When does mess become child neglect/squalor?

[AmysFriend]

So bear with me, please, this is very long but I want to include as much detail as possible.
I have a friend of many years, let's call her Amy, in her 30s who’s a single parent to three girls aged 3, 5 and 6. Amy and her ex husband split up amicably when she was pregnant with the youngest. The kids go to their dad’s house one night a week and every other weekend and slightly over half of the school holidays. Otherwise they are at home with Amy. Amy works school hours and Saturday mornings from home - she has a computer in the box room set up for this. The girls share the biggest bedroom and Amy is in the medium bedroom. Also in the house are one bathroom, a small kitchen and a living room. There's a table, supposedly for eating at, in the living room. Usually when she's working the girls are at school but on every second Saturday morning they're watching TV/playing on tablets and helping themselves to any snacks or drinks they need while Amy works.

Money isn't abundant but there's enough to pay bills, food, clothes etc and also have a few extras for toys, outings, favourite foods etc. Amy and the girls are mutually affectionate and loving. I'd say they have a lovely bond.

So that's the context. This is the issue. Amy's house is really bad. By arrangement I visit every Thursday morning for a half hour catch-up - Amy takes an early lunch break and we sit and chat. Over the months I noticed that things were getting more and more cluttered and grubby each week but lately it's struck me that I think it's crossed a line. To sit on the sofa, which is a cloth sofa thoroughly stained with juice and food spills, you have to move armfuls of laundry. Some of the laundry is clean, some is dirty but there's no attempt to keep them separate or really keep track of which is which. Amy says to put the laundry on the floor to make room to sit down but the floor is dirty carpet covered in crumbs and hairs and grit and general lack of vacuuming. Vacuuming would be a problem because the floor is cluttered with toys, skateboards, the box for a huge trampoline which the girls got for Christmas but which hasn't been put up yet, and a huge Barbie dollhouse. I'm not sure there’s room to put the trampoline up because the back yard is full of bikes, scooters, a broken bed and one of those Eglu hen pens for their pet chickens.

I decline offers of drinks/food because there are never any clean mugs or plates and Amy will go through to the kitchen to wash some but to do so she'll need to take dirty pans out of the sink and then she won't be able to put the pans on the work surface cos it's covered in food boxes and wet laundry that needs to go in the dryer but there's already clothes in the dryer that she'll need to empty the dryer but all the laundry baskets are already full on the kitchen floor so she throws those clean, dried clothes onto the sofa and then there's nowhere to sit etc etc. You get the idea. No simple domestic action can be performed without dealing with a whole other logjam of domestic actions.

The table to the side of the lounge that's meant for eating at has paperwork and school bags and colouring books and last years uneaten Easter eggs, still boxed!, all over it and the chairs have laundry on them so nobody can sit there. The kids lie on the floor to watch TV and usually sit wherever they can to eat. A lot of food is delivered takeaway - I think because it's so daunting to start to find clean plates and cutlery and pans etc. They also all eat a lot of fruit and raw vegetables. I've never known kids who like munching on a carrot as much as these three.

I don't know what upstairs is like but the stairs up are unvacuumed and have things (books, laundry, shoes) at the sides of every tread.

So to ward off the inevitable questions:

1. Yes, I have offered to help tidy, clean and sort. Several times. But Amy says she wants to chat when I visit, not do any housework. I've also said that I could come round for a couple of hours one of the weekends the girls are with their dad but she refuses. ‘I’ll get round to it soon.’ I have a lot of pressures on my own time and kids of my own so can't offer much in the way of practical assistance.

1. Yes, I have explicitly told her that things need to be cleaner and tidier. She laughs it off while agreeing with me.

1. No, she couldn't afford a cleaner. And also a cleaner wouldn't be able to start cleaning due to the clutter.

1. No, I don't think Amy is depressed. She's a very cheerful, hilarious, upbeat person who brings sunshine to my life.

1. Yes, I think she might have ADHD. No, I am not a doctor so this is not a formal diagnosis.

1. Yes, I'm worried about the kids. They're always clean and tidy looking in their personal appearance so I don't have worries about their personal appearance but I know they have, for instance, missed out on PE at school because a gym kit couldn't be found in time that morning. I suspect Amy fairly often will just buy the kids new clothes rather than trying to get a grasp of the laundry backlog, which obviously then adds to the clutter. This way of living isn't sustainable for them.

1. Yes I am doubtless a nosy bastard and bad friend for posting this here.

So how worrying is this situation? The kids are bubbly and ebullient and clean when I see them which admittedly isn't all that often, probably once a month or so when I'm picking the middle one up on a Sunday to take to Junior Parkrun with my son. Amy seems pretty content with her life. But there isn't any sign that she's going to want to arrest the ever increasing clutter and grubbiness. What should I do?

What's prompted me to ask now is that yesterday when I arrived with two takeaway coffees and some cookies for us to share (this is my way of pre-empting being offered a cuppa - see above) I noticed that the Costa cups and paper bag from last weeks catch-up snacks were still on the trampoline box which seems to have become a kind of informal seat/coffee table in the living room. Also on the box were several Barbies, a clean potty, a slightly muddy egg from one of the hens, the inevitable clutch of laundry and a pile of paperwork and I thought: this has, I think, crossed a line.

What would you do if anything? Thanks.

@FedUpMumof10YO my husband actually tried almost those exact words with his hoarder mother.

Went down like a lead balloon 😂

I would too. A friendly intervention

What's your definition of a health hazard?

A filthy kitchen sounds like one to me

But it's not 'washing hanging around'

It's the non-separation of clean and dirty. It's not having anywhere to put clean.

It's a filthy kitchen. Not just 'mess' Nowhere clean to sit

How bad does it have to be to be unacceptable in this day and age?

Having watched that Channel 4 programme on those sweary aristocrats I'd be concerned.

Filth is filth

A health hazard is faeces on the floor...an infestation, mould, rotten food etc. Dirty dishes that will eventually get done and laundry piles aren't. It might not be great and might not be the ideal way to live but ss are stretched. Unless there are other issues I really doubt they will care. They're not a cleaning service.

There were 2 mums in DDs primary like this. Both being heavily supported by their elderly mothers to keep it in control.
When one of their mums past away a group of other women now go in and blitz their house every few weeks.
Neither of them work, they don’t cook, their children are always immaculately dressed though. I think with both of them they have never learned, never wanted to. I had issues with one of them whose daughter was friends with DD, she wanted me to constantly manage her life for her and drive her about. She would ring me at work and didn’t understand why I couldn’t leave to take her out.

She needs to sort this for the sake of her children. It will become a source of embarrassment for them, I bet they would be thrilled to come home to a tidy house. That’s what you need to say to her, it’s not about her, it’s about them.

As a single parent of 2 (one pre-schooler) and someone who does find it hard to let go of things in general and whose home is often horribly cluttered and messy, and sometimes dirtier than I would like, I have a massive amount of empathy for your friend. Really like what @sunglassesonthetable has said. My advice FWIW (and obviously I am only speaking from my experience, and suggesting a place to start, rather than where things might/should end up)…

The house is likely to be a symptom of where she is right now emotionally/mentally

It may, in general, be best to treat causes not symptoms. But in this case you don’t know exactly what the cause is - she might not even know what it is. What is clear is that there a massive amount of overwhelm going on.

It’s important for her to know that you understand. She is not going to accept practical help if she feels judged or if she thinks someone else is going to impose their idea of what needs to be kept or chucked on her. The house indicates she’s feeling out of control - taking more control away from her won’t help.

So the very first thing you need to do if you want to help is spend some of your coffee sessions talking with her and letting her know that you see all the amazing things she is doing so well, and that you really empathise with how hard and relentless her life might often feel. If you focus on what she is doing right she may feel able to open up about where she is struggling. If she does then you’ve got an ‘in’ to say ‘well of course but at least that’s stuff we can tackle - id love to help’.

if she is genuinely able to make three young children feel happy and secure while spending most of her life in a small and messy house, trying to earn money and surrounded by an ever increasing to do list which she can’t deal with then she actually really truly is doing pretty well - you can’t teach the ability to give love, but you can help people with practical stuff, and it is ever so ever so easy to become so overwhelmed as a single parent under pressure that you don’t even have the bandwidth to be as kind and nurturing as you’d want.

If she broke up with her husband when she was pregnant then she has just gone through 0-3 by herself in this situation. 0-3 is a massively intensive ‘stuff’ phase. Dealing with that is a bloody nightmare and you can quickly go from being on top of things to having mountains of things to get rid of/sort out. It’s horrible.

Please also remember that poverty and money worries often do not look like having NO stuff. They can very often look like having masses of stuff, not all working, not all perfect nick. Worrying about money makes it very hard to get rid of things - you need stuff ‘just in case’ as you can’t go and buy it ‘just in time’.

If you really want to help I think you have to see this as something that you’re prepared to view as a medium/long term project, not a short term fix. It may be that at some stage along the way Amy can suddenly feel the fog lifting and is able to seize the moment and move quicker. But to start off, you’re probably going to need to put in some time, empathy and listening on and around her life in general and before you open a black bag or wash a tea cup.

Be honest about wanting to help, but make sure you don’t frame it as “this isn’t acceptable, SS should be involved etc”. What she needs to hear is “I love you and the girls, you’re doing so wonderfully, you are such a great mum, I’m so sorry you’re doing this all by yourself, it must be so hard to do all this by yourself. But it’s not ok that you don’t have a relaxing space to sit in during the evening, you need to be able
to give back to yourself so you have even more energy for the children, and so you can enjoy the brief time they are at their dad’s”.

Please understand that although she might be bright and breezy when she sees you, her daily life internally might be very different. Sometimes things just get so hugely difficult and overwhelming that it’s hard to know where to start. And when you’re emotionally and physically exhausted you’re starting from a very low point. I have had many, many nights where the kids are in bed and I’ve looked at my house and just cried or watched tv or run the laundry because getting started is really difficult. And ignoring, or doing a tiny task which operates by itself is way easier than starting to pull a thread on a bigger task and watching everything unravel around you.

That might be counterintuitive, but that is what I have found. The single one thing that has helped me tackle things is having support in feeling competent. When I feel incompetent I spend energy beating myself up and feeling hopeless. When I feel competent I remember that I CAN do things and I CAN make it better.

I would also suggest that there are probably way bigger issues upstairs in terms of clothes and toys etc etc. one way to help might be to deal with an issue you can’t see on your visits but which must be present which is that of outgrown baby clothes/toys. Perhaps say you’ve been clearing out your kids stuff to take to a charity which provides clothes to families in need - could you and she go through her kids stuff over a few weeks, or one of her ‘free’ weekends, and then you’ll take everything with your stuff to give away? How about suggesting you both put the trampoline up when the weather starts to get nicer and using that as a chance to clear through what’s not being used in the garden.

it’s hard to keep things you use nice when you’re also surrounded by things you no longer need but can’t tackle getting rid of. Baby clothes is probably a great place to start (this worked really well for me).

Have written an essay (so sorry) but I guess I’m trying to say that you’re right about the logjam and when things get that way even the simple stuff becomes overwhelming. It’s very likely she is depressed and exhausted, she just doesn’t show that to you. Try to let her know that you see the struggle - even though she has such an amazing game face and is doing so many things brilliantly. Be there for her. In the long run you’re more likely to be a good friend to her that way, and be able to help, than by making her feel judged, ashamed and small.

Please don’t tell her what she does/doesn’t need, sometimes letting go of things can take a little time. Let kindness be your guide…