Having six kids so close in age, who have been through domestic violence, broken relationships and various health problems, often makes me feel that I have been an inadequate parent. I had a fairly typical childhood, for the era I was brought up in. 2.4 children, a nice family home and parents who are still together now.

Over the past five years, my kids have had to deal with learning to live in a completely reformed family. When myself and my other half got together, five years ago, he was a single dad to two small boys and I was a single parent to three children. He and the boys moved into my home and we had a child together. This was hard for everybody and took some adjusting! Michael's son had to get used to no longer being the eldest, as my son was nine months older than him. This has caused some clashes! Jordan had to get used to no longer being the baby. He went from being the youngest, to having an 18 month old baby sister and then a baby brother. He still struggles with this to this day. He tends to be a little jealous of Alfie and tries to take over whatever he is playing with.

As Mum, I am very conscious of all the kids have been through. It is even trickier for my oldest, as he has had to deal with having problems with his bowel and kidneys, for all of his life. He has been unable to go on school trips overnight because of this and has had to deal with kids teasing him about these problems.

I have always been determined that the children should not suffer for the fact that there are six of them. They all have their various friends round for tea and they do goodness knows how many different activities. Footie, rugby, ballet, choir, karate, cooking club, and art club ......... could go on!

This half term, we devised a rota, as we wanted to make sure that each of them got some individual time with both of us. Over four days, we planned ten different activities, for the five oldest (Alfie gets individual time when the others are at school). We were looking forward to our "special time" with each of them, but it did not quite turn out as well as we thought it would. In fact the whole week has been rather like living in a war zone.

The first thing to happen last Sunday was that the children "inspected" our rota and began complaining and arguing amongst themselves, trying to pick flaws. We had worked hard to make it as fair as we possibly could, straight down the line, but they did not think so. There was so much jealously and rivalry during the week, it was unreal. When it wasn't a particular child's turn to do an activity, they got jealous and played up for attention! It was a nightmare. To top it all off, we all had stinking colds and that did not help the overall mood of the house. Whatever we did with them did not seem enough, they demanded more and were not happy. By the end of the four day's activities, we were both exhausted nervous wrecks and the kids were discontent and argumentive.

All of the following has led me to this final conclusion. We have been over compensating. We have felt so guilty for what they have been through, that we have tried to make up for it by spoiling them. They actually get a lot of attention, do a lot of activities and overall have the best life possible that we could give them. But, they have too much! They do not appreciate what they have got and just crave more and more. I partly blame this on the society in which we live, but I also think this is down to us as parents. It is our job to make sure that our kids grow up to appreciate and respect what they have. It's vital that we teach them to do this the best we can, for their future happiness. There seems to be far too much of everybody blaming their bad behaviour on their “difficult lives/pasts” these days. So no more overcompensating. Compassion and understanding yes, but over the top is out. It's time to teach them to learn to be happy and appreciate just what they have. To appreciate and look after their toys and indeed each other. I know this might seem idealistic and I am under no illusions that it is going to be perfect this time! We will just do the best we can, without spoiling them so much! After the uncertainty of their pasts, they now need stability. They need rules and limits. This will be better for them than the overcompensating I think?