Stress, it's a killer!

In case you are wondering, that is a quote from one of my favorite animated movies, Anastasia. Love it! But it's so true! Well it is March Madness and I never did a bracket :( Oh well, I can enjoy all the upsets. Brad on the other hand can't, especially after Missouri lost (he had them going all the way). Can't blame him though, they did have a great season and were an easy final four pick at least. I cheered for Duke to lose (yay!), cheered on my Tar Heels, and keep hoping that Kansas loses (go NC State!). We love college basketball!

Last weekend was our big stressful adventure. So, our whole marriage it seems that life has gone by the "when it rains it pours" law. Cause when one bad thing happens, something else always does (so it seems). The stress of a diabetic/pregnant wife, medical bills, cars, etc. has been adding on a bit. Well, last weekend I had taken my civic to get the oil changed and tires rotated. When I got back home, Brad and I decided to go to Walmart to get a few things we needed. I got a new phone so Brad played around with my phone while I drove. Everything was going fine, that is until I start to accelerate to merge onto the freeway. The care would not stop accelerating! So what do I do? I started to panic.

Thank goodness Brad was there sitting next to me. I was freaking out telling him that the car would not slow down and kept trying to speed up. I guess the main point i got across to him was that the brake was not slowing us down. So Brad told me to calm down and pump the brakes. I'm doing this, the car is no longer accelerating, but the slowing down is not really happening. Brad luckily does not forget that we have an e-brake (which I of course did) so he pulled it to help slow us down to 60mph. He then told me to merge off the freeway. I did this and he popped the car into neutral and turned off the engine. I kept pumping the brakes the whole time, as I was instructed to do, and we coasted to a stop.

Luckily, we had only gone maybe a mile on the freeway during this whole time, so we were still at an area where there is lots of shoulder and grass on the side of the freeway. Brad ended up having to push us over a little farther from the road (cause cars were whizzing by super fast), then he got in the drivers seat and I moved to the passenger. Brad tried to turn the car on and automatically it sounded like a nascar cause the engine just went crazy (and Brad was not touching any pedals). No bueno.

He got out, popped the hood and didn't see anything. So Brad called his parents to see if they could come help. Then he called his buddy, Doug, who happens to know cars pretty well. Doug suggested checking the gas pedal. Brad did notice that the floor mat was pushed up under the pedal a little. He pulled this back and then turned the car on again. The engine still sounded like we were flooring the gas pedal. So Doug suggests checking the throttle line thing. Granted it was 7ish at night, so Brad is doing all of this by the light of his little maglight that he keeps in my civic. He checks the cord, pulls on it a bit, sees it doesn't seem to be caught. So he turns the engine on again. It actually sounds normal now. By now Brad's parents had pulled up behind us in their durango and a cop showed up as well to make sure everything was okay. I stayed in the car while Brad talked to everyone, mostly because I was still having a hard time dealing with it all. My body was shaking all over.

The cop told Brad that he was smart to put the car in neutral and turn off the engine because earlier that week, someone had crashed from a similar problem and did not think to do this. Thank you smart husband (or I guess I should thank his mission because they would try to save gas miles by speeding up really fast and then putting the car in neutral and turning off the engine). So Brad has me get in the durango with his parents to ride home with them while he would drive the civic. He goes to turn the car on, and the engine won't turn. Great, we need a new battery. Brad's dad brought a bunch of stuff just in case he would have to pull our car home. So he gets in front of the civic, rigs it up to the durango, and off we slowly go. The battery in the civic officially died about 5 minutes into the trek home, so Brad had to steer with no power steering. Luckily, we only had one rough turn, and the rest of the way was pretty smooth going.

When we got back home, Brad's mom called the neighbors over, who happen to own a diagnostic tester thing. We jumped the battery in my civic so there was some juice, then they plugged in the diagnostic thing. It did not get any error messages from the car's computer. So the men decided that the floor mat pushed on the throttle cord, causing it to jam, and our battery died in the whole crazy process. Brad says the battery needed to be replaced soon anyways. The next day, Brad bought a new battery and the car was working again. I still had him drive my car to work on Monday, while I drove his. Granted, his is a manual and it had snowed so of course the road to my work was slushy and I got stuck at a light on an incline. But I made it to work, Brad said my car worked just fine.

Moral of the story, check the floor mat (which Brad jimmy-rigged to the floor somehow so it should have a harder time moving), and pop the car in neutral and turn of the ignition if your car is not stopping. Brad would also say to not freak out.

Not an ideal situation for a pregnant lady. But we survived, the car is running fine, I just accelerate slow. Baby is still okay (I think/hope) and is apparently roughly the size of a baked potato, about as long as my hand, and weighs 5 oz.