To wonder why people can't keep their houses in a basic state of cleanliness?

[HarderToKidnap]

Disabilities aside, why can't people keep their homes basically clean?

I work part time, have a messy dog, a demanding toddler, am extremely lazy but my house always looks OK. You couldn't eat your tea off the top of the door frames but the kitchen surfaces are clean, floors hoovered, sofas plumped and inviting, toilet free of poo crumbs. It's easy and doesn't take long. So WHY do I go round to so many of my friend's houses and see they live in complete pits? Gritty nasty sofas that are horrible to sit on, filthy kitchens, poo smears and crumbs all over toilet, minging hand towels, floors covered in bits. IT IS NOT HARD to do the basics. I've just done a house once over and it's taken 45 minutes.

I understand not wanting to spend all day dusting your books or whatever but when people are coming over why wouldn't you want them to feel clean and comfy in your house? I'm not talking about people that physically can't do it because of illness or disability, but the rest of you? WHY??!!!

I work 60+ hours a week, my husband also full time. We have young children (3 and 5) and a dog. We have no family support.
We get in gone 7pm, we then have to cook tea, do homework, get kids ready for bed, walk the dog.
We are exhausted. My house, unsuprisingly, is a tip.
I'm sure I'm not alone. You sound very smug.

To a degree I think it boils down to how much you like your house. I have lived in houses I did not particularly lie and iterated them with minimal care. I love my current home and enjoy it looking nice. If your house does not float your boat then I can totally understand why someone would do the minimal. We'll be a long time dead, I tidy and clean but I'm no way going to waste my life scrubbing to the bone.

We do a lot of 'tag team' cleaning. Dh will do the laundry when he gets in and start dinner, then he'll Hoover and steam the floors. I get in and do the after dinner clean up and usually do the stove and wipe down the cabinets.

After showers I usually do a quick clean of the bathrooms. Dh puts all the clean laundry away. He makes all the beds and picks up the bedrooms.

We all pick up the living areas in the evening, and I dust around two nights a week. I don't go under sofas, just the visible bits.

Once a week I go through the house like a dose of salts and clean the bejesus out of it.

We have a bigger house and ironically that actually makes cleaning easier. The house has a ton of storage and everything is out of the way.

I have an SN teenage dd and a teenage ds. They are pretty good at keeping their stuff in the right places. Ds plays a ton of sports tho, and his smelly kit is a constant source of contention. He's getting better since I bought him two laundry bins, one labelled 'dirty' the other 'toxic'. Apparently there are subtle levels of dirty that I can't recognise

with a full time job 5 kids, three dogs and four cats and suffering from ME, house work is not top of the list. I can't do too much and dh and kids seem to think that as long as dishes are done and clothes cleaned they don't need to do much else.
i felt quite good when a friend said to me that she felt relaxed visiting with her three kids as she dis need to worry about them making things a mess. it was a compliment as she could relax and didn't worry like she does when visiting friends with spotless houses.

Kiwi that's rubbish...time to go on mumsnet and other social media sites is precious for some people - for some people it's the same as a night out or seeing friends as they don't get out of the house.

Agree with the school run in pyjamas though, that's appalling!

If you've got time to MN and twitter you've got time to tidy up your house. Period.

That doesn't follow, actually. You can MN whilst breastfeeding, sitting in softplay, or being sat on by a poorly toddler who CANNOT be left alone. I'm not saying that MN slatterns are necessarily in that position when they're posting instead of doing housework, but it is frustrating to think "there are so many other more constructive things I could be doing if I were at home on my own".

IsIt- ah, not my sis then. I can at least manage to scrape food off the plates before stacking them there and leaving them! And I don't have enough plates to go a whole week, so I tend to have tackled the washing up before it smells actively offensive.

Well that is good because you sound lovely ie not my sister

I was going to wash the floors but the cat is asleep on my lap. Maybe they have cats too?

Op anyone that is in a bad mood is going to get all judgey about your OP. ignore

YANBU if you do a quick clean everyday there is absolutely no need for someone's house to be gross.

Although I am very house proud tbh.

I just feel it's not hard to do a quick dust and Hoover, if you leave it for weeks on end on end of corse it's going to take longer.

It's just laziness in my opinion

"If you've got time to MN and twitter you've got time to tidy up your house. Period."

I don't agree. I am on MN in my only down-time - when I pause between life's jobs to have a quick sit.

I am on for five minutes now having got through the two hours morning mayhem. Yes, there is tidying I could do. I will soon - but, I really would like that five minutes sit first! I am not superwoman... in the next 25 minutes I will finish the breakfast tidying, strip the beds and head out the door to work. That is enough.

If my house is not good enough for you, so be it.

I've recently had surgery, just over two weeks ago and I despair at the state of my house. DC do some of the housework, but actually making them do it to an acceptable standard is more stressful than if I did it myself.

DP does some of it, but not on work days. I can't wait until I've recovered so I can declutter and get things straight.

"If you've got time to be on MN/twitter..." Rubbish! I'm only on MN while I have a 7wo attached to my boob. I try to keep on top of the house for my sanity but generally find sleep a better option when I have >15 mins

Why are people focusing on visitors so much? Surely if your house is so dirty that you would be ashamed to have visitors in and would have to clean specially before they arrived, then it can't be too nice for you and your DC to be there? Why not keep it basically clean all the time? Like the OP, I don't mean show home tidy with everything away and dusted - I mean not filthy. If it is basically clean, then visitors won't care two hoots about DC's toys being out, or piles of clothes ready for the wash, clutter or whatever. They just don't want to leave feeling that they might have caught something or have to wash their clothes because of what they sat on.

Perhaps we are all talking at cross purposes and those saying life is too short for housework mean it is too short for complete order, but don't mean that it is too short to keep the loo unsmeared, rubbish in the bin and dirty plates, pots and pans washed up. If you really are too busy to have a hygienic loo and kitchen then you need to rethink your priorities big time. (Disclaimer: like the OP, not talking about those with medical problems that mean they cannot clean or cannot find the mental energy to clean but even they need to seek help if their house is minging).

If you can clean it top to bottom in 45minutes it must be a tiny house!

I absolutely agree with you Harder. Well done for having the bottle to take this lot on and standing your ground.

I had a friend when I was at school with really messy parents and the kitchen bordered on being a health hazzard at times.

They were very naice, middle class right on types. They had busy jobs, loads of hobbies and just didn't enjoy housework.

Haven't read the whole thread but basically yes YABVU and judgy, and as pp said, the sort of person I dread coming round.

I have a 6 month DS who I cannot put down even to sleep at the moment, and a 2 year old, aka The Destructinator. I'm lucky if I have time to go to the (non-poo-crumbed) loo!

While I'm typing this, I have DS asleep on my chest. If I try and put him down he screams and throws up.

My house is not a danger zone, but hasn't been vacuumed for a few days. The loos are clean.

Personally I'd prefer my kids to build up some healthy immunities rather than be allergic to everything, a condition that I believe is not helped by the neurotic overuse of antibacterial agents by people who have nothing better to do than judge other people's standards.

I think perhaps if your house hasn't been vacuumed for a few days, your loos are clean and it's not a danger zone then you are not the kind of person the OP is talking about! Why do people choose to feel so personally offended and attacked over things that clearly do not apply to them?

I am the last person to bother about a bit of normal, healthy, casual family mess and a few pots in the sink, but some people have houses so chaotic and so unsanitary as to be bordering on an environmental health problem, and you have to wonder if they are quite sane. And strangely, many of them do seem to be. Which I find bewildering.

Subliminal you're right - I got a bit too invested in this! Severe lack of sleep and coffee are factors here....

This is timely...

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/10313619/Smartphones-and-tablets-harbour-more-germs-than-toilet-seats.html

If you're genuinely terrified of Death-By-Germs, a pooy toilet is less of a problem than your smartphone.

What is basically clean? I've been ill the last couple of days, so bad that I couldn't take DS to nursery yesterday, so I've let things slide. The loo's clean, as are kitchen surfaces. But there's washing up in the sink, and the living room resembles an explosion in a toy shop.

Only feeling a smidge better today, so doing the nursery run and errands in town, plus maybe a load of washing because I've run out of socks...

Just out of interest, are the people who are 'nervous' of eating/drinking in a friends house because of dirt, at all worried about use of harmful bleaches and so on from over use on kitchen surfaces?

Because I would rather come into contact with a bit of dirt etc than vast amount of harmful chemicals.

Kiwiinkits - for me, Mumsnet and Facebook are my main escapes, and my main source of social interaction outside the family. I have people on here and on FB who I consider true friends, and whose company helps me to get through each day. Given the length of the thread, you probably missed the post where I told you all about my depression, and the impact it has on daily life.

I am permanently tired and struggle to motivate myself to get up and dress each day, and then I have a tiny amount of energy and motivation left, which I tend to spend on the absolute essentials - like making a meal for the family in the evening - and there is little left over for the amount of tidying I need to do, or the cleaning.

Social interaction is vital to me - it is an escape from the way I feel - so I guess I prioritise Mumsnet and Facebook above the cleaning.

Another thing is that, when I do clean and tidy, I feel like I am swimming against the tide, because other people in the house can untidy faster than I can tidy, and the dogs can shed fur faster than I can vacuum it up - and in a strange way, it is more disheartening and depressing to see a previously tidy room, that I have spent precious energy tidying and cleaning, descending back into untidiness, than it is to look at an untidy room.

Kiwiinkits - I am sorry to say this, but your post made you sound horribly judgemental. Please take a moment or two to consider the fact that other people may have stuff going on in their lives that you know nothing about, and that things aren't as simple as you think they are.

I love how this thread has become a swap-shop of useful tips on keeping a clean and tidy house.
Am taking notes
B.feeding btw, so able to read, watch, tv, MN, talk on phone but not clear away the breakfast mess.