To think that children do care about living in a very messy house?

[bakingmadmum]

A friend of mine put one of those quote thingies on FB today. It is about how the house is messy,because she is spending time with the children,and the children won't care because when they grow up, they will remember the memories, and not the state of the house.

Now, while I largely agree with this, the friend in question has a very, very messy house, bordering on dirty. I am not judging her for this- she has two small children, a large dog, and her husband is a lazy fucking manchild not much help. I know (because she has told me) that the state of the house annoys her. They can't use the kitchen table because it is snowed under, the children are in the same bedroom because the other one is full of junk... They can't use the garden because it is too dangerous. The husband keeps all his hoard of tools and equipment out there, even though they get rained on and rusty.

The thing is, my mum was raised in a similar household. She often talks about how, even as a small child, she was mortified and refused to bring friends over, as she couldn't bear them to see the house. Dirty nappies on the floor for days, the dining room covered in oil because that is where the bikes/junk was thrown, etc. She once visited a friend's house- the family wasn't rich, very solid working class- and thinking they were living in the lap of luxury, because their curtains were clean. She was about 11, and was genuinely baffled- how did they keep them so clean?

Mum has gone the other way now- she is a total clean freak, to the point where it caused massive rows at times, when I was a teen. She couldn't cope with what was, in hindsight, natural teen messiness. Things like a bit of toothpaste on the sink. It was like walking on eggshells for all of us. She has calmed down a bit now, thankfully.

Anyway, I feel a bit sorry for my friend and her children. The kids can't use the table for crafts, or homework, or family dinners, they can't go and play in their own garden. I can't help but feel that this will start to effect them when they get older, despite my friend's denial.

I agree OP. I had a pretty unsettled disorganised childhood. I used to love staying with friends who had clean, comfortable houses. I associated the order with feeling looked after and loved.

Most people who have messy houses just have too much stuff ime. De clutter then it's easier to keep clean.

Clutter literally makes my skin crawl. I am aware that I may have problems.

I grew up in a house which fit the dirty/messy description above ^. I was too ashamed to invite friends round at pretty much every point I can remember in my childhood. We rarely had family to visit, and when we did, everything was piled into one bedroom or another for the day, and doors were closed upstairs.
I was constantly told to tidy my bedroom. There were points when anything on the floor was removed by one parent. I could not see the logic - why should I keep my bedroom tidy when the rest of the house was such a tip?
Nowadays, I live with an uber-tidy girlfriend. I am tidier than I was growing up, but I had to learn to clean in my mid-twenties when I finally realised everyone else seemed to already know how to do it... When I lived alone, my flat was mostly very tidy, and if not, it would only have taken a quick blitz to put everything in its place.
I highly doubt my parents would enjoy visiting me in my home now. They would feel as people have said above - uncomfortable about the perceived 'rules' (shoes off, cups on coasters, plates straight in the sink for washing) and wouldn't feel like they could relax. This is a guess - they don't visit. We meet midway.

In answer: yes, I did care about living in a very messy house. I was ashamed of the way my family lived.

Clutter literally makes my skin crawl. I am aware that I may have problems.

Me too! It actually hurts my eyes! I don't know how anyone can relax with surfaces piled high around them.

What is their bedroom like?

If they are old enough to know how to tidy up, and it is not tidy, clearly they dont really care. If their bedroom is tidy, they probably do.

YANBU. My mum grew up in true poverty and squalor, with a horrible 'family' to boot. She ran away from home at 18.

I, as a result, grew up in an extremely clean and tidy house. It's only over the past 5 years (I'm 28) that she has mellowed hugely in this regard, although I'd say my parents' home is still far tidier at any given moment than most. I've grown up inheriting certain traits from her - we are both 'chuckers' and abhor clutter - although I'm messier than I would like because I didn't do much cleaning as a young person as she did it all.

My DP's stepdad is the same - grew up in filth and now is obsessively clean and tidy. My DP is very clean and tidy too as a result of growing up with him.

I'm not sure if children care or not. I think it depends on how much it restricts their lives.

Also often when people's houses are like this it's a sort of situation they get into and can't find a way out of.

Our house now is lovely - it's messy but it isn't dirty and I can usually find things. I have been very different in the past and when I was last pregnant, and quite ill, it was appalling as I just could not manage.

I hope no one reading this and unable to cope or make their house clean, doesn't feel even worse because of it.

If they are old enough to know how to tidy up, and it is not tidy, clearly they dont really care. If their bedroom is tidy, they probably do.

Assuming the parent's messiness hasn't encroached on that. The unstoppable march of clutter in my childhood home meant that our bedrooms became overflows for the crap and mess that wouldn't fit anywhere else
It would have been impossible for me to make my bedroom a tidy space. I could just move piles of mess from one place to the other, but nothing had a home. My parents even had a chest of drawers for their clothes in my room, because their room was too messy to fit it in.

From the age of about 14, I started doing cleaning blitzes on the rooms that allow it, but even doing things like the washing up is really really hard if there is no spare space available - you can't use a draining board when it is piled high with dirty pans, in common with every square inch of worksurface, and you can't put things away when the cupboard shelves are broken because of a half-finished DIY project...

"I don't know how anyone can relax with surfaces piled high around them."

You become blind to it after a while. Or you move a load of it and suddenly it doesn't look as bad to you, but still probably does to someone with 'fresh eyes'. I've got a pile of stuff on top of a cupboard that I must walk past twenty times I day, but I don't notice it much When I do I think "must put that away when I've done this" but then there's something else, or I have to tidy something else before I can put stuff away. And it can't get dusty underneath the clutter

I'm not trying to excuse it, but I think 'cluttered' people just don't see it the same as 'uncluttered' people. For instance, I've just cleaned my kitchen, including cupboard doors and the extractor fan. I hate it when it's dirty. But to others, it probably still looks a mess even though I think it's fairly tidy now (compared to other rooms). My toilets are cleaned every day, my walls and doors are clean (even light switches). My MIL thinks my house is filthy because it's messy but it really isn't - I promise!

I figure that one day it will be tidy. One day I won't have huge amounts of toys in the house. When that day comes, at least the house will already be clean

Although, thinking about it, the walls and doors are vertical surfaces, I can't pile clutter on them so they are easy to clean. Hmm...

A couple years back we went to view a house across the road from ours. The agent met us and took us round the back - this was because it wasn't possible to open the front door. The occupants (architect dad, sahm, couple of young children) simply picked up the post from the mat and left all the leaflets, free papers etc to accumulate behind the door.

The house was the dirtiest and messiest I've ever been in and I grew up in a dirty, messy house. There were used nappies on the kitchen work surfaces along with dirty cat litter trays. There were dirty, encrusted plates, cups and bowls everywhere, the beds were unmade, bathrooms filthy with empty shampoo bottles, toothpaste tubes etc flung on the floor.

As we came back downstairs I said to the agent, "I don't think I want to look any further, I can't bear to be in here to be honest". She just shrugged and said that they can't make people tidy up. I see the woman from the house around still, always nicely dressed in expensive branded gear and wonder why she keeps her house like that. It's not normal and it's not ok IMO.

We are in a two bed house with two kids, who have a room each. 9 year olds is lovely, teens is a tip.

Down stairs dp and I have a bed and sofa in our room/living room. It's far from ideal and we are very short on storage. I blitz it every now and then but clutter starts building up again. Drives me crazy.

We have a dining room which is full of camping and beach stuff at the moment. Plus a den my 9 year old built using an airer, blankets and pegs!! It's pretty clean but until camp is over and beach season is over we will have wet suits, wet shoes and beach towels in there. Kitchen is clean and today as is the bathroom. Our major issue is clutter. But kids have friends over all the time, we feed them, are welcoming and one of dd 2s friends loves it here as her own home is chaotic.

I am struggling to keep my house sorted. I always have.
At first I thought it was because I was working and we have 2 children. Now I am lucky enough to be a SAHM. I really did think I would soon get into the swing of a tidy house.

But I haven't. It overwhelms me. I am suprised that the same things need doing over and over again......
I hate the state of the house. I hate that my children are growing up in clutter.

I have lists and systems and if I miss a day for whatever reason then it just becomes too huge and then a massive effort is needed to sort it out.

Today I should be on a training walk for an endurance event but my bedroom is such a tip I couldn't find my walking shoes. So now I am having a massive blitz.

I hope my kids aren't ashamed of me. I hope I can get it under control and teach them to be tidier than me.

I think sometimes people's homes get like this because they don't know what's going to happen.

That sounds odd I know - none of us knows what's round the corner for sure. But sometimes it can be a lot more unsure than that.

I mean for example when you are renting, but you're not happy in the area and you are trying to find a job, and a different house and you're expecting another baby so you really don't know where you are going to be, or what you're going to need, and so you struggle to keep up with the changes that life is visiting on you.

We had a whole year where our stuff was packed in boxes, none of the children had a functioning bedroom, we all slept on mattresses on my floor with boxes piled around. We were renting, unhappily, trying to buy a house, which took MONTHS, in fact about 9 months from offer accepted - not our fault - and we already had an overcrowding issue with three children and two bedrooms, neither of which was suitable for sharing really. And a damp problem, and no attic or shed or other storage that was dry. And something fell through the ceiling and it flooded, so that was another room unuseable.

iyswim - sometimes things build up. Once you have a certain direction, and you know where you're going and what you're doing, it all sort of settles down. But sometimes people cannot settle, whatever their situation, and are always trying to prepare for various scenarios.

Once I knew I wasn't having any more children that really, really helped. Decisions, small or large, are sometimes what people struggle with the most. And without decisions you have no certainty and then your home kind of reflects that. You don't know what to keep.

Also, just to say - I would never pass judgement. I hate mess and clutter, but people have their own individual circumstances to deal with.

Placemarking

We live in a massive house and I can't really cope the way the children (2 and 4) rip through like mini tornadoes, I'm not tidy but it is a bit grubby but I love it. However I do know that our loo and cutlery, crockery are way cleaner than lots of our friends

As a PP said it's the 10% either end that causes issues. At the moment my house is 50% fine 50% utter chaos for various reasons. The 50% that is tidy is the "visitor facing" bit of the house (hallways, downstairs loo, main lounge, kitchen, dining room) which at least means my kids aren't ashamed of the house and we can have visitors over.

I have deliberately confined the chaos and am sorting through it behind closed doors! I am ashamed of the mess but I'm doing my best to sort it, confine it and for it to not have an impact on the kids. Right now the chaos just means we are down a second lounge/a garage which is fine temporarily but NOT fine long term. It's bloody hard work sorting through everything (cheers husband hoarder who is now too ill to help me clear up the chaos) but it CAN be and SHOULD be done.

If your house is impacting on your life to the extent that you are ashamed to have people over, are cramming kids into 1 room instead of 2, can't use your table to eat etc then imo it is NOT ok.

I am not saying it is great to have a dirty home or a show home but the frequency of threads like this seems to suggest that a lot of women still feel what your home is like is a judgment on a woman, less so on a man. I have moved from a lower middle class area ( lots of nice ex council houses) to a more middle class ( lots of teachers and doctors) dds new friends have on average a lot messier homes, are these families self worth less tied up in what the house looks like, my very posh retired consultant neighbour has a filthy house full of interesting books, wood turning equipment and doesn't seem to worry about who sees at all?

I just hate those patronising quotes, they are used by idiots to excuse their laziness!!

Can't see why you can't have both, a tidy(ish) house and childhood memory making!

Mine is not clinically clean but if the Queen were to pop in for tea suddenly it would take me 15 minutes to grab crap from the front room and dump it in a bedroom, clear the kitchen worktop and give the bathroom a quick wipe. It would be acceptable.

I have a 'friend' like yours. She has a chronic mice problem and can't figure out that it's directly related to the piles of rubbish near the kitchen bin (not IN the bin) floor never gets cleaned, kids eat everywhere, sofa is just caked in food debris etc etc. Heaven for mice.

I have friends who grew up at both extremes of the tidy spectrum.

One, her mum was messy, not quite as bad as the one described in the OP because you could at least use the dining table; but sideboards, shelves, etc. were always piled high with stuff. My friend reacted to this by keeping her own room as tidy as possible and being as organised as possible (her mum was pretty disorganised as well) and as she got older, doing cleaning and so on around the place because she couldn't stand it.
She's not a neat freak herself, exactly, but her house is way way tidier than her mum's was.

The other end was a schoolfriend - her mother was an absolute neat freak - friend had to put everything back in its right place after use, including the book she was reading. Had to go back in the bookcase. Even if she was reading it in bed, it couldn't be left out on the side table, it had to go back in the bookcase. She was very uncomfortable with the situation and rarely had anyone back to hers (I didn't go myself, another couple of friends told me about it). I don't know how she turned out herself.

I'm more middle of the road - parents weren't desperately tidy, but not untidy either - I'm probably more untidy than they are/were, but not much. I do follow in the family failing of keeping too much stuff though. I'm not good at throwing stuff out. My sister, otoh - not dissimilar to the person the OP is describing. I don't know how her DC feel about it, but they're still quite young.

I'm struggling with our house at the moment. It's a big house and it's an old and dusty house. I dust and there's visible dust the next day which I never had in my old house.

It's also way more cluttered than I'd like. Not my stuff, but DP's- we moved in to his existing home and he had a lot of stuff before we even got here! Im working on him to reduce the amount of furniture (who needs a coffee table and 5 side tables in one room??) and to box up some of his old stuff to give us more space. Tbh I could probably fill a skip with all the excess stuff in the house but I won't because it's not my stuff to do that with.

The sitting room in particular is really difficult to clean, just because of the amount of furniture. I admit it is too much effort and too time consuming to move it all to clean floors and skirtings etc properly-theres just too much to move one bit, put it back at a time, you have to move it all pretty much or there's nowhere to move it to iyswim.

We have two lodgers as well but neither of them clean - they do their own washing up but it wouldn't occur to either of them to clean the sink or oven etc.

I currently have bad morning sickness and can't cope with cleaning up after everyone at the moment, as a result the house has gone to shit and I'd be embarrassed if anyone came round.

It's fairly tidy as despite his clutter dp is reasonably tidy but the floors are disgusting, skirting boards haven't been done for 2 months, bathroom is covered in sand and everywhere is pretty dusty.

MrsM - I am the same with crockery and so on - I'm very very careful about how I wash up and would never give someone a dirty plate etc.

Sometimes maybe people's standards are a bit too high and they are so scared of getting it wrong that they don't even know where to start.