There has been a lot of very strongly felt emotions in my house lately. And when you are four that often means a lot of screaming. Loudly because, when you have three other sisters, sometimes you are sure that the only way you can possibly be heard is by screaming.

Even when you haven’t started at a normal volume. Because screaming gets so much better results so much faster as well. It doesn’t matter if it seems rude – it just works and when you are four, getting things to work the way you want them to — is the most important thing.

But it is hard for those of us who live with you. Who want to communicate with you and make things better, but at the same time don’t actually want to be shouted at. Especially when we are right next to you, especially when you walk into the room at volume 11.

Yet I know this is partially a phase. That while it feels like you are being louder than your sisters ever were at this same age of 4, you probably are not, you are all probably about the same. It is just that with each additional daughter there has been an additional voice and that is what makes it all seem, well, just so much louder.

There are times when we have physical reactions to you, when we honestly just cringe at the sound of your voice because it is so LOUD. Because even though six months ago you were really good at using your please and thank you’s, now you don’t want to use them at all. You just want to clearly speak what you need, and right now it usually comes out as demands.

This is a hard stage for me to parent. Because on the one hand, I am so excited that you can finally most of the time tell me clearly what you need and want (as the difference between the two doesn’t make sense in your brain yet). But at the same token the way you are demanding rather than asking, the way you are yelling rather than speaking, the way you are at times just so rude, makes it really hard for me to respond in a loving manner.

I want to teach you the skills so that you will understand that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar or in your case shouting.

I want to teach you that you can tell the universe clearly what you want, without losing any of your power but also without sounding like a complete and utter bitch. Because I don’t want you to be given those labels of bossy, arrogant and bitchy just because you can clearly state your needs, you know what you want and you are relentless about going after those things.

That is super powerful. At four and half you can already do that. I am so proud of you. At the same time you absolutely exhaust me. Not because you shouldn’t shine as bright as you are, but because, well the society we live in thinks I should tame you somehow. As if I could or should dull your edges so you don’t shine so bright.

I don’t want to do that. However, I do know that when you can explain your needs and desires in ways that work for all the parties involved. When you can create win-win situations. When you know how to win friends and influence people. That things go easier for you. People come to bat for you, you can make exceptions to almost any rule, and ask for forgiveness later.

These are tools I also want to give you. These are weapons as helpful as swords and arrows and a really loud voice. Being able to influence others to see your side and actually want to help you, now that is a gift that really will help you change the world the way you want it to be.

That is what I am trying to model and teach you oh dear 4. That you can get your sandwiches cut just the way you want and you can get all the milk you need in your bowl of oatmeal. But that by asking me nicely you will get it faster and I will feel better giving it to you. That your joy can shine through even when you ask with a smile.

Demands only get you so far. And where it comes to your three older sisters, it is really not very far at all. They don’t want to play with you if you get too loud, too bossy, too demanding, too bitchy. They don’t want to even be around you when you are like that, and let’s face it when they are like that you don’t want to be around them either.

So how can we meet in the middle, my youngest love? How can you learn to ask nicer while not losing any of your ability to articulate to the best of your ability what it is in fact you want? I don’t want to feel like you are bossing me around and telling me what to do. And you need to get your needs met.

Where is the middle ground?

Will you come and help me find it?

Can we practice balancing here together?

There is a picture book called Interrupting Chicken that was first shared with my family during a story time at one of our local libraries. The librarian who enjoyed singing songs and reading books to the kids apparently hated to use puppets, but for this book she got out a small finger puppet of a chicken because….

As the little chicken is getting ready to go to sleep she asks her Dad to read her a story. He starts one of the classic fairy tales, and before he has gotten too far into the story the little chicken interrupts and retells the story to a happier ending. This happens the magical three times before the Daddy chicken gives up and tells the little chicken to tell the next story whereupon the Daddy chicken promptly falls asleep.

It’s a very enjoyable picture book, whether you tell it with a chicken puppet or not, and my family has borrowed it from the library several times.

But the power of these stories, whether things that happen in real life, or that we tell ourselves, or that we pick up from beloved books, TV, movies and novels is when they become shortcuts to explaining our lives.

Interrupting chickens has become code in my family to mean that the kids have not let me or my hubby finish anything we have started that day. And how frustrating it has been to try and help them get their needs met while simultaneously getting what we need to get done, done.

There are other short cuts in my family. 1201 is code for when you are so overwhelmed by emotion or sensory input, or noise or whatever that your brain just wants to or actually does shut down and you need a few minutes of quiet to reboot yourself. This comes from a trip to Kennedy Space Center and learning that 1201 was the code that the computer in the lunar lander sent to NASA right before Neil Armstrong had to take over piloting the lunar lander so they could land safely on the moon. The computer got overloaded with information and had to reboot 50 feet from the ground.

Another one is I am undecided about spots which is hard to explain if you’ve never watched the British version of the sitcom Coupling toward the end of the last season and watched the couple having an argument over whether their new couch cushions should have spots or stripes. But in my marriage it has come to me that we really don’t care and could the other person just make the decision please. IT is helpful to have a short hand of this, especially in public where someone might think we should both have an opinion about something.

Troll Droppings is a nice way of saying all the shit that ends up everywhere in the house the moment your child becomes mobile. But also includes the stuff the cat drops on the floor or the dog leaves lying around. Especially Troll Droppings is the morass of stuff that is on the floor and really needs to find it’s way back to its home or get dumped in the trash. Seriously where do they find all this stuff to leave on the floor? It can also include sticky finger prints, and mud tracked through the house. Pretty much anything and adult didn’t leave behind. Think Family Circus and Not Me and I Don’t Know, their friendly household poltergeists.

Do you have code in your family? Are their short cuts that explain things? Do you nerd out and answer the kids when you are going for a family drive and they want to know where that you are taking the second star on the right and going straight until morning? Do you occasionally draw out the word legendary with a wait for it in the middle?

What is the family lexicon in your life?