Do your teenager's bedrooms look like this?

[thingersandfumbs]

Just that really. My teenage DD lives in an utter shit pit.

So, aibu to care? For context, DP encountered our dog with a used sanitary towel in his mouth a few weeks ago, from DD's shit tip.

I'm no clean and tidy queen, I promise you that, but to me this is unacceptable. Aibu?

As I said upthread take pics and threaten to put in on her IG or FB and you'll soon have a clean room as she won't risk being shown up for the messy person she is

That is disgusting. Mine are still little so I might eat my words but I couldn’t imagine letting any of mine do this, or that they would think it’s acceptable.

That's absolutely disgusting.

You say she's 18. I'd say by this age she should be managing her own room tidiness/cleaning by herself - but she'll only be able to do that if you've taught her/modelled good behaviour.

My children are younger teens, but they know my expectations, and manage their rooms around that.

I clean their rooms twice a week. On those days, their rooms need to be respectably tidy, so that I can reach everything to clean. I respect their privacy, but only if their room is in a good state - so I won't go in closed drawers to look for stuff, but open drawers are fair game for me to be rummaging through in order to tidy them. Ditto wardrobe, discarded bags etc - if stuff's put away, I don't go looking, but if its left laying around, I reserve the right to go through things to put them away. So generally they make sure all their drawers are closed and bags unpacked and put away.

Clothes won't get washed unless they're in the wash. Clean washing is returned, folded to the end of the bed for them to put away. If clean clothes are put in the wash or lots of clothes left on the floor then I make them do their own washing for a few weeks.

No food or drink (other than water in a sports bottle) allowed in their rooms, ever. Non negotiable.

Doing this twice a week means the rooms never get really messy. For sure there's muck in drawers/bottom of the wardrobe etc, but I can't be stressing about that, as long as the drawers are closed and nothing is overflowing. I tend to suggest a big pre-Christmas clear out each year, to make room for new stuff. This used to be all about toys, but now its more about getting rid of old clothes and clearing out make up etc. I help them with this, if they want.

Most teenagers won't keep their room to a decent standard unless you're actually parenting them. Hopefully by 18 my children will self manage - but who knows!

when i was a teen i probably had max 2 tea cups. How gross

Mrsm43s I have already stated, at least once, that I've cleaned and tidied with her. She knows how. She just doesn't.

My two teens were very different- ds bedroom frequently looked like your dds op but my dd is fastidiously tidy and always was.

You have two choices....
You either just shut the door and pretend it's not there and let your dd leak with it -
Or you yourself hook her in there and do it together once a week

It used to get me so down so know how you feel. I'm messy/untidy but I blitz every few days to stay on top of clutter .

What happens if you lay the law down regards the room?

Leak =deal ffs I hate auto correct!!!

Rytonsister it just doesn't get done or does but only half heartedly. I've grounded her recently as in, since she was 18. When I did it I said that I couldn't believe I was having to treat her as a child just to get any sort of respect or action. It didn't do anything 🤷🏻‍♀️

Mrsm43s I have already stated, at least once, that I've cleaned and tidied with her. She knows how. She just doesn't.

But that amount of mess must take a good few weeks to build up. If she knew that you were in to hoover a couple times a week (or she had to hoover/clean with you checking) then it couldn't build up like that. Basic hygiene would mean that every room in my house gets cleaned and hoovered at least weekly. That room can't be cleaned or hoovered because nothing can be got to. How are the window cleaned, the bedding changed etc? I think that an 18 year old should be doing it herself, but you and your DH as the house owners and the parents should be enforcing it - it's a basic requirement that hoovering, cleaning etc is done weekly. And in order to do that, the room needs to be vaguely tidy.

With her help, go in and gut the room.

With her help, take every item of clothing, whether clean, dirty, on the floor, or in a drawer or wardrobe. Take every book, paper, item of rubbish. Take every scrap of make-up, her phone, all the dirty dishes and empty bottles and packets. And the toiletries and used sanitary items . And black bag the lot.

With her help, strip the bed. Clean the floor, windows and furniture. Put up the new blind.

Now, give her a set of clean bedding, a lidded rubbish bin and a laundry bin.

She is now responsible for all the black bags. Tell her she is to take one bag at a time, sort through it and deal with every item therein appropriately. She can do this in her hallway, so that her room still stays pristine.

She can take her time over this, or do it quickly, but she will not get all her stuff back until she deals with it herself.

And put her phone in the last black bag she deals with.

1.Block her from the wifi until its done.
Or
2.do it your self and bill her. (A deep clean round here is anything from £25 -£60 per room)

1. Get a company in to do it and bill her.
2. Take EVERYTHING away apart from her bed and treat her like a child.

Hope you find a solution!

Mrsm43s As an aside, I own the house. My partner is not her dad.

She deals with her own sheets and has done for at least four years. She deals with her own room entirely. I don't vacuum her room ever. I keep the communal areas clean and tidy and help the little ones to do theirs, but I certainly don't vacuum anyone's room twice a week. I do virtually no washing for her at all - she does it and anything I do ends up in the same area all the dcs fetch their clean washing from. I don't deliver it to their rooms.

She deals with her own sheets and has done for at least four years. She deals with her own room entirely. I don't vacuum her room ever. I keep the communal areas clean and tidy and help the little ones to do theirs, but I certainly don't vacuum anyone's room twice a week. I do virtually no washing for her at all - she does it and anything I do ends up in the same area all the dcs fetch their clean washing from. I don't deliver it to their rooms.

That approach clearly isn't working, is it?

You don't need to do it yourself, but you do need to ensure that your DD does it. Minimum of weekly hoovering/surface cleaning/window cleaning/bedding changed/washing done and put away/bins emptied and all other rubbish cleared. If its done weekly (preferably twice a week) then it's easier to keep on top off and will never get very, very bad.

Unless you are happy for her room to be like that - if so, crack on with what you're doing.

But no, it's not normal, it's truly vile, filthy and unhygienic.

@MrDarcyWillBeMine WTF are you talking about? That's a pretty shit comment

OP I think that's pretty gross (particularly the used sanitary pad) but maybe she needs help having a proper clear out of that bedroom and she can start from scratch with new rules in place (e.g. No food in the bedroom). I know I always feel so much better in a tidier home so I'm sure she'd benefit! It doesn't need to be show home equivalent but for me, having too much shot around makes my brain feel cloudy and I'm unable to concentrate and I'm sure once it gets to that state it feels like an impossible task to sort it out

Well OP you have had a day to read the posts can see the consensus, so you either lower the boom, or continue to ignore. YOu say you have little ones. What an awful example she is setting. You could be in for years of this as the others grow up.

Absolutely hideous... and that's just the wallpaper

@thingersandfumbs OP, this is becoming ridiculous. Stop buck passing. It does not matter whose dad is whose, what you have asked, how many times sheets are changed. You ARE where you ARE.

Op, reading this, YOU have to get stuck in. YOUR daughter has been left to her own devices for too long and this is disgraceful. She is a
Young adult but would have been a child while this started brewing. She clearly is overwhelmed by this, PARENT her! You need to lead by example op and get in there and get stuck in. My eldest DC is 18 and I would never have allowed this to happen or allowed him to get in such a mess. I am my sons safety net while he navigates this world. Yes,cleaning is boring, yes, parenting is a thankless task, but it has to be done and time allocated.

Help YOUR daughter. I appreciate you are busy , we all are! Help her clear this and then be involved daily moving forward. Being a parent is a life long commitment and does not stop when your child is 18. She did not wake up on her b'day,with a whole new set of skills or understanding.

Lead by example. YOU are her mum, YOU are the leader. LEAD for god sake woman.

Get your rubber gloves out, get some Zoflora, grab some flash & some bin bags and get on with it. Show this industrious young lady ,that YOU brought into this world, how to care for her basic needs.

I'm sorry if my post is brutal but sometimes I cannot quite believe what I see in this world. It doesn't matter how many other kids you may or may not have, how many hours you work, how tired you are. These are the choices YOU made. These are the responsibilities YOU willingly accepted. Time to step up to the plate OP. YOU are allowing a child ,you have given birth to, to live in what can at best be described as health hazard squalor. Get it sorted, immediately. I would never expose my children to that.

Take charge, be a mum. Care for your offspring and put in the necessary effort required to raise another human being.

Accept responsibility Op on simple terms

My DDs is usually not far off this, but certainly no dirty san pro left lying around - that is crossing a line.

That is pretty gross. The sanitary towel is completely unacceptable, though.
Glad you got her consent though that was my first concern!

Loving the photo of the beautiful big bedroom someone helpfully put on further back in the thread captioned My teen's room now.

A bit like Jim Bowen in Bullseye " Now look at what you could have won."
Hop back in your car to Smugsville that person.

Oh well OP you did post it in AIBU. Not known for half hearted responses

I’m surprised you didn’t look the dog after it ventured into her room...

*loose

You have two options in reality (that will actually happen). You can either do it yourself or you can accept that’s how she lives. She’s 18, you can’t really force her to do anything (except kick her out but that seems extreme).

Personally, as it is my house and upsetting me I would deal with it myself and continue to maintain it till she fucked off purely because I want my house to be hygienic. I would be as intrusive and petty as possible though. Cleaning time would probably coincide with her favourite time to doss about/lie in and dirty clothes would be nicely folded and put away with everything else. I would cheerfully rearrange her shelves and possessions too.

The only thing I would make a stand on is the removal of anything with the potential to start a fire - there’s no way she’d be keeping those straighteners. I would insist on keeping them till she learnt how to judge not risking burning the house down.

*FFS LOSE

She’s 18!! I would maybe expect this from a 13 year old...