Long Story... but it was a LONG night.

Now I understand why my sister doesn’t like to travel without her husband. I was driving home from Clearwater last night, just me and my baby. I thought that I had sufficiently fed her enough so that she would just fall asleep quickly after being put in the car and it would be a nice quiet ride home. No such luck. Within 15 minutes she was screaming so loud I was at a loss at what to do. I was on the Causeway with no place to pull over. I finally couldn’t take it anymore, so I pulled over on the beach parking lot. It was very dark, but I saw a lot of people, so figured it was my safest bet because once I hit the next city, there was absolutely no place I felt comfortable stopping. So I pulled over and parked next to this beach security guy and got out of the car and started working on getting a bottle all warmed up for her. Then I heard the security guy yelling at patrons that the beach was now closed and if they didn’t leave immediately, he would start writing citations. That was all I needed. So I gave her the cold bottle to see if it would pacify her until I could find another stop. Nope. Not one bit. So, I scrambled to find the next possible stopping point. At this time I was on the highway. Again, no place to stop where I felt safe. So I saw the next exit and decided at least I was a little familiar with that area, so I would pull into the McDonald’s parking lot which was well lit. Again, I got out of the car and tried to get the bottle warmer to work (which I never got to work). I finally found a “room temperature” water bottle and proceeded to make her a bottle of formula after giving up on trying to warm up the milk. (I hope you can picture me scrambling around trying to do this at lightning speed while my daughter is screaming so loud I’m surprised I wasn’t crying right along with her). She gulped down two ounces and I thought we were in the clear, so I got back in the car. As I got back in the car, I saw this large (big and tall – muscular, not heavy) man walking towards my car. He didn’t look as clean cut as I would have liked, so I freaked out and slammed the car door, locked all the doors and sped out of that parking lot like a madwoman. He probably just wanted 25 cents, but I was taking no chances with this precious little baby of mine. She was ok for about 6 minutes and the screaming returned. I knew she couldn’t possibly still be hungry, but just to keep her satisfied until I could find stop #3, I tried the bottle again. She wasn’t having anything to do with that bottle and I knew it was time for some nursing if I was ever going to get her to calm down. Stop #3 was another McDonald’s parking lot about 10 miles down the road. I kept trying to soothe her and tell her it would be just a few more minutes, but the screaming just didn’t stop. Finally… (not sure what my speed was)… we arrived and I took her out of the car seat. She was drenched in the front with formula and drenched in the back with sweat. She looked scared to death and I’m not sure I looked any better. I couldn’t believe we were still not even halfway home. I can’t tell you how many times I pondered just giving up and finding a hotel room for the night. So, I just held her for a while until she finally calmed down and eventually the look of terror waned. Then I realized that she probably had too much to eat so I was just waiting for her to give some of it “back to me”. I didn’t even mind. I told her she was free to do it (after I put a blanket on myself so that I wouldn’t have to change my shirt). I just held her and held her and waited and waited. It was just me and her against the world trying to survive. It was indeed a bonding moment between us. We finally got back on the road. She started to whimper a bit, but it wasn’t the screeching as before, it was more like a worn-out-trying-to-not-fall-asleep cry. I endured the small cries and she finally crashed when we were about halfway home. Then, of course, it was too quiet and I started to worry about that… but luckily every few minutes she would let out a little whimper. I was never happier to see my house and know that we were finally safe and God had protected us and now we could both get some good and comforting rest. Whew. Hopefully I’m not the only one with experiences like this.