My First Mom Nightmare

The other night I woke up totally jolted. I was just snoozing away, minding my own business, when I was hit with quite the nightmare.

My friend Annie and I went to yoga. This was a first for us, but we had a great class. I was so impressed with how well I was doing and had what I think was a conscious thought about making sure to go to yoga more often.

We were walking out together and I noticed that Annie didn’t have her daughter Ellie with her. Then suddenly like a ton of bricks it hit me… Where was Charlotte?

I started running. I couldn’t remember where my car was, but there I was, just running. I pulled out my keys to push the panic button, but ultimately, that’s not what led me to her. It was her cry.

I heard her crying from across the parking lot and when I arrived at the car, Mark was there. He looked at me with this severe look of disappointment. A total reflection of what I was feeling. And just as I thought it couldn’t get worse, a CPS (child protective services) worker popped up from the front seat.

I woke up instantly.

Holy shit.

I know I’ve been holding onto some mom guilt about the car seat incident, but holy smokes. That was intense and terrible.

Needless to say, it took every single ounce of self control not to wake up Mark. I just hugged my pillow, looked at a few cutie pie pics of my sweet girl, and somehow managed to get back to sleep.

I guess I’ve officially entered the scary, paranoid world of motherhood.