Birth of the Anarchy Annals

I woke up this morning, realized I was off work and had no specific plans, and wondered what I would do with the day ahead of me while my girls were in school. Errands? Go shopping? Have a secret rendezvous with my mysterious Latin boyfriend? Okay, I've been watching too many Desperate Housewife reruns on the Lifetime Channel. Anyway, just as I was trying to map out my life for the next eight hours, I heard a raspy voice from down the hallway crying, "Mommy! My throat hurts!"

So much for my alone time .........

Well, the thermometer registered a fever and my daughter coughed a few too many times. So, I called the school to make Jordyn's absence from first grade legitimate, gave my child a Tylenol, and threw myself back in bed. Several hours later, Jordyn and I both woke up. And, surprisingly, we both felt better than we had earlier. I felt more rested, and she felt, well, all better. With the help of a three hour nap, my sick daughter had miraculously morphed into a very healthy child. She began running around my bedroom singing and dancing. She was asking for food and begging to have a playdate.

Immediately, I knew what could actually get accomplished on this seemingly wasted day. Now that my daughter was back to her normal, overactive self, she was fully capable of cleaning her room! Now, this room cleaning thing had been a long time coming. Gradually, over the past ten days, her room had gone from fairly neat and tidy to total and complete chaos. Each day, I gently reminded her to straighten the mess. And, each day, I was given a very plausable excuse as to why the task could not be completed.

So, now, finally, after countless hours of begging my daughter to complete her daughterly obligation to maintain a kept room, I basically had her in a position where she couldn't refuse me. She was home during school hours, with no one available to play and no where else to be. And now that her fever was gone and her energy had returned, Jordyn was finally going to clean her room!

With high hopes and a renewed sense of well being, I marched over to my daughter and flatly informed her that she was done playing until her room was clean and her laundry was put away.
I was confident. I was firm.

I was now face to face with the temper tantrum of a lifetime.

Is there some book or some website that all children read behind their parents' backs, that teaches them to go limp as soon as they hear the order to put their toys away? And, does this nebulous manual go on to instruct them to have an all out hissy fit if going limp fails to get their parents' attention?

My daughter was apparently paralyzed on the floor in front of me, yelling and crying and calling me the world's worst mommy. I guess she learned that name in the book as well.

It took all the courage I could muster up to look my hysterical, quadriplegic daughter straight in the eye, remind her one last time to clean her room, and then, bravely walk away..........

The screaming continued for days.........Well, at least that's what it felt like. In reality, it took her over three and a half hours to clean the mess she was supposed to have straightened up almost two weeks before.

By the end of the entire ordeal, she was all cried out and I was about ready to leave my life and never return.

My lucky husband returned home long after the temper tantrum and the name calling had ended. However, he was just in time to witness our two daughters hitting each other and fighting over some random, dearly coveted magazine that, apparently, only belonged to one of our children.

Now it's nighttime, and the kids are in bed. My husband's resting on the couch and I'm dying for a diet coke and a mindless rerun on the Lifetime Channel.

Maybe those Desperate Housewives episodes aren't so ridiculous after all.........