Is a tidy ordered house really that important?

Yes. I can’t function in a muddle.

My house sounds like yours OP and my mum doesn’t need any care at the moment so I don’t even have that to worry about. It’s clean but by god sometimes it looks like we’ve been raided by the police. I don’t give a fuck! Both of us have full on jobs, my husband works about 60 hours a week, me 40, our sons at school all day and when he’s not he lives like the 14 year old that he is. Like shit are we going to spend our precious ‘downtime’ fancying about tidying up.

OP firstly the person who told you this is an arsehole. Secondly, look on it as a brilliant way to weed out the people who you don’t ever need to invite into your family home again. A quick ‘fuck off’ should suffice.

I am so sorry your so called friends are saying these things about your home out of curiosity do these friends have less busier life’s than you are they at home more than you are?

Your house is fine. It's your 'friends' that need changing up.

I have a demanding job and an elderly mum I see twice a week - none of the extra stuff you're dealing with - and my house is an absolute tip atm. Sometimes that's just the way life goes.

I love this.

One of my good friends said she knew we would become friends when her daughter unexpectedly invited my then 3yo inside as we walked past; she ran in and my then very new acquaintance looked panicked and started apologising for the mess. I went in to retrieve DD1 and was like ‘This is just like our house!’ We never apologise to each other for the state of our houses now!

Our house runs the gamut from very tidy on a Monday (cleaners come) to ‘there appears to have been a burglary’ (Sat afternoon). We work, have young kids and busy lives. One day our house will be tidy, and quiet. But we aren’t ready for that yet.

They have little enough to be worried about if they can find the time to gossip about this. Don't worry about them OP, they sound like shallow people you don't need in your life.

Fuck me I hope not.
My sister's were the same. Appearance meant so so much to them, they have all the fillers and fake brows, lashes, can only wear what's currently in fashion for teenagers, they kids are in 100 quid outfits so can't get dirty. They think I'm a scruff. My kids play in wild water and get muddy and climb trees and so do I tbh. We live on land and do the manual stuff ourselves so our house always looks like a doer upper. Their houses are perfect millennial grey. I love our life, but we're rarely clean and well presented. Our wedding day presentation is their day to day look.

I wouldn't choose their priorities over mine. So I shrug off their judgement. Remind yourself you're a good mum, with happy well looked after kids.

I was trying to describe homes where the owner is so fastidious. You cannot ever entirely relax, eat, drink, use the loo, or live.
Where the furnishings or shine on the appliances seem to become more important than the people in the house.
Where the main preoccupation of the owner is to tidy, clean and clean again. Throw away. Where the kitchen is not really used but looked at.
There is a price to be paid being raised in a house like that.
According to my DH anyway.
Cleaning is important. No doubt. But so is life.

It depends. It really embarrassed me as a child and had a lasting impact as I was always a bit scruff, lost homework, couldn’t find matching socks despite clothes on every surface, crinkled uniform etc.
I feel it is very important for my children and life, always having things to hand, clean socks and pant drawer etc, my home isn’t spotless I’m a slow tidier who gets distracted but I make myself sort it.
Mind you, DD has my DM tendency to not see mess so the cycle isn’t broken.
Your situation is different, you’re busy, they were mean to criticise your home.

I think it’s moderately important.

For most people a messy environment is more stressful on the nervous system so it’s good to bring children up in a (relatively) calm, ordered home.

Untidy homes also mean you don’t spot issues with items that need to be repaired until it’s too late, so from a home maintenance perspective it’s definitely better to keep clutter down.

What isn’t important is to have a perfect show home with perfectly matching soft furnishings and decoration. Just a reasonable level of order and relatively tidy surfaces.

This.

It’s only important if it’s important to you. In busy lives the one thing that can usually wait is housework. In my house kitchen and bathrooms are clean - a wipe round every day and a deeper clean at the weekend. Floors get vacuumed and mopped when they need it, beds made daily but you’ll also find laundry waiting to be folded, books on coffee tables, dog toys everywhere, socks behind side cushions (thanks DS). The kids rooms are usually halfway to disaster. But there’s a warm welcome, always a cup of tea on the go, space a time to chat.

I can’t get on with minimalist, everything it it’s place living - I’m spinning enough plates as it is. If anyone wants to comment that says more about them than it does me.

That’s not necessarily true. There a common ground , define spotless. It’s funny though the people on here saying they are horrible op those women but then slagging off people who like a house that isn’t cluttered. It’s just preference isn’t it. When I come back from my friends house husband and I always joke it looks like we’ve been burgled. She likes lots of stuff out we don’t. Doesn’t make us superior or inferior.

My moto is you should be cleen enough to be healthy, but dirty enough to be happy.

I've seen people who are late for fun events as they cant go out without doing the dishes, or become really upset with there "clean home" ie the window cleaner missed a week ect, a child who wasn't allowed toys downstairs, and panicked when they spilled there drink saying "dont tell my mum"

My home is definitely lived in, but good enough, but my family can relax in it, the mess will be there when we get back and have time to do the job, ie load the dishwasher, put clean laundry away ect.

Let me guess they follow a load of cleaning accounts on Instagram and raid B&M for every new product launch?
My mum was obsessed with cleaning, she’d wake us up with the vacuum cleaner every morning.
And I have a vivid memory of talking to her when she was in hospice care and she said…
All those years I spent cleaning, I bet with just your dad there it’s a tip isn’t it?
And she was right. Three weeks in, and it was bedlam.
You are doing your best and to be quite frank, your kids will love not having to live in an army camp of cleanliness.
As for using the word ‘scruff’ well aren’t they charming? My friends range from hospital corners on beds to chaos, and I love them all.

Exactly what JillThePlantKiller says. Some people are so sure their way is the right way that they act as though everyone obviously thinks like they do. I can assure you they don't.

My friends and I have busy lives - jobs, children, pets - our houses are normal amounts of clean and tidy (of course social conditioning means that no matter where on the spectrum it is the particular day we visit each other, we will of course apologise for the state of it ;) )

It's totally normal to roll up to someone's house and see a sink full of washing up waiting, washing draped on the airer/radiators/in baskets waiting to be sorted/washed/folded/put away. Bits and bobs stacked in kitchen/living room waiting to find a home or be thrown/donated.

Cushions on the settee needing a wash because the dog (yet again) got on there, or everywhere needing a bit of a hoover because it's been a busy couple of weeks.

They sound nasty. We always have a clean but messy home. I’m looking at our lounge room coffee table right now which in addition to the indoor plant and family photo album that are meant to be there also has various bills, a pair of weights, playing cards and a half constructed LEGO car. Meh, that’s who we are.

Op I had a very bohemian home growing up loads of books everywhere and projects of dad's set up ...piles of papers etc.

But clean and lived in we wouldn't think about our movements jn the house and everyone except an Austrian friend of my dad's has shoes on that from council home to much posher larger homes.

How everything has changed there is an obsession with ultra tidy and clear and children are not allowed free flow play because they are being harassed over toys and tidy tidy tidy and shoes on and off and on and off.

Clean but messy?
Don't let them get to you. You're doing the best you can under the circumstances.

The issue isnt your clean but messy home but these judgey "friends" who should know whats on your plate. And YANBU to be hurt by that.

And tbh homes are for living in not showing off. If its clean and happy I would just ignore them, get better friends.

It's important to me, and I would be mortified if people saw my house cluttered and not spotless. I'd lose sleep over it.

But I would never hold anyone else up to the same level of scrutiny, certainly I'd notice, but I absolutely wouldn't judge. We've all got our own priorities, and we all see things differently and it wouldn't change how I view or like a person. It wouldn't matter to me at all, and anyone commenting in it I certainly wouldn't join in and I'd let them know they're being unfair.

This woman must be employing the old put someone else down to make yourself feel better trick and that says more about her than your house says about you.

Also im sorry about your mum and the sadness you must feel and all the pressure you are under. Give yourself grace (a bit rich coming from me eh) if you're keeping on keeping on you're doing well.

If your house is cleanish forget everything they said. Nobody's business. I was the sahm when kids were little and house was always done! Now all grown kids of their own. Messy houses and mine is like a bomb site when grandkids are here. If I could go back and change it id not have cared less. Get a cleaner if you can afford it. Sorry about your parent with dementia. That just takes so much time.

I guarantee my house is messier than yours cos half time I don’t lift stuff off the floor before bed and have stuff in boxes in rooms that probably should be binned or put in sheds. Towels on radiators and things left out of cupboards.

you are doing a great job and your house is comfortable for you.

I am sure I am judged for cluttered house regularly. It is an issue I worry about sometimes but hope I would be seen like the lovely Aunt upthread!

My house is very clean and tidy. I wish I could be more ok with it being messy and lived in, however it’s really, really bad for my mental health if it’s not sitting perfect.

I am one of those people who likes a house that doesn’t look like anyone lives in it. Trying to juggle that with working full time, having two children, a dog and two cats is also bad for my mental health.

These people are not your friends. I have high standards for me, but I have never judged a friend for having toys sitting about or things out in the kitchen.