Mom asks if she's wrong to bother plane passengers with crying baby.
It's hard to bring a baby on a plane, especially if your baby is crying. When this woman is struggling on a plane, she takes to the popular Reddit forum to ask:
'AITA for bringing my crying baby on a plane?'
This happened two years ago when my daughter was just 9 months old. I'm Australian but I live in the UK. I went back to Australia to visit my family and introduce my daughter to some elderly relatives who couldn't make the trip anymore.
Obviously I knew that flying with a 9 month old would not be easy so I prepped as well as I could. I packed her favorite teddy, brought books and and some toys.
On the plane I sat next to an older couple. They gave me the stink eye as soon as I sat down. During take off my baby cried. They sighed. A bit later she cried again. The woman next to me asked me to shush my baby.
I told her I was doing my best. At some point I needed to pee so I asked a flight attendant if she could hold my baby (she told me I could do that when I was boarding).
The guy sitting next to me told me I shouldn't be flying if I can't take care of my baby by myself. It went on and on with their complaints. Then the woman told me that the decent thing to do would have been to bring earplugs for the other passengers and that next time maybe I shouldn't fly with a baby since it's disrupting everyone's experience.
At this point I was fed up. I told her that they should have brought their own earplugs since I am not the first woman to fly with a baby so it could have been anticipated. And that my baby was a child therefore couldn't control herself whereas they were grow adults who should know how to behave themselves.
The guy behind us must have heard because he leaned forward and told me that it is generally considered rude or disrespectful to fly with a baby. I told him flying is a form of public transportation and if he wants to control his surroundings he should have chosen a private jet.
I was quite upset at the time probably because I knew I was the hated one on the plane. I still think about it sometimes and I decided to settle it now. AITA for bringing a baby on a plane?
Let's find out.
confectionfit writes:
Everyone here saying NTA but yes, YTA. Babies are annoying in general, especially if you have to stay near them for hours and can’t get away. That’s why Skype and FaceTime exists. Btw, if you have a baby, stop asking or trying to get everyone else to hold it. If we don’t ask to hold it, it’s because we don’t want to. It’s yours, YOU hold it.
eaca28245 disagrees:
NTA. I am sorry you wound up on a flight, surrounded by assholes. The UK to Australia is a long trip. At some point, it was inevitable that your 9 month-old would be uncomfortable, hungry, and bored, and that she would use her limited communication skills to complain.
You know, to cry. It sounds like you were absolutely on top of things and doing everything possible to keep her mellow, which is all that your seatmates can expect. I am sorry they were such jerks.
financeguyhere brings up this interesting point:
YTA for doing absolutely zero preparation for the easily foreseeable situation that you put everyone else in on an extremely long flight. I snore a lot, so when I go camping I bring along sleep meds and earplugs for my tent partners.
You should have done something along those lines or gotten a similar medication for your baby. People like you are the reason that I recently purchased noise canceling headphones. Note: I should not need to spend over $100 because you were unable to control your child.