To not know how to deal with DSs bedroom situation?

[ProverbialOuthouse]

DSs are 16 and 18. For weeks now I've been asking them to tidy their rooms. Nothing has been done despite them both spending plenty of time in them.

Yesterday they went to their dad's house for the night and I couldn't bare it anymore so went in to tidy them.

From DS1s room I came out with 4 "bags for life" full of recyclables. Empty bottles, cans, boxes and papers. There were 4 empty 2l Dr Pepper bottles, 3 packs of empty Coke cans (so about 12 cans), 4 milkshake bottles, 3 McDonald's meal wrappers and cups and around 5 empty cardboard boxes just thrown all over the floor. Basically our blue bin was emptied on Friday and by the time I'd finished in there it was full again. On top of that I came out with 4 bags of general rubbish - sweet wrappers, crisp packets, pot noodle pots, plastic bags ... on top of that there was mucky clothes, plates, mouldy food and general shit lying all over.

DS2s room wasn't quite as bad but still full of empty sweet packets, mucky clothes, half eaten sandwiches and bottles and cans.

I know people will say "why are you tidying their rooms? Just don't go in!" But it's my fucking house!! They're disgusting and it's stressing me out that two of the rooms in my house look like opium dens.

What can I do to stop this??? They just completely ignore me.

When in your “fed up to the teeth with messy bedrooms” position, my DM used to pile all of our mess on our beds and clean, vacuum and dust the room. When we got home from school we had to deal with the crap on the beds our own. It only happened once to me before learning my lesson (I was livid but understood) but it was maybe 3/4 days before my DB learned his lesson. The first time it happened he threw it all back on the floor and carried on. She just kept piling it all up on the bed every day!

I just wanted to say thanks to OP and everyone else who has posted as this thread has really helped sort my head out re my DS bedroom.

1. He is a fantastic young man who is kind, funny, intelligent and great company. He works hard at college (predicted all A*/A grades) and at his part time job. He doesn't smoke or do drugs or get drunk. Actually I need a bit of perspective here.

1. The only way to not have DS filthy room would be to insist DS moved in with his DF now, which I really don't want to do for various reasons.

Having him here with his toxic room is far better than him not being here, so I will suck it up for another year! Thanks all.

All the banning food, turning off the WiFi, taking the doors off etc won't solve the problem. You are just walking yourself into more conflict. Try a different approach. Try helping them tidy and every couple of days encourage them to do a quick tidy. It's a drag but it worked for me and we never row about their rooms now.

The rows about the rooms were awful and set off other rows completely unrelated to the state of their bedrooms.

I would advise anyone with young children reading this thread to not give them so much as a biscuit unless they tidy their rooms. All joking aside the state of teenagers' bedrooms can become a very heated topic and cause very serious rows.

Silvery it's not just boys,plenty of girls are just as bad!

In my experience, most of them soon mend their ways when they get their own place. I know I did.

Change your wifi password and only let them have it when their room passes an inspection!

Hee hee you could go to a pet shop, buy a few rats or mice and let them loose in there to freak them out! Seriously though, why are they allowed food upstairs?!

tree - do you mean turn off all the electricity? What about the fridge/freezer?

There would always be somewhere he could charge his phone, and if not, he would just pop round to his dads. And yes, both my DC were taught about motherboards/fuseboxes in case anything ever happened when I was out.

weewitch yeah - done that, made no difference. He would just sweep it to one side and crawl in. Or just lie on the floor on top of whatever was there with his duvet over him. He slept in the garden once - just on the grass, no tent or sleeping bag...............

No not all of it. You can leave some sockets on and the lights. You have several circuits in a house. Ours is something like one switch for upstairs lights, one for upstairs sockets. One for downstairs, living room and dining room lights, one for kitchen and hall sockets. One for kitchen and hall lights. I'd just switch off the one for their bedroom sockets. Plus one big trip switch which shuts off everything in emergencies.

My favourite rule is: you need to earn the wifi password. Basically you change it every night and they need to essentially do what you ask of them before they get the code. If the persistently ignore you they'll eat into their data and it'll cost them money. If they then just stay out longer and later, you add another level to the rule such as no pocket money, no treats in the house etc.
Then go for the good old "anything on the floor or messy will be chucked out" but actually follow through on this unless it is valuable, then you hide it somewhere and they need to earn it back.

Yeah I know what you mean tree but that means he would always be able to charge his phone somewhere. He rarely uses laptop, just sometimes for netflix if we are watching stuff together.

His dad pays for his phone and the contract gives him virtually unlimited data so the wifi thing isn't an issue. Neither is money as he earns his own.

Can you charge him for cleaning it? Hitting him in the pocket might be effective. Tell him you won't stand for it being a mess and if you have to clean it, it'll cost him.

Yes of course but reading countless threads on here, it's virtually always the woman complaining that her partner is a lazy arse who does absolutely nothing re housework or childcare. Can't recall any men complaining the same way about their female partners. Compounding that is if you have a MIL who dotes to extreme on her darling son and treats him like he's child.

My Mum banned food upstairs in bedrooms and no drinks other than water upstairs if we didn't tidy. For grounded if you took anything up.

No ideas OP, suffering similar here - but the idea suggested above of a 'chore chart for pocket money' for an 18 year old made me chortle!! I can just imagine this big hairy 6'2" adult coming back from work/the pub/a weekend away with his girlfriend and her seeing his sticker chart (or learning that he had 'pocket money'!!) Brilliant!

Backintown I think you misunderstood that. It's not a chore chart as such it's more these are the things we expect you to do. No chores / No money or top ups.

Of course if you introduce this at a young age it hopefully wouldn't be a problem with an 18 year old.

But I do understand what you mean the Dc's school doesn't allow them out at lunchtime even though they are 18, drive to school, vote etc

Could you get bins for their rooms (sounds like they each need decent sized ones rather than just waste paper basket type things? A landfill bin and a recyclables bin for each of their rooms? They might put rubbish down and think they'll take it to the bin later but never get round to it so if the bin was there it'd be easier?

Can't recall any men complaining the same way about their female partners

Confirmation bias?

I've read plenty of men bemoaning their girlfriends habits various places on the internet although I will concede that men seem to moan about lazy untidy housemates more which makes me think they're less conditioned to be accepting of long term partners who are a mismatch in terms of housework than women.

But there are plenty of lazy, messy and downright unhygienic women in the world.

MynewnameisKy yes - sorry, just tickled me (I have a 7 year old with a sparkly self-drawn sticker chart with dinosaur stickers and was imagining my taller than me teen having one too, was just that honest!).

I do expect the teen to do chores (even though he still looks as if it is an elaborate torture to unload the dishwasher!) and we don't on the whole have junk food in the house. I had always hoped that the endless sticker charts/taking way the internet/various reward schemes/losing privileges - all from an early age would mean that it was all second nature. It isn't thankfully as bad as the one the OP describes (although I have every sympathy & no solution), but he is far from a neat freak & there are plenty of clothes that need washing lurking in there!

id be more concerned about the amount of junk that DS1 is eating! That's a hideous amount of sugar...

He's 18!

If I bought coke and crisps for the DCs they would be drunk or eaten in a day- so it was money down the drain and tooth rot rolled into one.
I would buy none of that stuff, if they are wasting their money on it I would cut their money.
If they want to go out with friends for chips or beer fine, otherwise they are out of luck (and healthier)

Taco So!? Should parents cease to worry about their child's health once they hit 18?

There's a massive obesity crisis going on in case you hadn't noticed.

If a poster on here said their mother was trying to tell them what to eat they'd be told to go no contact because she's clearly controlling. You raise your children and then you let them be adults.

The amount of crap they're eating is gross! Agree with pp, no internet password, no money, no nothing until they earn it - by respecting you and NOT living like savages.