She caves

I remember reading how Bernard Kerik helped to turn the city of New York around in the eighties by making the police take people to task for basic things like jaywalking, littering; the little stuff that people do all of the time and that are often overlooked, especially in an already taxed environment. By curtailing the minimal stuff, the behaviors actually trickled up and there was a substantial decline in crime and nare-do-welling in general. Since that point, he's pretty much gone down hill; but for awhile, he had a good run.
Perhaps what I'm getting at, is that whenever we bring down the gauntlet at home, it's a radical transformation we're looking for, though we've been letting things slide for a while and don't really have much in place for any real change. The tidy and controlled lasts for awhile and then we slip once again into the chaos of rushed attempts of order and gum stuck under the table.