INDIANS WITH BABIES......

[ManuNSam 1]

hi

my mother-in-laws visitors visa to the US was denied. No big surprise there. (she is just a housewife and has no ties to prove return).

so we are considering visiting india so she can meet her grandson. (our son)

hes 10 months old now.

but.........im an so worried about taking him there.

there are so many things he will be exposed to there (meaning diseases) that he has does not have immunity for yet.

SOOOOO

Im wondering - how did others deal with this?

how old were your children before you took them to india the first time?

sam

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

hi

my mother-in-laws visitors visa to the US was denied. No big surprise there. (she is just a housewife and has no ties to prove return).

so we are considering visiting india so she can meet her grandson. (our son)

hes 10 months old now.

but.........im an so worried about taking him there.

there are so many things he will be exposed to there (meaning diseases) that he has does not have immunity for yet.

SOOOOO

Im wondering - how did others deal with this?

how old were your children before you took them to india the first time?

sam

I think you want the Asia: South sub-forum. This is Asia: East and Pacific.

[payxibka 10,045]

done..Asia-South it is

[champi 13]

hi

my mother-in-laws visitors visa to the US was denied. No big surprise there. (she is just a housewife and has no ties to prove return).

so we are considering visiting india so she can meet her grandson. (our son)

hes 10 months old now.

but.........im an so worried about taking him there.

there are so many things he will be exposed to there (meaning diseases) that he has does not have immunity for yet.

SOOOOO

Im wondering - how did others deal with this?

how old were your children before you took them to india the first time?

sam

My sister's baby was 14 months old when she first took him to India. He was fine except some mosquito bites (but no sickness, disease, fever, etc). And they did travel a lot, not so much around India, but daily travels, to weddings, relative's place, etc. It's been 7 months since they returned and everything seems fine.

Just an FYI... they were mainly in Gujarat, India..

Edited July 14, 2009 by champi

[klinus 0]

hi

my mother-in-laws visitors visa to the US was denied. No big surprise there. (she is just a housewife and has no ties to prove return).

so we are considering visiting india so she can meet her grandson. (our son)

hes 10 months old now.

but.........im an so worried about taking him there.

there are so many things he will be exposed to there (meaning diseases) that he has does not have immunity for yet.

SOOOOO

Im wondering - how did others deal with this?

how old were your children before you took them to india the first time?

sam

Hi Sam:

I’m sure that I’m going to get the ####### kicked out of me for this but if you are going to take your son to India here’s what worked for me:

I’ve taken my children when each of them were pretty close to a year. I’ve gone over the Pacific (SFO –HKK-SIN –MAA), with the Hong Kong flight being 14 hours on a full SQ flight. Then I’ve flown with the other transatlantic on an empty Delta flight (good news) on the day that DL declared bankruptcy (the disappearance of your pension does wonders towards your outlook on life so there was a lot of snarling from the grandmas who were the stewardesses on the flights (with American carriers flight staffing is determined by seniority, none of the 25 year old cap imposed by the Asian carriers)

Specific tips:

Get the malaria prophylaxis started well before the trip.

Cough syrup works wonders for the long flight.

Try to get bulkhead seats.

Even if you are lucky enough that your son doesn’t use a pacifier, having something to suck on during take off and landing will minimize the pain.

Expect conditions to deteriorate on your connecting flight Three hundred Indians, free booze and the unique ability of Indians to trash a restroom – u get the picture – in other words don’t count on diaper changes in the plane’s bathrooms .

DO NOT FLY AIR INDIA.

After the travel saga:

Have whoever is meeting you bring odomos and spread liberally.

Boiled, filtered water.

Take a graco snugride with the base http://www.gracobaby.com/Catalog/Pages/Pro...959110||1#/1740 (some of the cars may have LATCH). Ignore the laughter it made me feel a lot better when I had to put him into those little cars. Plus, you can take a little netting and bingo – mosquito protection.

Expect diarrhea; take a couple of Pedialytes with you.

Overall it will be a lot of fun. Use grandma and his jetlag to get some time for youselves.

Isaac

[gqbabson 0]

LOL - what do you have against Air India?! I thought the direct flight was great! 14.5 hours.

[ManuNSam 1]

we are thinking that maybe we will go straight to punjab after landing in delhi.

its a cleaner area, has less people, and really is where most of the family is anyways.

for those of you that thought i was a little over-worried.

you have to understand that while i was living/working in india I was working for the national polio program. i really got to know all of indias health issues.

klinus::

how did you bath your child? did you use the purified water?

i know that seems overboard, but my kid drinks water while bathing.

not literally drink - but when running water over his head(for hair rinsing) he opens his mouth and water gets in.

can you think of any other issues you had while there?

any ideas/help is appreciated! I would like to prepare all i can.

[CTRL+ALT+DEL 1]

don't worry about immunity. go in the winter months - great time is in october in Diwali. rain will have stopped, and it'll be moderately cooler (70-80 F) depending on where. lesser masquitos, cooler weather. obviously user precaution - if you're not used to tropics, use bottled/filtered water, use masquito repellent, start maleria medication (get lariago from indian pharmacy. its dirty cheap. basically, you take 1 pill a week, for 6 weeks and it works miracle).

if your son is 1/2 indian, don't worry - he has some immunity. and its the best time to get immunity right now. let him go and play with other children and develop immunity.

klinus::

how did you bath your child? did you use the purified water?

i know that seems overboard, but my kid drinks water while bathing.

not literally drink - but when running water over his head(for hair rinsing) he opens his mouth and water gets in.

can you think of any other issues you had while there?

any ideas/help is appreciated! I would like to prepare all i can.

are you F'ing serious? You should stay in your westernized civilization and not leave comfort of modern amenities. I'm sick of americans thinking anything outside of contigious 48 states is as dirty as their unwashed ####.

Listen to me - people over there have bettter immunity then here. If you DO NOT expose your kid to some bacteria right now, he/she/it will not develop any immunity and will have asthma, ulcers, and all the basic problems us americans face. get your kid outside, let him play in dirt, if he starts crying, don't immediately rush there and put a pacifier in his mouth.

u want to use purified water? sure, why not. go ahead.

here is what some people in india do to was their babies. they take hot water, mix it in with cold water (u can use aquafina if u wish to), and use various different techniques for clensing.

1) flour from ground chickpeas. YES. recent western research shows vitamins from extract are beneficial for skin, and now they've strated selling 'johnson and johnson baby soap' for $15 bottle - available at your local walmart... or you can ask your indian releltives on this and do it virtually for free.

2) various types of sand/clay mixture. YES its been in India for thousands of years. but for you to enjoy it here, you'll have to goto a SPA and get a MUD bath and pay hundred of bucks... or you can ask your indian reletive on how its done.

3) warm water and mild mixture of INDIAN SOAP.

you should take one bag full of dipers, baby wipes, soap, and one of those large bubbles that will not expose your kid to outside world.

[ManuNSam 1]

CTRL+ALT+DEL :

you dont have kids do you?

[MARM 7]

CTRL+ALT+DEL :

you dont have kids do you?

It is unfortunate that you are getting such advice as that given by CTRL+ALT+DEL.

Your concerns are serious and I would like to offer some useful advice to you. I have never been to India, but I am a native of Pakistan so we do go with my family every other year to visit extended family there. The concerns about water are SERIOUS, unlike the above person mentioned. Last year I went and even though I always drink boiled water or spring water (I am speaking about areas of Pakistan with well-developed communities with maybe even better living conditions than the USA), I got sick with giardia (intestinal bacterial infection). The reason was I accidentally swallowed some water while showering. It may have not even been a mouthful, but I had severe diarrhea, couldn't keep anything down, and had to take two rounds of antibiotics to recover fully. When I came back to the USA, I went for a regular check-up and the doctor told me that even a mouthful of water could have caused the giardia. So either use purified water to bathe your baby, or boil the regular tap water (to kill all the germs), and then cool it of course to a comfortable temperature and bathe your baby with that, it is just as clean as any spring/purified water.

Mosquitoes are a problem everywhere, if you are not taking medications/calamine lotion from the USA, be sure you have access to export-quality or US medications/lotions/etc in India.

Your concerns are totally legitimate and you are not "over worried" at all in thinking about necessary precautions for your baby. Of course, you understand that children here have less immunity to common illnesses in that part of the world than the ones that are born and have lived there for generations due to environmental, genetic, and other factors. This is why it is very important to PROTECT your baby (unlike what the above poster said about letter your baby "roam free" in a sense).

Also, I would like to point out, I don't know how old your baby is, but if he/she still drinks formula milk, then keep it that way in India, you can either pack on a supply from the USA or make sure you have access to the same quality and brand in India. Whole-milk should also be consumed after it is boiled.

Diapers and baby wipes, soap,etc should be easily available in India.

And you are on the right track thinking this:

"we are thinking that maybe we will go straight to punjab after landing in delhi.

its a cleaner area, has less people, and really is where most of the family is anyways."

Don't forget sunblock for your baby and yourself. Remember, higher SPFs don't mean higher protection, it is the amount you slather on that matters. So, for example, SPF 35 lotion rubbed all over in a thin layer is better than a little bit of SPF 85 rubbed like moisturizer into the skin.

Good luck on your trip, have a safe one!

[maya62 7]

Hi Sam,

Nice to see a post from you... I hope you are doing well!

We were just in Nepal and I helped wash my SIL's new baby using mustard oil! She was very careful to get the oil into all the little creases and folds. She did it on a warm day, in the sun, on a clean cloth and the baby loved the attention and massaging that went along with it!

I think your concerns are valid, and I wouldn't assume your son has immunity because he's half Indian... he's (probably) been drinking your milk, which is how a lot of a baby's immunity is conveyed, and you are obviously not Indian.

I hope you decide to go, and just do your homework like you are right now, and have a great time!

Maya

[Rohini 0]

My baby was BORN in India. I am not an Indian and I stayed there with my finace from October through just last month. (I was in Mumbai and in the Raipur area of CG.) My baby is now three months old and she had no problems with anything at all. Go to your local international travel health clinic and they can give you all the info about what meds/vaccinations your baby may need. Obviously, if you are using formula you'd want to boil the water and be prepared with any baby meds you may have trouble finding in India.

[DanielParul 50]

We were planning a trip to India in november of this year. But then decided Aditya will only be 8 months old. So now we will wait till next year and take him there when he is 18 months old or so. A bit easier to handle the 20+ hr flying too.

[CTRL+ALT+DEL 1]

here's a little read on children - http://www.rd.com/living-healthy/bubble-ba...icle150007.html

When your baby-goods store is selling saline-soaked, aloe-treated, grape-scented tissues designed to "ease" the process of blowing your kid's nose, it is safe to say: There is no kiddie problem too small, no discomfort too negligible, no danger too remote, that some manufacturer won't come along and peddle a pricey product to prevent it.

After first scaring parents to death.

In the Kiddie-Safety Industrial Complex, parents are gobbling up hitherto unheard-of stuff like those Boogie Wipes tissues, toy wagons with seat belts, sure-grip gloves for lifting baby out of the bath, and even knee pads for babies to wear when they start to crawl over that crushed glass you chose instead of carpeting for the nursery.

Oh, you didn't? Well, the knee pads will still set you back $19.95 a pair. Forget the fact that 300,000 years of human evolution has already given babies built-in knee pads called fat. And how to explain "baby moisturizer"? Clearly, baby skin just isn't soft enough. And what about the Thudguard? That's a helmet you're supposed to strap onto your baby the minute she starts to toddle because skulls just don't do the trick anymore. As the Thudguard's website notes (beneath pictures of helmeted toddlers who look as if they've all just had brain surgery): A head injury can be "traumatic for both parent and infant."

So true. That's why I asked Dr. F. Sessions Cole, chief medical officer and director of the St. Louis Children's Hospital, how many children he's treated for life-threatening brain trauma as a result of learning to walk. He could not recall a single one.

You don't get hard science when you start buying baby safety products; you get hard fear. The companies plant a big "God forbid, what if?" in your brain, and suddenly, there you are at Buybuy Baby—tightly gripping a bottle of Valium—wandering the aisles in search of a baby mattress sensor. These are pads you put under the mattress that will sound an alarm if your child makes no movement for 20 seconds. The unstated assumption is that if you hear the alarm, you can race in to prevent every parent's worst nightmare: sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

Two million of the Angelcare movement and sound monitors have been sold at $120 a pop, according to the company's product manager, Roxane Popoviciu. But she can't say how many deaths they have prevented, if any. "They're not medical products," she demurred. So I asked Dr. Sydney Spiesel, a pediatrician and professor at Yale, how helpful such a device is.

"I don't believe it'll save a single child," he said. The sad fact seems to be that when children die of SIDS, they don't give 20 seconds' notice. That's why it's called sudden.

It's also rare, affecting about one child in 2,000. And by far the best preventive measure you can take, said Dr. Spiesel, is putting your child to sleep on his or her back. But now that these sensors are on the market, a good parent has to buy one, right? You don't want to be the mom or dad who didn't do everything possible to prevent even the most unlikely danger.

Tali Hylen felt exactly that way, so she bought a sensor when her daughter was born. But at night when she'd go in to breast-feed, Hylen says, "I would forget to switch it off." With the baby off the pad, the alarm shrieked bloody murder, "scaring the living daylights out of me, baby, husband, and dog!" After a few weeks, Hylen yanked it out.

Still, she swears by the camera, which came with a pricey flat-screen monitor; she keeps it focused on her daughter's crib so she can run in whenever she sees her pull her blanket over her head. "My mom keeps telling me not to worry about that," Hylen admits.

The specters of death and injury lurk in every aisle of the baby store, a place you'd think would be warm and cheerful. The Kiddie-Safety Industrial Complex is dedicated to convincing parents that "our own eyes and ears are not enough to protect our children," says Harvard psychologist Susan Linn. That explains fear gear like the plastic bathwater turtle. Put it in your baby's bath, and if the word hot appears on the turtle's tummy, your water is, well … figure it out.

Of course, there's another way to figure out the same thing. You could put your wrist in the water. In fact, the turtle comes with a warning: "Adult should always place hand in bathwater to test the temperature before placing baby in tub."

So what is the point of this perky plastic pet? There isn't one. It's useless. But there it is, in the bath aisle at Babies"R"Us, instilling doubt: Maybe your own wrist isn't enough.

Maybe your own arms aren't enough either. That's why, instead of just holding them by the hands, you can buy your little ones a set of Walking Wings, a sort of marionette-like getup that you use to keep them aloft while they learn to walk. This way, according to the package, the baby "gains confidence and independence."

Would kids not gain confidence and independence without the wings? Come on! They're learning to walk. Confidence and independence—more than most parents want, in fact—are guaranteed. The product goes on to promise "no tugging and twisting of little arms," as if holding children the old-fashioned way is torturing them.

But the true torture, of course, is reserved for those of us who can eat solid food. Right and left, we're told that we are incapable of ushering our children through childhood without a truckload of baby tackle. As Paula Meredith-Faris, the mother of Tali-with-the-flat-screen-monitor, says, "I walk through Babies"R"Us, and I think, How did we ever do it without all this stuff?"

Did You Grow Up With Any of These?

Shopping cart liners

Cloth liners you plop into the grocery cart before putting your child in. The idea is to prevent your little pumpkin from touching any germs. Sure, shopping carts are loaded with germs, but so is everything else. The bigger problem kids face is getting their little legs out of those even littler holes.

Wipe warmers

Perfect if you want your child to grow up expecting a warm washcloth at the dinner table. And a prewarmed bed. And maybe prewarmed socks. "There's a sense that babies are never supposed to be frustrated, that everything in their lives is supposed to be perfect," says Harvard's Susan Linn. But coping with little frustrations teaches children to cope with bigger ones later on. Even bigger than chilly wipes.

gLovies

Pint-size, disposable gloves that a young Howard Hughes would have (g)loved. Put them on your moppets' hands anytime they leave your sterilized home. "Keeps kids safe from germs in public places," promises the ad copy. Of course, this is the same ad copy that promises, "Fun to wear!" I'll bet.

Toe toppers

Individual nubs you place over baby's toes, like pencil erasers, to prevent them from getting stubbed. Actually, I just made those up. The toppers, I mean. But I'm sure they'll be on the market soon.

[DanielParul 50]

CTRL+ALT+DEL - When its your baby, you try everything on her.

To the OP, if your baby has not geen to India before then the concerns are valid coz the baby has not been exposed to the germs there. Heck, I get a upset tummy when I go to India now (been out for 4+ years) and its just because of the change in the climate, germs etc.Get all the vaccines that the baby requires and carry hand sanitisers, baby's everyday medicines like tylenol for just in case. Don't give tap water. You do get pasturised milk like nestle etc at big bazaar and its safe to drink without boiling (my cousins from the UK have been drinking that and its never given them any problems). All the best and have a safe trip