To say yes, I CAN have a tidy home and a DC?

[VincentIsGodly]

My house is never a mess, and I take pride in organisation and I'm a bit of a classic decor lover... I love it.

DS1 is due in November. I'm getting varied comments about never being able to keep my house tidy once DS arrives. Similar to this, I have a lot of people laugh at me and make snidey comments when I dare mention (after being pressed), about birth plan, of which includes natural birthing strategies with gas and air as an aid. Because how dare I have a single plan

Bit of background. I took on a DC of 1 week until he was 4 months old a few years back. It's a personal, family issue, but my house was not a mess. It was trickier but also therapeutic.

I have never, ever dared mention cleaning or anything to anyone. If someone has a messy house, so what? Maybe instead of cleaning to a photo standard, they watch a box set etc. It doesn't bother me and I don't think any less of anyone who isn't exactly tidy.

However, I'm quite sick of friends and family coming over and making comments of how I'll be joining them and their messy houses very soon.

Yes, sometimes things won't be so great but that's fine! I have a tiny baby. But, I'll still make the effort as I did looking after an infant before.

Yes, birth plans often don't go to plan. That's no reason not to have an idea of what I want, is it? I won't put myself down if it goes tits up. My body is amazing regardless.

AIBU here to tell people straight next time? It's turning into more than the odd comment.

I had two close together. Worked part time and managed to have a clean and tidy house. It isn't particularly hard. I just needed to be organised. It helps to have a large kitchen table for messy play and crafts.

Perfectly do-able if it is important enough for you.

It depends what kind of baby you get surely? You might have one that refuses to be put down. You might have one that's happy to be left whilst you clean or whatever. Personally I found the first few months really easy as I could just put him in a sling. I find it difficult now as a working single parent and my son is 2.5 so once the house is clean and tidy it's a mess a few minutes later! Then again it will be hard for me I suppose as I'm working 12 hour shifts, studying and raising ds mostly alone. His dad will only ever have him if I'm at work as he doesn't like me to have time to myself!

Oh and with the birth plan all I said was I would ideally like a water birth and no epidural as I knew someone who had an awful experience with it. As it happened I couldn't have a water birth due to complications. I managed just with gas and air but that was purely because I was in too much pain to speak and ask for more pain relief. I literally thought I was going to die from the pain! I didn't even scream as my body just couldn't make a noise!

Yes with one. I have a 1, 2 and 4 year old. I can stay on top of it most of the time.

I agree it's possible, if it's important to you, you will prioritise it.

Reasons why parents don't manage to keep the house pristine are ...

• demanding kids, especially babies and toddlers who need watching constantly or who cling to you

• having v little child free time and preferring to go to gym / relax / cook / whatever instead of housework

Both apply in my case! I think it's very different if you have an easy baby and or local support. So many friends had their parents coming over and actually doing their housework - or taking the dc so they could get stuff done.

There's nothing wrong with having a plan as long as you realise it may not go your way!

I wanted a water birth with dd1. Ended up with a forceps delivery and left with a prolapse that is still not fixed after 2 operations. Dd2 born by elcs.

I havent had time to read all replies but the fact that people are commenting makes me wonder if you are a bit obsessive on the tidiness front . If so then i would say that you would be best to aim for a balance. My mother had 4 of us and our home was immaculate and we could never make any mess, couldnt put feet up on sofa etc etc.
It is not a healthy environment for children imo and i have been more relaxed with mine. I have a clean and generally presentable house but it is most definitely lived in and the teen bedrooms are a right tip which i find hard but refuse to clean up behind them so just ignore.
I may be way off base so in that case ignore me but i know how i always felt material things were more important than people to my mother which is a grave mistake to make .

You sound like hard work. For your F&F and also for yourself. Clean and deep breathe all you like (I just had first baby with just gas and air - it can be done!) but perhaps don't make such a statement out of it. Personal preferences dont make a personality.

I have a clean and tidy house, I get people comment on it when they come in as I also have 4 children under 6. And questions about why I bother? Because cleaning up is my happy place, but I do have to give up that extra bit of sleep and time to myself to do it.
Birth is easy to think of how and can be a while different ball game, my plan before kids was completely natural and hands off by midwives. What I ended up with was 4 inductions, 1 premature including an epidural and a lot of time in hospital, things happen just be prepared it may not go the way you want it too.

Also my house has stayed pretty tidy/clean etc throughout, but my bf is a doer and got us through the early days. I couldn't have cared less as staring at the baby is far more important!

My house is always spotless BUT it's tiny so I can clean the bathroom, dust, Hoover etc in literally an hour And my DD is only 7 months so she's not really making a mess yet! I don't know what I'll do when she's bigger tbh!

Of course u can have a tidy home BUT perhaps won't be such a priorty once dc arrives? Plus I don't count a sittingroom with toys as untidy. U let kids play then do a whip round before bed.

Unless your like my friend who only allows 1 toy downstairs and u wouldn't know kids were in the house

But I do know that it's not much fun being the child of someone for whom a tidy house is an obsession.

^^ This. Be careful that your tidiness doesn't take over, leaving your kids thinking you care more about the house than them. Let them have their bedrooms how they would like them. Make sure it's a home rather than a house.

My house is tidier now that before I had DC.

I'm better at pretty much everything on the domestic front that I was before I had them. I'm more organised, and how the house looks affects more people than it used to. When it was just me or just me and OH who really cares if it's a mess, it was only us looking at it. We would usually prefer to spend our time having long talks into the early hours, drinking red wine, lying in in the morning, going out seeing friends. We didn't care much what the house was like, usually, and if we did it could always wait. We had jobs with long, long hours, so a lot of the time we shut the door on it and used it as a crash pad.

If it's a mess with a baby, it become a hazard. If it's a mess with a toddler, it's chaos personified. If it's a mess with a child, it can affect them socially.

It's not perfect, now, by any means, but washing is done and kitchen is clean, most things have a place, the floors are clear and cleaned regularly, the bathrooms are clean. When you spend more time somewhere, and more people use it, it becomes more important to keep it nice, and children are after all another set of hands (eventually) to help that happen.

Re birth plan; I planned a water birth with minimal pain relief at the lovely mw led unit. I actually got a heavily medicalised induction in hospital and ventouse delivery.

My friend had a baby a year and a half later. She planned a water birth with minimal pain relief and got exactly that!

Sometimes it works, more often than not (based on friends and family), it doesn't go exactly to plan. It can be a little embarrassing if you've bleated on throughout your pregnancy about how you would absolutely refuse pain relief etc in favour of a more "natural" birth, to then have to eat your words! So I'd always say, have a plan, but be open minded and expect to deviate from the plan.

Ime, people who were very tidy before having kids somehow still manage to keep their houses pretty tidy. But if you were quite messy before kids. i.e me, then it usually gets worse.

Which ever you are, I do agree that's it's actually a lot easier to keep the house tidy with a young baby than once they start moving.

Mine are older. Downstairs is tidyish but their rooms....

A couple of preschoolers can make 3 hours worth of mess in the 20 minutes you left them unsupervised to clean downstairs.

Anything is possible if you put the effort in.

I have 3dcs and like a clean and tidy house so I clean and tidy it every day to greater or lesser degree. It usually looks visitor ready bar whatever the children are currently playing with, toys-wise.

I also have good storage so tidying is 10 mins of putting things back in their box/shelf/cupboard.

I keep flat surfaces free of general clutter so I only have one surface layer of tidying to do which is that days or afternoons mess. I don't have longer/term piles of clutter sitting about.

Keep a pretty toybox or whatever Cher basket in the lounge for baby toys/rattles etc. You can shove it all in there every night... job done, lounge back for adults!!

*wicker basket!

Whatever cher! 😂

Was always tidy before ds, still tidy now! At certain times of day it looks like the toy box has exploded all over the house but it all gets tidied away whilst ds naps. Laundry gets washed and hung every night before my bed time. Washing up done straight after dinner. Vacuuming/dusting/mopping etc done every one or two days. I don't have a big house though and I'm a SAHM so o don't think I have an excuse not to be on top of things really. My parents were full time pub landlords with only weekend staff to assist them - with 3 dc, 2 dogs and a horse, our home was still clean and tidy. It can be done!

My house is lovely and clean but not 24/7 I let my boy go nuts with toys and activities etc where as when I was a child my mum pretty much didn't let you move for fear we would make a mess so now I'm way more relaxed about it. I usually tidy after lunch and before bed