How to Deal with Overseas Travel Time Adjustment

The cool thing is that you can enjoy late night meals with wide-awake children. The bad thing is that the first night or two they will be up until 1:30 a.m. and during the whole trip they will probably sleep heavily during the day.

You could try melatonin, if you can find it in a low enough dosage. I haven't been able to find it in drops. Here's an abstract of an article about a study of safety and effectiveness in children (I can't find a full-text source, but I've seen a copy of the article) - but of course you would want to check with your pediatrician first. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12635982

My experience has also been to work with the new time zone right away as well (for both you and the kids). Try not to take a nap when you first get in, but rather give them their naps at the normal time (if they nap) or just keep them up until bed time. Get them up at the usual time in the morning as well. On the first day, maybe you can schedule some very exciting outings to keep them awake.
Obviously keeping them up might be impossible, but do the best you can and you will find that the adjustment will be fast.

Last summer my family (including my 7.5 year old and 3.5 year old sons) traveled to Ireland. I never really worried about the time difference, funny enough, and it didn't really effect them. We traveled over night and arrived in the morning, both boys getting very little sleep. We kept them awake until around 4pm which was when all of us crashed. They woke up around 7pm for dinner, then went to sleep for the night around 10. The next morning they slept late, until 11am, then sleeping was not an issue...they were back to their "normal" Irish time.

I would not plan anything for the first two days, you know play it by ear. If your children are tired, let them sleep, but do try and enforce your regular bedtime routine while traveling to help them.

Happy journey!

hello!

i've dealt with this a lot over the past 3 years because we lived overseas and travelled a great deal. we have a 4 year old and 1 year old. my recommendation is to immediately switch to the new time zone. keep them awake as much as you can during their normal waking hours on the new time zone and definitely wake them in the morning if you have to. the mornings will be rough at first, but if you just go into the new time zone as best as you can, that's what's always worked best for us. good luck and have a great trip!

We lived in London where I had my first child. I always found taveling to the states easier than the other way for the time adjustment. Just try to get back into your routine as quickly as possible whichever direction you are going - it helps.

Hi! We just took our 2 year old to Hawaii last month, where the time change is significant in the other direction (it is earlier there). I agree with what a lot of moms have written about trying to keep them on their schedule as much as possible. This seemed to work well for us too. But regardless of whatever you try, just be prepared for their adjustment to the time change to take a few days - and be patient with it. For the first few nights, my daughter was waking up at 3:30 in the morning (8:30am Chicago time), jumping up in her crib and demanding to go swimming! These types of things are bound to happen, so just be ready mentally and you'll be able to handle anything!

Have a great trip!