Why am I driving down the highway in the pouring
When I was kid I was a big worrier. I remember
when I was 8 years old I watched the movie
Beaches, and I became convinced that my
mom was going to die after that and I wouldn’t ever
let her leave the house without me. I could
never fall asleep and I always thought someone was
going to break into our house in the middle of the night.
At school we would have fire safety month every year
and for weeks after I believed our house was going
to burn down. It was bad. But as I got older that
faded away and I wasn’t really like that anymore.
As a matter of fact, I will be taking things I did in
high school to the grave with me and Emily Palmer
has sworn to me she is too! I don’t know what
caused the shift with me but I was ok until…..
If you have kids you know, but if you had a baby
that had to stay in the NICU for a significant
amount of time, you REALLY know what I’m
talking about. The day the twins were born my
anxiety began to harass me like the AT&T
salesmen at Sam’s on a Sunday afternoon. Every
day in the NICU there was a new test that needed
to be run on them, or a disease that needed
to be ruled out. There were always alarm bells
going off every time my babies moved and at the
end of the day I had to leave them there and go
home hoping that when I came back in the
morning they would still be ok. It was devastating
and scary and if there is such a thing as
NICU PTSD for parents, I have it! Anyway, from that
moment on I was a worrier again.
Sometimes it gets really extreme and I never
know what random thing it will be for the day. I will
say Web MD is the devil. Mostly my anxiety is
directed towards my family. Every week I am
convinced of a new critical illness my dad has or
I will watch a Tik Tok video of someone
explaining an accident they were in and I just
KNOW that is going to happen to me or my mom
or my kid. It’s ridiculous and all consuming and
I hate it. But it is what it is.
So, when my nineteen year old twins decided to
purchase $25 concert tickets you would think
that I would be able to say “ok well have fun
and be safe” and let them figure out how to get
there and back by themselves because they are
adults and capable of that. Well, my brain
doesn’t work that way. Instead my brain works
in the way where I have to choose to either
make myself sick worrying about whether or
not the Uber Drive will kidnap them or just take
them myself despite the fact that it is a
Wendesday and my alarm for work will be going off on
Thursday morning at 5:00am. I chose the latter.
My plan was good and included minimal stress
on my part. The plan was to have the girls drive
from Denton to our house at noon on Wedneday
afternoon so that when I got home from work at 5:00
they would already be here. The doors opened for
the concert at 7:00pm and it was located in Dallas
near the downtown area. This was the first problem.
I had to drive them downtown during rush hour after
working all day and if you work in a school district you
know the week before spring break is CRAZY! So anyway,
the plan was in motion. I drove them there, came
home, helped Maizy do all the missing
assignments she put off until the last minute,
and then at 9:45pm I left to go back and pick them up.
The minute they get in my car it starts raining. Hard.
This isn’t good since I am already a bad driver by
nature but add in astigmatism, slick roads, and traffic
and you better be prepared for a little nausea. If you
aren’t familiar with the area, Dallas to Denton
(where the girls go to school) is about an hour drive.
On the way they mention that they didn’t eat dinner
and they are hungry. I told them I would stop at a
McDonald’s on the way since it was late. I get really close to
Kenna’s university and I find a McDonald’s. I stop and get
them food and take Kenna to UNT. I drop her off and
head to Avery’s school. As Avery is getting out of
my car I get a phone call from Kenna’s roommate.
It’s Kenna and she says she left her phone in my
car and she needs it so I drive back to UNT and
drop off the phone. By now I am almost out
of gas and normally I would chance getting
home on what I had especially since it was
late and still raining. But, I was hungry too and
there was a Buccee’s really close to where I was.
I drive there and fill my tank full of gas and
go inside for a chopped brisket sandwich IYKYK.
I start my journey home with my BBQ sandwich
that is dripping all over me. By this time it’s already
well after midnight so I blast Creep by
Radiohead so I can keep my eyes open and I
finally make it home around 1:30am. I fell into
bed and set my alarm for 5:30 which was only a
few hours away now and I take a minute to reflect
on my decision to inconvenience myself to
calm my nerves, a common occurrence in my
life. The girls’ $25 concert tickets ended up
costing me about $100 in gas and food and
a Thursday at work where I was not pleasant
to be near. And not to mention another drive
back to Denton to pick them up the next day
since their car was at my house.
So that’s my explanation. Basically being a mom
has turned me into a crazy person and
although it’s a HUGE problem about 97% of
the time, I’m grateful for it all and I’ll happily
accept my seat on the crazy train. Anyone else?
No? Just me? LOL
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