When I failed to give birth to any girl, I started to count my blessings over my two lovely boys.  

To me, boys tend to be tougher in protecting their mummy, have a better sense of direction (which is always the case especially for Brendan when he is able to give me the correct direction in my driving), expected to be stronger in braving pain and scolding, and much more… One true character of boys is that they also FIGHT more and this has become a DAILY AFFAIR in my family life.

Just a few days ago, frequent contact between my two boys over the last week, has led to an abrupt fight between them “under the nose” of my domestic helper. The result was brisk and we ended up with an unpeaceful night as Darren wailed in pain, with a bleeding hand due to 2 cuts on the skin! Apparently, the boys have used my laundry basket as their fighting gadget and Darren had cut his hand “during the battle” with the basket.

 Just last Saturday, while Papa Ed and I were barely away from home for 3 hours, we received disturbing calls from Brendan with loud commotion behind and much wailing sound. Not able to make a word out of the telephone conversation amidst the “imaginable” chaotic scene at home, I was totally disturbed and half-hearted over what I was doing at that moment. It was only an hour later that I made out from my domestic helper that again my boys were fighting at home. Only this time to aggravate the situation, my adult domestic helper could not manage my two active kids, and she joined in the “verbal fight with them” until she ended up crying instead of managing the fighting situation as a logical adult.

You can imagine my disbelief (that an adult should break down and cry just because she couldn’t get the kids to stop fighting) and she let the whole situation ran out of control.  Eventually, I actually had to “direct” the remedial actions to stop the fight at home over the phone! The fight eventually ended but the situation landed me in a very unpleasant mood over the whole Saturday and pondering over what I should do if I should end up with my domestic helper joining in the fight with my kids, instead of stopping it, should it happen again!!

While the kids are still kept away from school and banned by me to play any PC game or hand-held games, what other gimmicks or games do the kids indulge in to keep themselves occupied? Obviously, it is fighting again! The interesting thing is that they are still a loving pair of brothers after each fight.

That's me trying to stop the fight

I am starting to take it as a growing up process for my two boys and as long as nobody gets hurt, I guess we might have to accept the reality of living with it. Usually after each fight when someone gets hurt, I will try to find out the reason behind the tension, instead of jumping to conclusion. We give our fair level of judgement to determine the reason for the fight and give a sound lecture to the “culprit”. Over the months, I have learnt that the one who inflicted those minor injuries, might not necessarily be the one who started the fight. The “victim” might not necessarily be innocent. Many times, the reasons that trigger the fight are so insignificant that I can’t help but sigh since they are still young and boys after all. Many times, it could even be parents ourselves who unknowingly display some acts that spark jealousy or even my domestic helper who failed to manage the situation or their feelings tactfully.

One day probably the boys will outgrow these childhood fighting days and look back at their “affectionate” fighting  moments and have a good laugh about it.

Most important is that they are still a loving pair after the fight