People who grew up in dirty/messy homes…

[Melbourne12]

What do you live like now?

I grew up in a cluttered, messy house. To paint a picture, it was one of those houses that was needing renovated for a million years.

Half painted walls (as if someone could only reach up so far and couldn’t be arsed to get a ladder), sunken sofas, a shower with a plastic bag sellotaped along the edge because it leaked into the room downstairs, broken drawers.

I had one school uniform and it got washed once a week, dishes were permanently in the sink. The kitchen table wasn’t functional as a table because it had a pile of shit on top of it, plus more shit under it.

Now that I’m an adult, I have my own home and it’s virtually immaculate at all times. Just small things like making the beds, hoovering and cleaning daily, not letting the washing build up, ironing the clothes, ensuring the place smells nice.

I hated the way I lived as a child and can vividly remember promising myself that I would never have my children in an environment like that. Needless to say, I’ve stuck to my work. I don’t want my child to be too embarrassed to have their friends round when they’re older.

I guess I went the opposite way from how I’d grown up, but I wonder if this is common?

Grew up in a derelict house that never got renovated.Then lived in a very dirty messy house with my Dad (think maggots in the kitchen bin and cat pee on the sofas.Our shower curtain was my twister mat Filthy carpet and broken hoover.I could go on).I live in a beautiful clean,uncluttered,bright ,tidy space.It's really important to me that it isn't messy if my kids have friends over or we have visitors.I never want my children to feel embarrassed of where they live, or their own home to make them feel sick.I have friends with cleaner houses though-it's not sterile.I love my home and get stressed with clutter.

My Mum was very household. Think no one is allowed a wee as she's putting bleach in the toilets or hoovering at 7am on the weekend. I'm similar ish. I can't stand untidy things. My best friend lived in squalor, her mum was an alcoholic and I can still remember the very specific smell of her house that would be on my clothes afterwards. She's a very tidy and clean person now

Houseproud not household!

Growing up the house wasn't dirty, but it was messy or lived in. Very much every surface had stuff on it, never hoarding levels of clutter but one time I cleared the coffee table of clutter and my mam went through the bin fishing out bits of ribbon etc that "might be of use later on." My Dad would get stressed by the clutter but never really did anything about it. Bits of the house weren't painted or carpeted.

It sounds chaotic but I always remember friends and younger family members saying they liked coming to ours because it felt homely.

As an adult, I like to think I live in a much more structured (or at least aspire to) way - though currently the house is a chaotic mess due to having a baby and little time, and it stresses me out.

One of my siblings lives in a very clean, tidy, nicely decorated house but that may be more down to their partner than them. My other sibling is a hoarder quite frankly - absolutely chaotic levels of stuff.

Weirdly my house growing up was pretty tidy and very nicely decorated but my parents rarely cleaned. Skirting boards with thick layers of dust, grubby bathrooms, dog hair everywhere etc. It’s like they thought as long as it was tidy then it was fine, but they couldn’t be bothered to clean anything. My dad worked away a lot, months at a time and I think my mum just thought it shouldn’t all be left to her. My mum’s house is still like this now.
My house is probably a bit more cluttered than mine was growing up (3 kids including 1 who is disabled so we have a lot of ‘stuff’) but is very clean.

My H grew up with a mum who was obsessed with shakenvac and hoovering. Consequently he loathes the sound of a hoover and I do it only once a week (upstairs only is carpeted) when he is out!

I lived in a shithole - no bedding, towels stuck into the holes in the mattresses that had worn away, having to use tissue paper as a sanitary towel, and my stepdad was a hoarder so the house was filled with dusty junk. I still remember dying of shame when my mum went into my secondary school for a meeting and she smelled. She was in the pits of alcoholic depression at the time.

My house is not immaculate, but I am really sensitive to things like smell on clothes, bedding etc. We could never afford fabric conditioner and its one thing I refuse to downgrade in a budget.

I was raised in a hovel. My home now is clean but not always neat! Everything is nice and well kept though. I over compensate with buying food (as there never was any) and I can be an impulse buyer of things I can't really afford.

Exactly the same. We have a cleaner once a week and it's not a pigsty but certainly not at my mums standards. It's caused many an argument between us. I commented on another thread the other that my overriding memories of her from when I was a kid was her cleaning.

Mine was okay with some areas that were full of clutter. I turn married a hoarder and was in a constant battle to try and keep some order so the kids wouldn't be embarrassed. They still were occasionally, but were fully aware it was down to their dad.
My house now is lived in, but clean and mostly tidy. I have a whiteboard with sticky notes where every single job is broken down onto bits that take between 2 and 10 minutes. I move the note down when the job is done and move them all back up at the beginning of the week.
Simple stuff like clean the bathroom sink, sweep the kitchen floor. It means nothing is overwhelming and it's easy to keep on top of. Audhd brain here!

MIL’s house is horrific. To the extent I wouldn’t even trust accepting a drink there. DP moved out as soon as he possibly could and our house is immaculate. He regularly spends 15 minutes tidying before he comes to bed and workmen have asked me if our house always looks like this!

I'm sorry about the hoarding 💐

I'm curious about the minimalism down to 4 mugs though. What do you do if you have guests?

My mum was obsessed with cleaning she spent all weekend cleaning as she worked full time in week. If anything was spilt there was a massive overreaction and she was always too distracted to play with me as there were always jobs to do. By contrast my best friends house was messy and I felt much more comfortable there. I sway between being messy and hating to clean to feeling driven to clean and tidy incase people judge me.

Just a note to all the people on this thread beating themselves up. There is all the difference in the world between messy, cluttered, needs a bit of a clean and the kinds of neglectfully dirty and dangerous houses full of dog poo, rotting food, mould etc.

I have nothing but compassion for those growing up in a neglectful hoarder’s house, but unless your house is like that, everyone should stop beating themselves up and enjoy your kids childhood in a slightly messy house.

@SliceOfCakeCupOfTea
My exH grew up in a show home and tried to force the same standard on me. In his case the insistence on spotlessness, all toys put away immediately after use, preferably kids only playing in the (dark, cold) basement, etc, was 100% an imitation of his mother's domineering ways.

They both imposed their will on their families as a power play. ExMIL refused to get up in the night for babies - boasted to me about this - and any child who was sick enough to stay in bed didn't get fed until they got up and came downstairs. Sometimes if I went out to get grocery shopping done without DCs on a weekend I would come home to find exH furiously cleaning and tidying - like a human tornado - and the poor DCs sitting very silently on the couch watching TV but not at all relaxed. I stopped leaving them with him after seeing this a couple of times.

ExH had no time for sticking DCs' artwork on the kitchen walls, and God forbid if more than ten minutes elapsed between opening a Christmas present from a relative and writing a thank you note. If someone accidentally knocked over a glass of water at the dinner table he made a huge song and dance about it - first ott criticism, followed by yelling to get a cloth wrung out with hot water (completely unnecessary to clean up cold water)... There was pressure all the time.

All of the places exH has lived in since we divorced have been quite grimy, with a strong smell of unwashed roasting pan in which someone maybe cooked beef two weeks ago. A very specific and very unpleasant meaty stench, mixed with the smell of dog.

I grew up in dirty, cluttered homes with damp and half-finished bad DIY.
I'd love to say I was clean and tidy, but in reality I work full time and I'm a lone parent, so it's always a bit messy. Compared to what I grew up in, it's spotless. I also hire plumbers, electricians and carpenters as needed.

We only have 4 mugs. Neither DH or I drink hot drinks and I’ve never had more than 4 guests wanting a tea or coffee at any one time!

My Mum is a hoarder so our home was very messy and chaotic I hated it and never had friends over because I was embarrassed. My home now is very clean and tidy despite having young children. I declutter often and we have a lot of storage/systems in place. For me a clean home gives me a peaceful mind.

My husband's mother was messy, or rather she just kept house extremely dirty.

Husband is messy, but not dirty. He just doesn't put things back to their place, but keeps the house clean.
His brother is pedantic.
Their sister is exactly as their mother, that we actually don't visit her, because smell of her house is awful. Shit marks in the toilet, dishes everywhere etc.

Ah, I'm a tea addict, and perhaps like attracts like (or I push hot drinks on my guests too much) 😂

What's his name? Sounds interesting.

My childhood home was untidy but not dirty. My dm was a sahm who just wasn't very good at housework, my df worked very hard and preferred a tidier home but not to the extent that he'd tidy it. As a child I remember my dm looking down on people who were houseproud as though it was some kind of failing. I am far tidier but certainly not immaculate. The big change as she's got older though is she pays me to clean her house for her as I quite enjoy housework... Her house has never looked better and she actually admits she prefers it that way!

Ours was pretty chaotic and mucky but not as bad as some.

Dad was crap at DIY so loads of things were half done and the garden was like a jungle. Carpets were threadbare and DM had so many clothes they were piled up on bedside tables, and beds were never made.

Weirdly we didn't have enough clothes, and would be scrabbling around for clean socks for school.

I haven't become super houseproud but my house is a palace compared to what I grew up in. My brother's on the other hand is like a replica of our childhood home and takes me right back when I go there 🤦‍♀️

My cousins' home was immaculate, expensive things in it. I used to marvel at the fluffy carpets, the massive dining room table with protector, the integrated appliances, double garage, immaculate bathroom complete with his and her sinks and bidet, separate shower. Everything was neat, tidy, modern etc (1980s)

Now both cousins and their families live in filthy, untidy houses and seem to not give a shit. I swear it would be a health hazard to have a cup of tea in either house.

I grew up in a house very similar to you op. I am also obsessively clean and tidy now but however much I clean I am still worried whenever someone comes round that they will judge me for my home and think it's dirty. I recognise I am a bit neurotic about it however!