The four-rule sign this mum made to stop her precious shower time being interrupted by kids.

Parents, you know the scene. You’ve been up for 27 hours, and you finally get a chance to sneak away from your beloved offspring to take a blissful shower. You make it exactly seven seconds before you’re interrupted by a child.

Yes, it’s a scene many parents would be familiar with, and perhaps even feel helpless about. But not Adelaide mum, Kerryn.

The mum-of-three decided last weekend to take back her power and stop her sixty seconds of personal space from being violated. She took pen to paper and wrote up her rules for exactly when her children, Cooper, 10, Alannah, nine, and Jenna, six are allowed to disturb her in the bathroom.

“If mum or dad are in the shower, before you knock on the door, ask yourself these questions first,” she wrote.

“Is someone dying?

“Is someone bleeding a lot?

“Does someone need an ambulance?

“Is there someone at the door?

At the end of the list, Kerryn concluded, "If you answer yes to any of these, you can knock. If NOT then let us shower in peace!! Love, Mum."

And then she posted the notice to the front of her bathroom door for her kids to see, and then on to her personal Facebook account for her friends to enjoy.*

Her Facebook post was captioned, "Will it work??"

Kerryn explained to Mamamia what led to her frustrated note that morning.

"Let’s be brutally honest, I didn’t need to write Dad on the note - it never happens to him, only me," she explained.

"Some mornings in my five minute shower I could have had all three walk in for various reasons once or twice each."

Kerryn, quite simply, has had enough of sharing her five alone-time minutes with the family.

"Oh, how I long for an en suite," she told Mamamia.

"But, unless there was a lock on the door I doubt that would really make a difference anyway. They’d probably just stand at the door and yell at me - or each other."

So, what are the cherubs wanting Kerryn's attention for?

"Some days the door to the shower opens and an iPad gets thrust just far enough in not to get wet waiting for me to put the code in to unlock it for them," she said.

"You know, really urgent stuff like that."

We wish Kerryn gets to shower in peace some time soon - or at least, just occasionally, before the kids leave home as adults.

*The author is a friend of Kerryn's and has reproduced the photo with express permission.

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