut off date before departure and storing but after baby is born. That is point of no return, you say when baby is 3 months (for example) you will go or will not..

That is only fair on the rest of them.

It is also fair the rest of them know what babies can be like.... Let them change afew nappies and baby sit before you set off

 

[Mark-1]

You know your case better than the rest of us [snip] you say when baby is 3 months

+1, to my mind that's very sound and I'd guess is more or less what they're doing anyway. Make the call when they know themselves as parents and their child.

One quibble. Our baby at 3 months old was a completely different animal to when she was 5 months old. She and her ten NCT peers changed and developed literally day to day. I think my daughter at 3 months wouldn't even have noticed being confined to a boat for 4 weeks. At 5 months it would have been miserable for her. So the go/no-go decision needs to be very, very late indeed. Certainly later than 3 months.

I still don't think the go/no-go decision means much. Our daughter was mixing much more with other children by 5 months and picking up a bug of some kind every other week (and passing it on to Mum and Dad.) Would the OP set off if her child was in that worrying 'floppy' state and hadn't kept food down for three days? Seems to me a commitment to be be somewhere at a certain time where a baby is involved means very little indeed.

 

[ridgy]

The examples given of babies cruising are not really valid.
A committed husband and wife team, sailing their own boat, following their own dream, with their own child(ren) is a very different situation from the one proposed.

No skipper of a sound mind would choose to take another persons baby on board for a transatlantic. Especially one with a big party at each end.

 

[haydude]

Plain irresponsible and thus stupid even asking the question.

 

[Pickem]

Firstly, congratulations on the great news!

I've just come back from ARC 2012 and many yachts did have young children and babies on board. However, they (I think) were all families who owned and skippered their own yachts. The only concern I would ahve if the impact on the relationship with the owners, skipper and rest of crew. It'll have to be a crew decision.

Sailing the Atlantic is a wonderful experience, I have done it many times and no passage has been the same. I hope if you don't get to do it in 2013, then you will get your chance some time soon.

Mike

 

[emsworthy]

The only advice I would give is don't what ever you do commit either way until you have actually had the little darling. Despite both being rational, intelligent and capable professionals my wife and I were reduced to the existence of a couple of sleep deprived morons after the birth of our first child and this was well beyond 5 months. Cross an ocean?? I wouldn't have trusted either of us to cross the road most of the time!!!

You don't know what 'type' of baby you're going to get until it's born. If only ours had known of Snooks' wisdom that babies only cry because they want something! Not in our case they didn't... unless of course what he wanted was to turn his parents into gibbering wrecks!!!

He's a delightful 11 year old boy now and No2 was a dream in comparison, but I still wouldn't have inflicted either of them on my worst enemy in the confines of a small boat for 2-3 weeks on the bounce.

Just my personal opinion of course.

 

[Mark-1]

I've just come back from ARC 2012 and many yachts did have young children and babies on board.

I think everyone accepts it can be done, I think people are just suggesting it might not be a great idea to do it.

I reckon the parents will know with some certainty if it's the right thing for their baby by November. I hope they let us know what happened.

 

[KellysEye]

Lot's of babies go over the Atlantic, it's not a problem just make sure the baby is well secured day and night. One thing you will find is that boat kids are the better educated, politer and more chatty than land kids. Also when you see kids playing who can't speak to each other, because they don't speak the same language, it's a marvel to watch. When we crossed little Rosie was one year old but was a baby when they left the UK.

 

[Mark-1]

Lot's of babies go over the Atlantic, it's not a problem just make sure the baby is well secured day and night.

Except the very last thing most babies past ~5 months want is to be secured!

 

[snooks]

Except the very last thing most babies past ~5 months want is to be secured!

This!

We can manage a car seat for a couple of hours max, then we have to stop for a break and a feed...which has kind of limited our sailing to 2-3 hours hops.

 

[KellysEye]

>Except the very last thing most babies past ~5 months want is to be secured!

Over the Atlantic the boat rolls 20 degrees each way every 30/40 seconds, if there are cross swells the boat corkscrews. It difficult for adults to stand up and you always have to hold on with one hand. Now think about a baby being thrown across a boat, it doesn't bear thinking about, past 5 months old has the same problem as one month.

 

[snowleopard]

Over the Atlantic the boat rolls 20 degrees each way every 30/40 seconds

OMG - a monohull!! That's quite different.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

I'm not qualified to say whether or not you should do it; I don't know you and I don't know your fellow crew-members. It can be done and has been done, and as far as I can see, no-one has actually turned out worse for it! Babies are a LOT tougher and more resilient than people think; it is better for them to learn from a few knocks and bumps early in life than grow up too coddled. Most people discover that when bringing up their second, which is usually handled a lot less carefully than the first!

HOWEVER, I do notice one thing. You mention breast-feeding at 5 months, and intending to continue. Now, it happens that for good reasons, my wife couldn't breast-feed ours, so this isn't first-hand knowledge - but it is derived from the experience of many friends. And that is that when the first teeth come along, it gives a VERY high incentive for weaning a baby. First teeth are like razors, and I understand that breast-feeding a teething baby is extremely painful! It's bad enough if a baby sucks your finger and catches it with a tooth; I hate to imagine more tender parts getting that treatment. Our second used to get through plastic teats at an enormous rate once she had teeth....

 

[Mark-1]

Except the very last thing most babies past ~5 months want is to be secured!

This!
We can manage a car seat for a couple of hours max, then we have to stop for a break and a feed...which has kind of limited our sailing to 2-3 hours hops.

That exactly where we are now. Not a terrible problem for me since I like lunch stops, but there's no way we could cross an ocean without inflicting much misery on the bairn.

We'd perhaps do the odd X Channel, but there'd be no pretence that we were doing it for her - we'd be doing it for ourselves. If we did it overnight we'd have a chance that she'd sleep through the lot and not be bored at all.

 

[snowleopard]

HOWEVER, I do notice one thing. You mention breast-feeding at 5 months, and intending to continue. Now, it happens that for good reasons, my wife couldn't breast-feed ours, so this isn't first-hand knowledge - but it is derived from the experience of many friends. And that is that when the first teeth come along, it gives a VERY high incentive for weaning a baby. First teeth are like razors, and I understand that breast-feeding a teething baby is extremely painful! It's bad enough if a baby sucks your finger and catches it with a tooth; I hate to imagine more tender parts getting that treatment. Our second used to get through plastic teats at an enormous rate once she had teeth....

2 of my daughters have between them breast-fed each of 7 children for the first 12 months! It has the enormous advantage of not needing to faff around sterilising bottles. I would very strongly recommend taking an adequate supply of formula and equipment in case of a mishap to Mum. A mid-Atlantic rendezvous because there was nothing for baby to eat would be unfortunate.

 

[Mark-1]

HOWEVER, I do notice one thing. You mention breast-feeding at 5 months, and intending to continue. Now, it happens that for good reasons, my wife couldn't breast-feed ours, so this isn't first-hand knowledge - but it is derived from the experience of many friends. And that is that when the first teeth come along, it gives a VERY high incentive for weaning a baby. First teeth are like razors, and I understand that breast-feeding a teething baby is extremely painful! It's bad enough if a baby sucks your finger and catches it with a tooth; I hate to imagine more tender parts getting that treatment. Our second used to get through plastic teats at an enormous rate once she had teeth....

As you say everyone's different, but exclusive breast feeding 'till well past 6 months was typical in our NCT group with some people still giving the odd breast feed nightime treat still today at 15 months long after they've been fully weaned.

I'd think at 5 months the OP will be predominately breast feeding, assuming breast feeding worked out for her!

Breast feeding would really help on a boat - f***king about with formula and bottles on a boat would be a nightmare I would have thought, although I'm sure the OP will take some as backup.

As an aside, 15 months ago the idea of breast feeding made me feel slightly sick. now I'm enthusiastically talking about it. What's gone wrong?

 

[AntarcticPilot]

2 of my daughters have between them breast-fed each of 7 children for the first 12 months! It has the enormous advantage of not needing to faff around sterilising bottles. I would very strongly recommend taking an adequate supply of formula and equipment in case of a mishap to Mum. A mid-Atlantic rendezvous because there was nothing for baby to eat would be unfortunate.

Entirely agree about the benefits; I wish we could have done it, but for reasons I don't want to go into in public, it wasn't an option. It was my job to sterilize and mix formula milk! The tins formula milk comes in don't compare with the attractive packaging of the natural stuff

But I merely point out that many of our friends, who had the best intentions of carrying on as long as their baby needed liquid food, found it impossible to continue when teeth came along. Obviously, experiences vary in this regard, but the OP would be well advised for both our reasons to be prepared to switch to formula if necessary.

In the book "The Greenlanders", there is a rather grisly scenario of a bloke feeding a baby by cutting his breast and allowing the baby to suck his blood. I'd hate for it to come to that!

 

[Mark-1]

In the book "The Greenlanders", there is a rather grisly scenario of a bloke feeding a baby by cutting his breast and allowing the baby to suck his blood. I'd hate for it to come to that!

If it made her go to sleep I'd cheerfully do that!

 

[snowleopard]

Plain irresponsible and thus stupid even asking the question.

IMHO sensible question, stupid answer.

 

[BurnitBlue]

Let hubby sail the boat to the Caribbean (Fort de France), then you can fly to Martinique via AirFrance. I packed up sailing completely when I became a father. I would have hated to lose those walks in the park pushing the baby carriage knowing I was the envy of the world. Those days are still the highlight of my life. Wouldn't have missed it for anything.