by Consuelo Bernardi

Created on: May 09, 2009

I never ever, ever should have turned the radio on this morning.
I should have just left the TV on and grooved to the musical numbers from the Backyardigans on Treehouse.
Instead, I randomly selected a radio station and the first song I heard was Guns 'N Roses 'Welcome To The Jungle'.
Now normally I crank up this song when I hear it, it is one of my all time faves....but this morning I just had this bad feeling about it....it was like a premonition of what was to come.

And I was right in my musically based fears.
The damn song was my fate for the remainder of the day.
The song followed me around EVERYWHERE.
And it wasn't a good thing [no offence to Axl Rose and company]

Damn those music gods.

It was like that song switched on the 'full moon crisis mode' in both of my children.
Non &^^%%$# stop since they woke up.
One meltdown after another.
When one crisis was resolved another was one brewing, waiting to explode.

And then Mummy reached her 'that's it I've had it and I'm laying down the law' point.
That happened when Matteo pushed Isabella into the row of toy bins in his room.
[He's had the 'don't push your baby sister' lecture more times that I can count]
So I took Isabella to her room, threw Matteo's BFF teddy into the washing machine (he loves that thing with everything in him and HATES when teddy has a bath) and told Mr. I Like To Push he was having a nap whether he liked it or not [and he didn't...the kid hasn't napped since he was 15 months old...yes I have a slight hate-on for parents whose kids nap, but I digress] and I closed the door and walked away.

According to my calculations, crying fit #145 of the day took place.
Matteo kept getting out of his bed, would kick his door with all his might and tell me that he was going to hit me because he was so mad.
I just kept marching back in, kept repeating that he was being punished for continuously pushing his sister around and he was going to lie down on his bed until I told him he could get up.
Eventually, after 22 long minutes of the back and forth routine, he finally fell asleep.

And I felt like shit.
Damn the guilt.
I hate being the hard ass. Even though it seems to be my role more often than not.
I felt bad for coming down on Matteo, when in his defence I couldn't really blame him.
He's a such a good kid at heart but his sister annoys him on a daily basis.
And like any adult, he has a breaking point too.

See his sister Isabella is one VERY determined 1 year old girl. That whole theory that the second child is

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