It was one of those days.

Spud, after being sick for several days, woke up on the wrong side of bed and started screaming her head off in anger at her father for checking up on her to see if she was still running a fever. She got mad because she was woken up as opposed to her waking up herself.

It then went downhill from there.

For almost an hour, Spud would not calm down. She screamed and screamed and screamed at the top of her voice with NO to everything, wailing like she’s been roasted alive. For almost no reason at all.

She then climbed into the bathtub while Silver Bullet was showering Squirt and started to stomp around, still screaming. Squirt followed suit, crying away and then saying no to everything. All 3 of them, in the bathtub – two kids stomping away and screaming their heads off as we tried to prevent any mishaps from happening in the tub.

Let me tell you that it was an impossible task. Patience ran low, temper flared and anxiety skyrocketed as we tried to get them to calm down before anyone of them slip and hit their head. It was one of those morning when it was hard not to “lose it”. The bathtub is hardly a place for little toddlers to be stomping away and throwing temper tantrums!

Spud was just impossible to handle. She cried and screamed like she’s been possessed. We were rendered helpless and after several unsuccessful attempts to calm her down, I decided to ignore her, shoved her into her room, slammed the safety gate shut and walked off. Out of exasperation, I told Silver Bullet to ignore her completely. I.WAS.DONE.

She got riled up even more, and exploded in anger shouting “Papaaaaa….YOU IGNORE ME!” It was repeated over and over and over again, accompanied by the surround sound of an un-tuned, badly played violin. I could have implode.

I then made one remark to her to stop her nonsense or she will be free to stay in her room for the rest of day as we had to send her brother to school and ourselves to work. Not one minute later, the crying and screaming stopped. I waited for 5 more minutes before I went up to open the safety gate for her.

She came downstairs, asked me for cereal and then had her breakfast.

It begs the question: How does anyone deal with such insanity?

Just a few weeks ago, both kids have been so well-behaved and it has been a joy to hang out with them. And just a few days ago, both were sleeping blissfully in the same room, on the same bed in some strange hotel room. And when they slept, there wasn’t a peep. Seeing them sleep so peacefully was such a sight that I just had to still-frame the image.

This morning, I just wanted to disappear into the ground. A fleeting thought of dropping them off at the orphanage crossed my mind. Go find another mother for all I care. I was seething with frustration.

Have I ever told you that my kids drive me mad? One of these days, I would probably go check myself in a loony bin.