We’re on 3 rows a day – and counting

“I want to be Vernon Kay.”

“No – it’s MY turn to be Vernon Kay. Muu-um - tell him. TELL HIM.”

And that’s how my attempt at a bonding board game of Family Fortunes ended in yet another fight.

I had hoped the fun and distraction might help my three youngest children resolve their differences. I’d already rowed with the eldest on the perennial subject of why he needed to spend at least as much time revising as he did going out with an A-Levels module just a week away.

And the never-ending saga of why it was my 14-year-old’s turn to walk the dog had left me exhausted.

By the time the Family Fortunes row broke out I wanted to put my fingers in my ears, close my eyes and shout “la la la la” very loudly until they took me away to a calm and peaceful padded cell.

Unfortunately I decided to play peacemaker by nominating my daughter as Vernon Kay.

“She can’t be Vernon. She’s too small. She’s a girl and she can’t do the ‘uh-uh’ sound right.”

I gave up, leaving them to it.

I retreated to the kitchen where the ever-faithful dog jumped up, licked my face and wagged his tail.

Maybe I would have been better off breeding Labradors. After 18 years as a parent I still feel like I can’t get it right. Why do my children argue so much?

Consoling myself with a large mug of tea, I sat down in the kitchen to read the newspaper.

“FAMILY LIFE MEANS THREE ROWS A DAY,” screamed the headlines.

Misery, they say, loves company. The report claimed that most British families have three disagreements a day. The most common rows were over household chores and children “treating the house like a hotel.”

Fights usually flared up three times a day, lasting on average five minutes.

Judging by the deafening silence from the living room, we were normal after all.

I began to think back to the days when I was around the same age as my own children.

My dad used to work in the evenings and was always in the house when we returned from school. My brother and I would very often find him in tears as the credits rolled at the end of another episode of Little House on The Prairie.

For years I used to think it was the heart-wrenching storylines that made him cry until I realised his tears were more likely down to the fact that as soon as my brother and I walked through the door, the peace was shattered along with my dad’s dreams of a happy and harmonious family life.

I decided there and then to phone my dad and ask if my brother and I fought as much as my children.

“Fight? Fight! You never stopped. Do you remember that time I nipped out to the corner shop for a quarter of ham and I came back to find Aunty Ethel mopping up blood after you’d pushed John over.”

Remember? How could I forget? For weeks, or should that be days after I would lie in bed haunted by the fact that I could have killed my younger brother – who, after all, did provoke the push by pinching my favourite doll…

Strangely enough, my brother and I are now best friends – a relationship strengthened when he became a father of three.

So the report had it right. Family rows are not a bad thing. Rows apparently play a vital role in building and strengthening bonds, while acting as a release valve for family members.

And the best advice for coping with the all that chaos was to begin by counting slowly to 10.

I drained my tea, cheered by the fact that we were normal after all. This was around the same moment as I heard that familiar wail: “MUUUUUM!”

“One…two…three…four…five…”