Big sister has been getting a lot of the attention lately. And it’s been mostly the bad kind.

My house is experiencing the early stages of a civil war. Children fighting against adults. There’s no violence, but tensions are rising. Our one-year-old twins believe they have rights to the couch. This includes kicking the dog off and using the elevated surface in unique ways.

Our three-year-old is the first to emerge from her bedroom. The time is 6:03a. And even though I’ve been in the presence of another human for more than an hour, my first words are spoken only now. “Good morning, Soph. How are you?” I intercept her footsteps in the hallway and guide her to her parents bedroom so she doesn’t inadvertently excite the youngest in the house.

I couldn’t tolerate the kids playing in the kitchen any more. Cooking was happening and it wasn’t safe. A fire was lit on the stove. Heavy pans were being moved from the cabinets. Knives were slicing vegetables. There was plenty of room for kids to move freely in nearby rooms that didn’t involve ducking under refrigerator doors. I lost my cool. At that moment I invited a monster into my house.

This is number one on my 10 truths of parenting list: don’t do anything once you don’t want to do 500 more times.

My wife and I are methodical about how we care for our kids. We have to be, there are three little ones in this house that have very different needs and schedules. We knew this would be true before we had our twins. Life was going to slap us across the face. Hard.

We have a big family. We have three young kids. And these kids are not necessarily big in size. That’s not why I use that term. Big describes that they seem to be in more than one place at a time. They’re lighting fast. Big describes the sounds that they’re able to make. Their cries and yells can penetrate walls, I’m sure of it.

We know kids don’t come with instruction manuals. How could they? While needs are similar, the homes we bring these kids into are all different. Different norms. Traditions. Cultures. Each kid is raised under different circumstances.