BATON ROUGE - Monday afternoon, a surprise storm shut down electricity to more than 20,000 Entergy customers in Baton Rouge. 

By Wednesday evening, 2,300 people were still out of power in the parish. Residents who couldn't handle the record-breaking temperatures with no AC and had extra funds turned to hotels to avoid the hundred degree temperatures.

"Jay" is a mother of five. She asked to not be identified for this story. Monday, the lights at Manor House Apartments on Florida Boulevard where Jay lives turned off. She brought her family to a nearby hotel.

"I just found the cheapest hotel where they have beds and air, and that's how we're keeping our heads above water," Jay said.

The mother of five returned to the family apartment Wednesday to find all of their food and groceries spoiled. After two days without power, the apartment thermometer read 90 degrees. 

"I just got food stamps and P-EBT. Now it's in the trash," Jay said. "I had to throw everything away because it went bad."

Jay says she tried to save whatever was salvageable from the hot refrigerator, but most groceries were too far gone.

"I was trying to save what I can: pancakes, waffles, stuff like that, but meat and ice cream to keep the kids cool. It's all gone," she said.

With the money she's spent keeping her children cool, now Jay says paying rent seems like a pipe dream.

"I would pay my rent, but what I bring in - that extra money I spent on the hotel was the money I needed to put towards my bills," she said.

As others in the Baton Rouge community see their lights turn back on, when Jay looks at the Entergy outage map, she says it doesn't give her much hope.

"I've called Entergy. They keep saying 'It's going to be fixed this date, this time,' and they keep pushing the date back," Jay said.

As of Wednesday afternoon, Entergy said crews are working to fix power, and it should be back on for The Manor House Apartments by Wednesday night.