Do you struggle to keep your house tidy?
Do you struggle to keep your house tidy?
I feel like my house is constantly a fucking mess. My wife and I work 80 hours between us and we have a 2 year old and I feel like it's constantly a mess.
We do what we can and often spend a couple hours on a weekend tidying but it's a losing battle.
How do you cope/keep on top of things?
My robot vacuum really helped with this. It runs every day while at work, which forces me to pick stuff up and make sure it won’t get stuck somewhere.
Got me into the habit and by now it’s second nature. Before I leave the house I do a quick check/clean, which takes a minute or two at most.
And then you have the obvious benefits in getting the apartment vacuumed.
A minute or two each day gos a long way.
It sure dos
My dogs would shit themselves if a robot started vacuuming. I mean, they shit themselves when I do it, so I can only imagine…
My cat is less scared of the robot vacuum than regular vacuums. Possibly because it is small and moves in a predictable pattern?
Thats like the worst thing a dog can do around a robot vacuum.
Damn I thought I was the only one haha. My robot vacuum also forces me to keep my place relatively tidy so it doesn’t get stuck.
I can certainly see there being a habit aspect to it, and once it's tidy as you say it's a minute or two to keep it that way.
Do you have different floors to your house?
I could see it helping with the ground floor but still neglecting the bedroom level, etc
Live in an apartment, so that definitely helps. It tidied the floor in every room. But honestly, it’s not so much the vacuum, more so the habit of cleaning a minute or two when I leave the home.
As well as picking stuff up when I’m done with them obviously.
You just need to master one rule: designate a place for each item and put them IMMEDIATELY back in their designated place after use.
OP can master that rule today, won't make a damn bit of difference with a 2 year old around.
haha, yes, all hope is lost there...
Oh yes, this is the path to giving up.
If your 2 year old has access to so much shit then you have bigger issues.
Yeah, it really helps if you limit the amount of stuff you have in your house and put everything back where it belongs right away.
If you then clean 1/1.5 hours a week you can keep everything relatively clean.
Also like one of the others comments said a robot vacuum can really help limit the dust in your house.
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It's very interesting indeed. A while ago I read Carl Popper's Open Society and it's Enemies. In that book he argues that Plato and to some extent Aristotle have developed underlying philosophical tools to support, for a lack of better term, "closed" societies. For example slaves rather remain slaves, farmers remain farmers, and rulers remain rulers. He argues that they contribute to a totalitarianism, and undermine democracy by discouraging being equal and in general "change".
Take all this with a grain of salt, since it's a while I've read the book, so can't articulate it better. But your comment reminded me of all this, so I thought it might be interesting for you and other readers.
ps: I personally think there is no natural place for things, that's us, sentient beings, who define that and give things meanings.
I don't have kids and never will, I live alone in avarage european flat, yet I still struggle to keep it at least managable. I like having it clean, I just hate cleaning
Sounds like you need a cleaner
I recently found out I had ADHD, which explained a lot imo.
BUT, you have a kid. Who has a kid and a tidy house? Rich MFers who get there home cleaned weekly ig
It makes me wonder if anyone really has a clean house or I only really go to my parents/in-laws house and they have only themselves to clean up after
I've found the only people I know who have clean houses are: people without kids, people with house cleaners, people who's mental health issues make them want to clean. Everyone else just apologizes for their mess and moves on.
Preach.
Moved from 1000sqft to 2400 and all hope was lost.
With 2 kids under 5 and a couple of pets, I literally can't clean fast enough to make a dent.
Bathrooms and kitchen are clean.... the rest belongs to the animals.
Wow, I can feel the despair trough the text.
I only have a cat and I'm already at my limit, u have my respect.
So me and my wife talk about this.... Is keeping a small house tidy easier than a large house? We have a 2400 sq ft house as well. I would assume if you had a small house, it's the same amount of mess, but it'd be more overwhelming because it's compressed into a smaller space. And clean space would fill up faster. So you'd be cleaning more to at least have some space that's clean.
As someone who grew up in a house that was definitely too small for a 4-person family, it makes keeping the house decluttered a lot more difficult because there's just not space to put things away. And god forbid you aquire NEW things, because then you have to shuffle everything around to make a place for it or it just ends up laying around.
I say it depends on the type of people making the mess. I myself can live with a little mess. If it not catastrophic, I might add to it by not putting some stuff away immediately. But at some point, it's too much, and I'll be putting things in order as I go, instead of adding more.
But with a bigger place, I can spread it more, so overall more mess can be made before I stop adding more
Dispersion is the problem. In the last place, there were 2 places the kids could wreck, the living room and their shared bedroomso we could tidy them and it would be presentable..... this place? Half dozen easy, plus there's 2 additional bathrooms, the kitchen is twice the size and the basement is like a soccer pitch sized FFS.
We needed the space, last place wasn't working so these are good problems to have but it's definitely more than I anticipated.
I feel this comment! Makes me feel better about the state of things. Entropy, entropy everywhere.
We have a sign in our home. “Cleaning a house while kids are growing is like shoveling while it’s still snowing.”
We have a cleaning day once a week. Other than that, we let it be other than daily kitchen duty.
It's a lot easier to shovel a foot of snow thrice than it is to shovel 3 feet of snow that's compacted, melted down a bit, formed a freezing layer on top and ice on the bottom, and now your shovel is broke because you were trying to pry up that ice with 60lb of snow on top of it.
But at that point you say fuck it and just pay a guy to swing by with his plow and throw out some salt.
I appreciate the sentiment though.
The idea being to clean the driveway of snow while it is still snowing means that immediately after, it’s covered in snow again.
This saying isn’t about volume.
I think the saying still works. For me, it feels like it's a case of reframing it as an in-progress task rather than one that can be completed. It is easier to shovel one foot of snow thrice, but it can be demoralising to shovel a foot of snow and feel like you've made no progress.
In the context of tidying, it's about clarifying what's normal and reasonable to achieve. Tidy all the time clearly isn't, but that doesn't mean don't tidy.
Same here.
At home, me and the wife try to split chores as evenly as possible. When she was struggling with burnout, one of her problems is that the house explodes into a mess, thanks to two children. One of the advices she was given by her therapist, is to block a few minutes a day for the entire family just to do minor cleanup chores. The mess remains, but it feels a bit more manageable now.
You either have a clean house or you have a kid. You'll never have both at the same time. Most people have neither.
For me it's also impossible. Theres just so much stuff.
- robot vacuum runs at night, shit needs to be off the floor - this helps a lot already
- be into podcasts, designated hour of cleaning while listening to something interesting
robot vacuum runs at night, shit needs to be off the floor - this helps a lot already
Absolutely can second this. In my case I just spend 5 minutes each morning making sure there's nothing on the floor before the robot does its thing, and it's helped tremendously. Stuff used to get moved around to places it didn't belong and just stay there - but not anymore.
I also make sure to never leave a room empty-handed, if there's something that needs cleaning up. Just pick up a glass on my way to the kitchen, or a toy on my way past the kid's room - at this point it's just automatic, takes nearly zero extra time or effort, and has a huuuuuge impact. I think I've only purposefully tidied the apartment once in the last 6 months, because stuff just no longer builds up to the point that it becomes a big mess.
I am a parent. So I don't have a clean house.
That is all lol.
No, I have adhd and anxiety. Cleaning helps me feel calm.
I wish my anxiety functioned like that. A mess makes me way more anxious but my ADHD tells me evening will take 92 hours so don't do it.
Now I want adhd. Gimme some :)
My wife is someone who cannot relax unless they house is pristine. We have a two year old also, and it seems never ending.
Somewhere on a lifehacks post, posted that they set their phone for a 15 minute Timer each day.
I do it on my watch now, silently. Each day. My wife hasn’t caught on to what I’ve been doing. But I can say is I’m having far more sex than ever.
(It’s still never ending, and seems to just shift room to room, but just more manageable)
Look at Mr stud over here lasting a whole 15 minutes !
Hmm. Seems to be taking longer as I age.
Yes. I have a husband and a 16 year old autistic son (unfortunately he is very low functioning and does not really help with any chores because of that, despite his age).
My husband works 5 to 6 days a week, usually 12 hour shifts, sometimes if there's a 6th day it's 8 hours. I work 8-5, 5 days a week, but also have about a 45 minute commute one way.
Husband also has a large family and we have a pool, so right now at least one weekend day is usually spent hosting them for swimming.
My best strategy right now is that if I walk by something that needs doing and will take a few minutes or less to complete (think throwing away some trash, tidying the coffee table, grabbing all the dishes in the room and moving them to the sink), then I do it right then. It's not perfect and it doesn't take care of everything, but I'm hoping if I do it more, I'll be able to sort of stack things and do two things at once that need doing and then cleaning will become part of my routine.
But honestly I'm mostly here to get tips because my ADHD brain needs help.
We really went minimal after our fourth kid. Too many toys, too much of everything. We don’t need 3 whisks, or 4 blankets, or 6 duvet covers, or 4 spatulas.
We now have a fairly minimalist house, with the exception toys, but here we do weekly rotation, leaving most of it boxed up in the garage and only some out. They kids think they get new toys when some of their old stuff reappears.
I just try really hard to do the small things all the time. Whenever I leave a room, I try to bring something with me that shouldn't be in that room. Whenever I go into the kitchen, I try to clean one thing in the kitchen whether it's putting something in the dishwasher or throwing out an empty package.
Just do small things whenever you have a moment.
Our place still looks chaotic though so don't expect miracles.
Wife and i both work full time with a 3 year old and my wife is currently also going to school as well. Basically clean as we cook in the kitchen, one of us pick up the toys while the other puts her to bed. Pretty much everything else gets sidelined until it absolutely needs to be clean. We have a roomba that vacuums, but other than that the floors dont get cleaned until one of absolutely cant stand them. Bathrooms get deep cleaned only when people are coming over. Windows get washed once or twice a year. Basically, weve adapted to mess in a way that's tolerable to the both of us in order to enjoy the little free time we have. I think the best thing we've done is not holding messes against each other. I'll tell her tlthat im not doing dishes tonight but ill get yhem tomorrow. If she decides to do them, thats her decision. If she says she's not doing laundry, cool, ill do it if i need something. Im absolutely fine living in qrinkly clothes that came straight out of the hamper. Communication is absolutely key to not losing your mind.
Thing is, you and your wife must make sure you share the same set of rules. For instance, here I saw someone suggesting that you should put things back to their designated place immediately after you used them. It’s a good advice, but both of you must commit to the same rule, orherwise you’ll end up like me, that is, tidying up after my parter almost all the time. 😆
dont tidy up after your partner. tidy up after yourself, and let them figure it out eventually.
Let me assure you, this kind of passive behavior does NOT work and only results in being resentful as you wait for the other person to figure it out and they never do.
Don't assume people will figure something out on their own if you care about the result. Communicate openly. I cannot stress that enough.
Yes. I have depression and I struggle everyday to keep things decent enough. Doing the dishes everyday is been my long battle. I am trying the strategy of putting a minimum time of doing the dishes everyday (five minutes). Usually it's enough for me to clean all the dishes in a day. Once a month, a person comes to help me clean. This makes me clean as well before, so I don't burden them.
No. If my house is not tidy, it disturbs me. I have to clean up.
This is me. Except it's still not enough to motivate me to do the cleaning. Adhd sucks sometimes.
probably try to change yourself? it's so common case especially when you have a boy
I’m AuDHD. Other half is undiagnosed but probably ADHD. 8 year old is AuDHD. No idea about the three year old. But yeah… our house is either stripped bare if I’ve been on a hyperfocus clean or absolute chaos if neither of us have been
Deebot our robot vacuum has helped a lot. And we are trying to implement some routine but none of us are very good at routine so… 😂
We've got a robot hoover, herv but he's been struggling recently because we're remodeling our kitchen and the floor is a bit uneven. I'm hoping that he pulls his weight a bit more when the floor is tiled
Yep. Depression paints in broad strokes and has degraded my ability to clean, keep schedules, etc. Not fun.
That's living with a 2 year old. We had similar situation, but we were able to put little guy to sleep at about 6-7 pm every day. Still we were so tired, that we went to bed around 9-10. But we woke up at 5 am, and we were able to clean before work. Sometimes it was more effective than cup of coffee.
Yes. Same situation as you but a 3 year old. I gave up on the stuff my kid yeets everywhere and focus on dishes/kitchen/vacuuming. Then once every couple weeks I go on a rampage and pick up everything when I can’t take it any longer…
I know what you mean. I have a 3 year old. I don’t really bother to pick up toys every day. Try to focus on just the space that you want clean for yourselves. For me, it was the kitchen counters and the living room where I like to relax. Also, having a bin in each room for toys helps a lot, just spend 2 minutes piling all the toys in the bin will go a long way to helping it look better.
Similar hours, no kids but 2 dogs and 2 cats.
A Roomba and a housekeeper once a month to do the big things (dust, bathrooms, floors). Worth every penny.
I think having an isolated area for kids toys or an easy to dump bucket to throw everything in would probably help the chaos that I see in other parents' homes but as a childfree person I'm the last who should give advice on that so feel free to laugh and ignore that idea.
A robo vacuum only seems silly until you have a decent one. Then it's noticeable how good it is.
Good luck getting a toddler to only play with things in a designated area. They are a full force of nature. I do have a basket or toy bin in each room to shove stuff in but it always comes right back out.
For daily upkeep it's best to clean as you go. Little tasks embedded in your other tasks. Like if I need to change my shirt, grab the laundry on the way and put it away before putting on that shirt. It saves 1 trip of walking along the way. Same principle as cooking, you clean as you go. Like you slice meats and start the browning...so turn around and clean the cutting board while you wait for it to brown.
For monthly upkeep we hire cleaners to go through the whole place for 200+25% tip. It definitely costs money, but saves on our time and sanity to not have to remember to do all these little cleaning tasks all over the house that just keep piling up until you "find" time to do it.
My wife and I got the idea that our home is cluttered and messy because we have not one, but two toddlers. Twins. Not so much because of the mess they make (although that certainly adds to it), but because we have zero time to deal with it while they are awake, and when they finally sleep we are completely EXHAUSTED.
But reading these comments from parents of single children honestly made me feel a lot less bad about it. So thanks for that, fellow clutterers.
I have two kids who are 3 years old (they are twins). I accepted that my house can't be as clean as it used to be without my kids...
No, I don't struggle, because I feel no compulsion to keep it tidy in the first place :)
I don't have kids and live alone in Tokyo. Space is limited so keeping things neat and tidy is a must. Also idk I just can't relax if I know there is still some small housework to be done (dishes, etc.).
If you have two year old I think you can be forgiven for a bit of chaos! Don't stress.
I just hire 2 cleaning ladies.
This is going to sound stupid, but... Don't you have to clean up for them to be able to come in and do their job?
Our major issue isn't so much that it's "dirty" per se. Granted that is an issue too, certainly. But the real issue is just that there are "things" everywhere. Kid stuff, papers or objects put down in haste, things that toddlers surreptitiously grabbed and moved into incorrect locations, etc.
All those things are why we don't get to truly cleaning. Wouldn't we have to get all those things picked up if we hired cleaners?
I wonder the same thing. All the kids stuff has their place, so everything can be put back into place, but I imagine that has to be done before cleaners come in as they don’t know where stuff is supposed to go (or they clean around it? ..which would be super half-assed)?
I do! But having scheduled company over for dinner and an RPG session once a week has helped me get over the procrastination to do the bare minimum to keep the house presentable.
Don’t have a tip from my own life, but I know someone who has them 😊
I can highly recommend minimalmom on YouTube. She makes videos about family minimalism, and I think her info may be very useful.
She is currently running a course on minimalism that explains the concepts of it.