Does a messy home negatively affect a child's upbringing?

[MaryPopppins]

A friend of mine has gone away for the week and as an emergency needed me to feed her cats and let them in and out as her mum is also away and normally does it.

I've only been in her living room and kitchen before. They're both very cluttered, no space on sides anywhere. And lots of collections. But I guess I'm used to it and look past it as kids are normally running round playing and we only tend to pop in for an hour or two here and there.

But today saw the bedrooms and bathroom for the first time. And was really quite shocked and saddened.

(It's a bungalow, you have to pass the kids 2 bedrooms and the bathroom to get into the lounge and kitchen, wasn't snooping. Normally the doors are shut.)

The kids bedrooms were covered. I can't quite figure out how they get into and out of bed. And the bath was piled high with dirty washing and towels. Toilet all brown, even the seat, sink full of bath toys. Every windowsill is full of stuff so they wouldn't be able to open/close curtains etc.

If I'd seen photos online I'd assume it was of mentally unwell people or old people who needed help. (I will admit to being a germ phonic person. Quite obsessed.)

But they're smart, and the kids are smart, quite cheeky boisterous children but they're happy enough and doing fine at school.

Am I blinkered and terribly judgemental and that's a fine way to live? Will it effect the kids negatively?

I'm not concerned for their emotional well being. But I suddenly feel really sad for them seeing where they sleep/are supposed to get clean.

I was lucky to grow up in a very tidy home. My mum is very house proud and maybe I just took it for granted?

I feel like offering help would insult them. They're very capable. Maybe they're overwhelmed?

I really don’t like the assumption you don’t play with your kids and must always be cleaning ‘where do you find the time’ etc if you are tidy. You find small pockets of time every day and because it isn’t very messy or unclean, it doesn’t take very long

I agree.

My house is a 1 and was even when Ds was tiny. I can't function in a messy house. Tidy house tidy mind and all that. Saying that toys all over the place are fine, paints and play dough etc all good. Toys got cleared away at the end of the day( into wicker baskets to makele it easier) I honestly think kids play more in tidy homes as you know where everything is and can access toys as a pp said.

I tidy as I go and that way stay on top of things. I wouldn't ever leave a room without taking a used mug back into the kitchen,I wouldn't leave dirty dishes out on the side over night,kitchen gets a clean down after every meal. Laundry gets folded from the drier or line immediately so it's not hanging around in baskets crumpled then all needing to be ironed. Ds's room is a shit tip, his room is his room,typical teen bedroom.

Life is easier in a less cluttered environment,imagine going to your kids nursery or classroom and seeing it piled high with stuff and piles of stuff on the floor,you'd be horrified and out of there like a shot. No amount of staff saying "Oh but we don't have time because we're playing with the children" would convince anyone that's a nice environment to grow up/learn in.

OP, I don't know what the answer is if the kids are clean and fed- sounds utterly grim though. I like the idea of doing the bathroom 'because the cat shit in there and few loads of laundry also.'

I think it is comforting for many people to have order in their lives and can make you feel stressed and anxious when you do not.
When I work I like to do it with as least amount of paper possible. I categorise everything and make to do lists but I am ok when things don’t go right and can sleep at night when I have a messy email inbox and a messy house. I just wouldn’t feel happy always having those things in my life every day, there is a sense of completion and satisfaction from maintaining the order and I think some people feel this more strongly than others. Losing things is a good example also it is not so wasteful, I know where things are so don’t have to pull the house apart looking for things or keep buying them. DC are now teens but I kept some of their toys for my niece and nephew to play with when they visit and then I just put it away when they leave

I also have an element of growing up with no nice clothes or toys I appreciate everything I do own and teach my DC to appreciate and respect belongings too. Material things are expensive and I have to make them last, if I don’t treat them nicely they will need replacing and I have other things I would rather do with my money!

It doesn't necessarily impact on a child's wellbeing if a house is messy but we should all be teaching our children to tidy up after themselves and to have a certain level of hygiene in the home. Or what happens when they grow up and move out? Are they the ones that then leave their partners to tidy up after them and keep the house clean and organised while they do nothing and then just claim they don't see the mess?
I let my kids get as many toys out as they like as long as they clear up at the end of the day.
If things are kept generally tidy and the house is clean then isn't this what children will accept as normal as they get older and keep those standards themselves?

Houses def can be cluttered yet still clean. You just tend to move stuff around to clean under it then push it back

I can't get my head around that at all. Would it not be quicker to deal with it than to move it, clean round it and put it back?

My house is not a sterile show home, not by a long way. But we don't have piles of stuff anywhere. I grew up having to move stuff in order to sit down and I have always vowed that no one will ever have to move anything in order to get a seat in my house, so my one 'rule' is that nothing is ever put on a chair, except a person.

Yes to there not being any mention of the men. My house is tidier than 1. We have a cleaner once a fortnight.
So we ALL do housework. That’s why 20 mins a day is way more than enough. The 7 year old will help me clean the kitchen, load and unload the dishwasher and help with the laundry. We will chat about his day and school stuff while we do it. The toddler will help as well singing loudly, and he and his brother will tidy up all their toys at the end of the day before bedtime. All the toys have a designated bit so they know how to tidy up and I do declutter the toys every few weeks. DH does the bins and the laundry, irons and changes all the sheets and hoovers. Overall this takes maybe 30 mins every few days. And most of this he does when the kids are in bed. I do all the cooking, kid related admin, some laundry, and generally keeping the kitchens and bathrooms clean.

My house is clean and tidy because I don’t see it as my job- I see it as OUR job to have a relatively neat and tidy house. At 6:20ish every evening we all spend less than 20 mins doing our chores. It means that when the kids go up for their bath, the laundry is folded, the kitchen is clean, toys are put away and the living room is tidy. The 7 year old makes his own bed in the morning and the 2 year old puts away all his toys.
I don’t mind having all the toys out during the day, or paint or play doh. They just know that at the end of the day they have to tidy up. After a meal they both help me and DH fo tidy up the kitchen (dishes in the sink, and I will load the dishwasher- DS1 will wipe the table and DS2 will wipe down his own high chair). To me these are all important life skills and watching both parents do housework is important. We will sing loudly or chat as we do it and so as ‘quality time’ goes it is probably much better than 20 mins of CBeebies while a harassed and tired mum frantically cleans up and feels resentful and inadequate.

There is a happy medium. I am amused by people who cannot bear cereal boxes in display ...horrified by 3.
If you work ft in a demanding job like me then finding pockets of time every day is tough as i cook when i get hime at y then want to relax as im exhausted. Same for many i expect.
Plus in my house dd was the untidy one. At the age of 10 it has just clicked that if she wants to live in a tidy house like her mates she has to put her stuff away and help mummy. Bingo...she has started cleaning her room and decluttering due to peer group pressure...she wouldnt listen to me nagging.

@Ted27
Your house sounds lovely!

That scale is frightening, I thought I was messy but I don’t think we get much beyond a 2. If you’re friends house is at 5 I think that is real cause for concern.

I grew up pretty untidy (parents rarely made me tidy my room) and I think it really messes with your mental health, makes it much harder to think clearly about things.

That hoarding scale is fascinating! As is the relationship between mothers and children in terms of this.

My living room, kitchen, bathroom are probably a solid 1.5 rising to a 3 on a monthly cycle before things get blitzed. Although I do aim to clean the floors and kitchen/bathroom every weekend.

Bedrooms probably are 3.5 the majority of the time. Every few months I get the energy to blitz them , but they revert pretty quickly.

But it is in general clean and I do make an effort. I just find it very hard to keep on top of though, i’m Not naturally tidy and now I have 2 not naturally tidy kids too it’s even more difficult.

I've been the mum with the house like this. In hindsight it was a combination of my undiagnosed ADHD, and poor role models as a child (but mostly ADHD). It was on the borderline for social services assessment because my health visitor was concerned. At one point my landlord came to inspect and essentially sent me a warning letter saying I needed to sort it out or he would terminate the contract. When I moved out he refused to return the security deposit due to "lack of care" - at the point of leaving, it wasn't that bad but I had no energy to fight it.

Is it ideal? No probably not. It won't give them the sense of good hygeine etc, meaning they may struggle socially particularly during puberty etc to keep on top of body odour. Once they get to a certain age, they may be embarrassed to bring friends round to such a messy house. The parent might be on some level ashamed of the house and not invite people over which is socially isolating, too. When there is such disorder it is difficult to learn good habits of organisation, which is a useful skill for studying and work.

In some cases messiness like this can present a hazard - if food hygeine is compromised for example, or simply accident risk. This did unfortunately happen to my child as he tripped and fell onto a glass which was (for no good reason) on the floor, which broke and cut his face. We were extremely lucky it did not damage his eye or mouth, and he has a scar from it which he'll probably have for life. Even that didn't really push me to sort it out although I did become more aware of risks like glasses on the floor.

But although not ideal, it's not actually harmful enough to warrant actual child protection intervention. The harm that would come from removing children and taking them to foster care etc would be much more than the small increase in accident risk, social disadvantage, and reduction in life skills such as personal hygiene and organisation. If all other aspects of parenting are adequate then the description in the OP would come under "good enough" parenting. It's much better in terms of outcomes for children for them to stay with a "good enough" parent with a few problems than to suffer the upheaval and emotional wounds of the child protection system.

The most useful thing that happened when I did have a brief social services contact was that they passed on a checklist to my health visitor, who passed that checklist onto me. Because of that I was able to see two things - firstly that some of the houses social services go into are far worse than mine, which removed some of the guilt/anxiety which was actually in hindsight a bit of a barrier to tackling it because it was too frightening to look at it head on and honestly - and secondly exactly which parts of the mess were considered an objective problem, and not simply a subjective difference in opinion in standards. I've used it as a sort of mental checklist ever since and I've been able to keep my house much more in order. DH is a huge help/influence as well. One of the problems (which I'd agree is also an issue for children being raised in a house like this) was that some of the things they were flagging up I just refused to believe were a problem because it was completely normal in my house when we were growing up, for the washing up to be left until it was needed again, for the floor to be littered with bits of food and general debris (this would never fly with DS2 who eats everything, but wasn't an issue with DS1 who never did) and so on. I remember the frustration and fear when the health visitor vaguely proclaimed my house to be "unsafe... inappropriate...just the same" on the visit she'd made after I had made a substantial effort to clean up, but focused on completely different areas than the ones she was looking at.

I don't get the sense of calm people talk about when in a neat and tidy environment. In fact I feel quite calm and comforted when I'm in my own little "nest" of untidiness. I keep the house as far as I can to a decent standard now, but my desk is a disaster zone. It doesn't hurt anybody so I don't worry about it and it makes me feel safe and secure. Quite possibly I'm just weird. But I don't agree that calmness is universal or that clutter/mess makes everybody anxious.

My Mother would have deemed 1 untidy with the cereal boxes out on display. My home is a 1 and very occasionally up to a 2 but it’s not tolerated for long. I know someone whose house is a 4 I really don’t like going in there.

Interesting scale. These days house goes between 1-2. Though kitchen counters (not floor so much) will go to a 3. In the "bad" days, we probably hovered at 3-4 most of the time, though again, less random stuff on kitchen floor, certainly no boxes of newspapers etc.

We have more space/storange, less stuff, DH who is bothered by mess so tends to clean/insist on cleaning every few days. Better routines for me and a solid sense of what needs cleaning vs what can wait.

@BertieBotts

Im glad your son is ok
I think the sense of calm comes from things like knowing nothing is dangerous on the floor for DC, things feel secure and safe for them. I don’t mind the feeling of having a little messy nest but I wouldn’t spread it further than a sofa because I too am renting and want security of being able to stay in my home, I don’t want my DC or pets to get hurt or ill and I am just more of an avoidant risk taker type of person.

I live next door to cluttered people. One of their DC has visible clutter in their room all over the windowsill piled high with boxes and their kitchen is really cluttered as often the lights are on with no curtains or blinds pulled. They are antisocial, never have visitors on weekends and don’t even use the garden. I’ve also lived next to a person like that before with DC. Personally it makes me sad for the DC to be trapped inside the messy nest where the parent feels most secure, because that is more about how the parent is feeling and not how the DC night be feeling. This is why it becomes a matter for SS in serious situations because the needs and feelings of the DC become drowned by the clutter and feelings of how mess makes the parents feel. There is a lot of feelings and emotions attached to hoarding and I think there can be a strong denial as to how this affects other people. My DM is a hoarder and doesn’t/can’t factor how other people might feel and how they are impacted because she can only see how she feels

Would it not be quicker to deal with it than to move it, clean round it and put it back?

Deal with it how, though, if that’s the only place it will currently fit?

I’m looking at a bedroom with five large musical instruments, ten box files of music, a spare door, a dog crate and someone’s huge GCSE and A level artwork here.

I’m shortly going to shove it aside and Hoover, then shove it all back again and have coffee.

Bertiebotts, yes to ADHD!! I have dyspraxia and ADHD and I definately think it effects my ability to keep a tidy house.

Just out of interest, what were the priorities the health visitor told you that you keep on your mental check list?

Houses def can be cluttered yet still clean. You just tend to move stuff around to clean under it then push it back

I can't get my head around that at all. Would it not be quicker to deal with it than to move it, clean round it and put it back?

No it’s definately not. Organising stuff for me can take days and days. It’s just so overwhelming, I get caught up so much in the memories in every object, I set myself impossibly high expectations in terms of the systems I want to create when I tidy, I get swamped by the enormity of the task, I get distracted by an object and then end up leaving everything half done and needing to just sweep it to the side.

My usual strategy of cleaning is, pick everything up off the floor and put it on surfaces/sofa/bed. Sweep, hoover, steam mop. Attempt to put stuff on surfaces/sofa/bed back in the right places but run out of time and just have to shove the stuff somewhere (like a bag for life) or put it back on floor. What doesn’t help is that all my storage space is filled with stuff that I generally don’t use because I csn’t See it, so there’s not many places to put stuff away.

I do try every few months to clear out a cupboard, and it’s exciting for a little while having that space orderly with room to put stuff away. I just did the airing cupboard yesterday , took me 3 hours! But it usually reverts pretty quickly and that’s depressing.

I worked out that even when I have a system in place, which takes me a monumental effort to do, it’ll always break down because I am the weakest link. I can’t consistently keep to a system. And one slip and it breaks down and is a mess again.

It genuinely feels sometimes like the stuff in my house has a life of it’s own and that I have very little control over it.

Deal with it how, though, if that’s the only place it will currently fit?

I’m looking at a bedroom with five large musical instruments, ten box files of music, a spare door, a dog crate and someone’s huge GCSE and A level artwork here.

I wasn't really thinking of that sort of stuff. I'm a musician too, so I also have instruments and shelves/files of music.

I'm intrigued as to the spare door though!

But actually what I really meant was people who lift a pile of Eg paperwork then put it back in the same place. Just can't get it at all because it takes far more time to sort through it everytime you're looking for something than to just deal with it and file or bin it in the first place. Same with laundry.

Folk who imply only lazy people don’t clean are really missing something obvious.

If you tidy that thing away as soon as you’ve finished you don’t have to waste ten minutes looking for it amongst the chaos next time you need it.

If you wipe the crumbs up in ten seconds before eating your toast you don’t have to spend half an hour wrestling the hoover to clean the floors of the whole house because the crumbs got tracked everywhere.

Tidiness and order is a perfect example of working smart, not hard.

From looking at the images in the link I find 1 to be too messy/cluttered in every image!! I am extremely house proud (as was my mum and in fact all of my family!) and my house pretty much looks like a display home all the time. DP grew up in a more cluttered and dirty house and whilst he struggles with keeping up to my “standards” he admits that he like the house so clean and tidy and now finds his parents annoyingly dirty and untidy.

@TreadingThePrimrosePath

Well I agree it shouldn’t be notable having a man doing cleaning but they are notable in their absence from this thread. There isn’t any criticism of a father for living in a dirty / untidy house. It’s all “ I know a mum who lives in a shit pit / show home”. At the end of the day the blame is always rested squarely at the foot of the woman irrespective what end of the spectrum they’re on.

From my own experience, I can confirm that coming from a messy, dirty home as a child can seriously affect your well-being, self-esteem and social life. It used to make me so unhappy. Please keep your homes clean if you have kids, it's grim to have no friends because you are ashamed to bring anyone home.

@Divebar.
Yes, and after 45 years of me living as an active feminist, it still annoys me immensely that women still think of women in those terms.

My husband is very very tidy. It drives me mad when people tell me that I'm lucky that he helps around the house.

No, he lives here. It's just right and fair that he does housework.

I can't remember the exact checklist now, as I don't have it any more and it was years ago. I managed to find it online once and I posted it on a thread here, so if you happen to be on an ADHD hyperfocus, you could probably find it with advanced search (it's not too difficult to work out the problem with the broken links and fix it, it's just really annoying and time consuming. Easier on a desktop than a phone.)

But my mental checklist (in order of priority) these days goes:

1. Kitchen is hygienic:

• Dirty plates, pans, etc in dishwasher (may mean emptying dishwasher first) unless it is on in which case they are scraped of old food and piled neatly(ish) near it.
• Rubbish thrown away/in recycling, etc
• Any bins causing a smell to be removed/taken out and bin bags replaced.
• No food left on side. If it's to be eaten, into fridge/freezer in reasonable container.
• Sides are wiped down
• Floor is swept/clear of "bits" and any sticky or wet spills are wiped. Stains are not great but not an immediate panic.
• Incorrect items in kitchen are OK but any dirty clothing, dishcloths etc removed and put into laundry bin
• Sink is clean, wiped, drain not clogged or creating a smell

1. Living room/dining (same room) not disgusting:

• Plates, cups etc taken out to kitchen
• Food dealt with ie wrapped and put back away or thrown away if old
• Nappy bin emptied if it's creating a smell or too full
• Rubbish thrown away
• Dirty clothing, bibs etc taken to laundry bin
• Floor is swept/hoovered with no bits of food, rubbish etc.
• Table, highchair is wiped clean

1. Bathroom is hygeinic:

• Toilet (and surrounding floor) is clean/wiped so that no hairs/urine staining/smell. We do get limescale staining because we fall behind with it but I scrub it as much as I can. After several scrubs it does eventually come off.
• Sink, side of bath is clean/wiped so no dust/hair/toothpaste film
• Towels, bath mats changed
• Bin bag changed
• Old containers/rubbish removed
• If the rest of the floor looks gross I will wipe it but not that regularly TBH.

1. Everyone has enough clean clothes (not necessarily put away, but washed and dried)

1. Main passageways - hallways, doorways, bedrooms - are clear of obstacles

1. Random: Anything not elsewhere on list which looks dirty, e.g. windows with handprints on, sticky door handles etc, cleaned.

1. Clean clothing is put away. Random objects in wrong rooms put away or returned to correct room.

1. Living room looks nice:

• Take clutter/crap off sofa/table and put it away where it goes
• Put away clean clothing hanging around in here
• Put away toys
• Maybe clean desks, clear paperwork, etc
• Fluff pillows :o

1. Bedrooms: (DC who are old enough do theirs every Sunday, ours is more sporadic, but these are a special case as no visitors see them)

• Dirty clothes into laundry bin
• Clean clothes put away or into designated hidey space for "clean enough to wear again"
• Bed clothes sorted out (we don't change them as often as we should)
• Rubbish removed, taken away
• Random things off floor onto shelves, top of drawers etc
• Floor swept/hoovered

Also other things:
We have limited plates, bowls, clothing etc so we MUST wash them before it gets insane.
OTOH, we have LOADS of dishcloths and tea towels and bibs so I can chuck them in the wash after one use so that you're never questioning how manky this one is and how long it's been hanging around.
Enough clothes dryer space to hold 3-4 loads at any one time. So even doing a wash every day in the winter when stuff takes long to dry is feasible. But leaving stuff on the drier forever is not.
Vertical storage a la Marie Kondo is great. Also those big square ikea shelves with drawers you can chuck all your crap in, great.