blog.bioethics.net

About zonking the kids with Benadryl...

It's frowned upon. The issue's been floating around the web after a mom and toddler were booted from a flight last month when the kid wouldn't stop chanting, "Bye bye, plane!" According to the mother (and ABC), her conversation with the flight attendant went like this:

"She leaned over the gentleman who was sitting next to me, and she said, 'OK, it's not funny anymore. You need to shut your baby up," Penland said.

Penland said she told the flight attendant that she expected her child to fall asleep momentarily.

"'It doesn't matter. Regardless, I don't want to hear it,'" Penland said the flight attendant told her.

"'It's called Baby Benadryl,'" Penland said the attendant told her, suggesting she give her child allergy medication to help him fall asleep fast.

"I said, 'Well, I'm not going to drug my child so you have a pleasant flight,'" Penland said.

And that's when the skies became not-so-friendly.

Well, an article in today's New York Times rolls out some of the reasons kids shouldn't be "sedated" with diphenhydramine. They include possible side effects such as breathing problems, constipation, increased hyperactivity and -- though it's not spelled out exactly -- a belief that zonking your kid is just kind of tacky. Yourself? Now that's a different question. From the article:

Dr. Kenneth R. Cohen, a psychiatrist in New York who specializes in psychopharmacology, suggested another way of looking at the problem: not the restless children, but the adults who have a hard time dealing with them.

For those adults, he said, there are anti-anxiety medications, which should be taken under a doctor's direction and should be tried out at home first.

Hmm. So, let's review:

Drugging the kids because they're being annoying? Bad.

Drugging yourself because the kids are being annoying? OK.

Noted.

-Greg Dahlmann