COLUMN: 'When she shouts, I'm fine, but when she walks away, I know it's coming'

First of all, I’ve a few things to clarify from the Boherlahan Bingo Night column, writes Darren Hassett.

The Boherlahan Parish Hall can take an attendance of 250, so I’m told. 

I obviously don’t listen intently enough when my father is speaking, at least that’s what I think he said to me.

I also should have written that we shouted “CHECK!” outside the hall on Bingo Night to cause the false alarms and not “CHEQUE!”, although if you’re shouting it, both will do.

I’m sure there are more mistakes in this column, more on those next week...

Now, seen as I have already mentioned not listening to parents, on to my daughter...

Lily Nell is a one-year-old that has proven herself to be tougher than our three-year-old. Creche describes her as: “She is well able to stand up for herself.”

Which is code for if someone tries to cross her, they’ll get a dig or be subjected to a screech.

She doesn’t like being told no.

And when she is told to stop doing something, short of a shout and collapsing on the ground - which I would prefer, on occasion she will walk calmly away and then once she is a sufficient distance from me, she will turn and throw an eye that would send a shiver down your spine it is so cold.

I call it the death stare.

Parenting my little girl is so different to parenting my little boy though.

I have a different relationship with the two of them.

Me and Jack could be seen any evening playing hurling in the hall or soccer, or wrestling on the “big bed” and Mammy fuming that I’m riling him up right before bed time. Lily Nell doesn’t mind being thrown around the place either.

But if I sit down on the floor she will happily come over, turn around, and plonk herself down in between my legs.

Whereas Lily Nell always wants her Daddy, Jack always wants his Mammy, unless he’s in the mood for a wrestling match.

They are so different too.

Jack is such a sensitive little soul, the occasional expletive aside.

Whereas Lily Nell is tough as nails. Nothing phases her.

And if Jack and she bump heads, Jack is usually the one roaring and Lily Nell just goes about her business.

Something has to be very wrong for Lily Nell to be crying and when she loses her cool, she is terrifying.

Whereas with Jack, just last Thursday, he lost his sh*t just because he thought I didn’t pause Megamind when we were going out to school, he wanted to watch it that evening from the same place he was at before I pulled him away to school.

Little details bug him. His cars and tractors all have to be in a straight line, things have to be exact and perfect or it stresses him. A little scratch on his hand is a gaping wound.

And Lily Nell is the wrecking machine that is here to wreck his head and his life.

The little woman is banned from his room and she loves nothing more than getting it there and destroying Jack’s perfectly lined up toys.

She knows it is a forbidden area and she wants to get in there, it’s clear it is all she thinks about from morning until evening.

We’re so blessed that we get to experience a son and a daughter because they are both so different and there is so much to learn for fathers with their daughters.

I put tights and a T-shirt one day on Lily Nell, but I didn’t know you had to put something on over the tights and Mammy found it very amusing and warned that our daughter was not a “Kardashian”.

I also find it easier to hold firm when I say “No” with Jack but with Lily Nell I can stay the course with my “No” and “Don’t do that” for about three minutes.

But Jack is that bit older.

It’s amazing, because I love them both, obviously, but in different ways.

And no day is the same parenting the two of them, I’m sure other fathers and mothers can relate.