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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To find this attitude to getting a cleaner bizarre?

62 replies

Rae34 · 03/02/2021 01:15

My mum seems to have an attitude RE people getting cleaners. I am getting one now at the end of a tenancy before I move to new home I've just bought. She raised an eyebrow that I wasnt doing it myself but said fair enough

The cleaner is coming this weekend. She remarked 'but surely you'll clean a bit yourself beforehand?'. Er, no. The place is already pretty tidy and it'll be mopped and wiped down throughout the week.

In holiday homes she always cleaned them within an inch of their lives/until gleaming so we'd spend half of the last day doing just that. Even though a cleaner would be in after.

She really struggles to keep her own home tidy and always did when I was growing up. She could have afforded an occasional cleaner but never would have got one. AIBU to find this 'I must do it all myself/who gets a cleaner' attitude strange?

OP posts:
Aquamarine1029 · 03/02/2021 01:24

She is who she is. In the future, keep getting a cleaner to yourself. It will save you the tuts and headache.

Original poster
Rae34 · 03/02/2021 01:26

I just don't get where the attitude comes from. I saw a journalist say the same thing last year.

That's just it @Aquamarine1029 - as I am moving to a bigger place I am thinking I will sometimes I get a cleaner in. No doubt that will seem unacceptable. Smile

OP posts:
TheOtherBoelynGirl · 03/02/2021 01:28

Definitely when I was growing up (rural, working class area), it would have been looked down on to get a cleaner, like you weren't doing your wifely duties properly.

Absolutely no way would my mum ever consider it. It is, in part, a pride thing. And generational, I think.

I love getting a cleaner in, personally.

Aquamarine1029 · 03/02/2021 01:29

I just don't get where the attitude comes from.

It's your mother's form of martyrdom. That's all it is.

Original poster
Rae34 · 03/02/2021 01:30

@TheOtherBoelynGirl her mum was a cleaner and put a lot of pressure on her to always have a clean house. She could never manage it. She still struggles now and complains she doesnt have enough time for hobbies due to having to clean...

I definitely put it down to her working class upbringing but then isnt it like saying you shouldn't give cleaners work? I don't know

OP posts:
Original poster
Rae34 · 03/02/2021 01:31

Maybe you're right @Aquamarine1029

She is always going on about poor me, I never have time for myself due to all these other things. And it's true, she does have all these other things but an occasional cleaner would free up her time.

OP posts:
TheOtherBoelynGirl · 03/02/2021 01:34

@rae34 My mum was a cleaner too but she definitely had the attitude that it wasn't for 'the likes of us'. She definitely still has very ingrained attitudes like that, like she wouldn't like going to a fancy restaurant or a nice hotel or anything like that. Not even just the money - she literally feels uncomfortable in that environment. I remember once they offered us an upgrade to business class on a flight and it was really cheap, like 50 pounds for the both of us on a long haul flight and she wouldn't do it! Absolute madness, the usual cost would have been about 3000 pounds each!

Fastedbrownie · 03/02/2021 01:36

Though it's not specifically about cleaners, I think the best explanation of this is in the luncheon episode of the youtube series Gayle, where she's explaining to her daughter why she can't serve a store brought store pie at her lunch party.

"When you serve a store brought pie you're climbing out of the trenches and you're waving the white flag in the air. It's a sign of weakness. It's a lazy desert. If I was to serve a store brought pie, I would essentially be strolling into the courthouse, handing over my womanhood, and picking up my golf clubs and shorts."

OldAndWornOut · 03/02/2021 01:37

I think it's a generational thing.
There was something to be said for a line full of sparkling white nappies on the line, the baby outside in a pram getting "the air", and a tidy house.

Things are the same now, possibly even more competitive, but just about different things.

TheOtherBoelynGirl · 03/02/2021 01:43

"Things are the same now, possibly even more competitive, but just about different things."

Yes, I was just thinking about this the other day. We don't have the same standards over cleanliness and doing all the chores by ourselves, but there is more pressure to have your house done up like the Ikea catalogue and for it to "reflect your personality". And to spend more time "being a mum", making amazing games for your kids from two bits of cardboard and a length of string, and doing roleplay and Montessori activities day in day out. If we told my mum we were bored, we were told that 'only boring people get bored' and turfed out to play.

Different times.

Isitbedtimeyet4 · 03/02/2021 07:24

I asked my husband if we could get an occasional cleaner in a while back and he was horrified at the thought... I’m not PAYING someone to do something we can easily do...
Once I’d kindly reminded him that he works 50/60 hours a week and we usually spend his days off having family time and going for walks and I’m home all week alone with three under three so he was effectively saying that I could do all of it he quickly changed his tune and has been contacting companies!
He’s always been quite ‘traditional’ and gets it from his parents so honestly I think it’s just a generational thing!

SmileyClare · 03/02/2021 07:36

I've worked as a cleaner and have had two clients who kept me secret.

One didn't tell her husband she had hired me three times a week; we used to laugh about it, and one lady with an enormous house always asked me to hide clean upstairs quietly when she had friends over for coffee and not come down Grin

There is definitely an embarrassment in having a cleaner for some. I find most women feel they have to justify why they hire me by listing all their commitments and the reasons they don't have time to clean. It's silly really, we wouldn't be like this about employing a tradesman or window cleaner for example.

ScrapThatThen · 03/02/2021 07:52

I think with your mum it's her shame talking - she hears her mum saying 'that's not good enough for others to see'. Plus, I know what she means, some tidying and respectability needed for most family homes before a cleaner comes to do their job.

lovelemoncurd · 03/02/2021 07:55

My 85 year old MIL came from working class roots. She always had a cleaner. She wasn't a martyr and a complainer that's the difference.

Babysensoryspider · 03/02/2021 07:59

Many tenancies require a professional end of tenancy clean which is actually a standard very hard to reach yourself so you could explain that!

I think my mum would be the same though. I'd LOVE a cleaner if we could afford/justify it!

WellTidy · 03/02/2021 08:06

I think it is something she identifies along the lines of not doing as well at being a wife as someone who can do all of it themselves, like Mrs x and Mrs y. Having a cleaner might trigger her inner voice saying that she is ‘failing’.

I’ve had a weekly cleaner for nearly 20 years, including when DH (then DP) and I moved in together and we were both working full time, when I was in maternity leave and now when I work part time. I really really value it, and of course I could do it myself, but it frees up my time to do other things.

I absolutely love her. I’ve only had four different people in all that time, and my current cleaner is the business. I love her, she does a much better job than I would and I love going into the weekend knowing that the place has had a proper clean. She irons when she comes as well - mostly bedding, but clothes too. Did I say that I love her? I really do.

WellTidy · 03/02/2021 08:08

Just remembered something my mum said when I came home from a play date as a 13yo having seen a dishwasher at a friend’s house, and thinking it was the bees knees. My mum said ‘of course, [insert friend’s mum name] works full time. I only work part time (30 hours a week) so I wouldn’t have one’. Madness. We could have afforded one and also had space for one.

Worried830410 · 03/02/2021 08:11

Your mother is a martyr and that is certainly nothing to aspire to. She looks down on that, because without her martyrdom she has very little else that makes her feel better about herself.
Times have moved on, women don't need to feel like this is what defines them being a good wife. If you can get a cleaner then do it. I have a cleaner and it has never crossed my mind that this makes me lazy.

user1493494961 · 03/02/2021 08:14

Don't tell her then.

Jent13c · 03/02/2021 08:21

I dont know what like things are elsewhere but I'm in Scotland and there is a bit of a cultural thing that if you can do something yourself you would. My folks are literally the only people I know who never do any form of DIY, they outsource everything. My cousin married a girl brought up in Dubai and when we lived there she was horrified that I didnt have a twice weekly cleaner and a nanny to help with my kids. The few times we did get a cleaner there I felt ridiculous sitting in the living room and ended up cleaning along side her

Londonnight · 03/02/2021 08:24

@Babysensoryspider Landlords aren't allowed to request a professional clean anymore, it against the law.

My elderly parents used to have a cleaner come in once a week before lockdown.

Themostwonderfultimeoftheyear · 03/02/2021 08:32

I never understand this sort of attitude to a cleaner. If you can afford one get one! It is buying you time which is just so precious. Time to relax, time to spend with family, time to spend on hobbies, time to spend on work or whatever you want to spend that time on.

Porridgeoat · 03/02/2021 08:33

I tidy pre cleaner and that’s it. She gets to see our loo in all its skid marked glory

Cyberworrier · 03/02/2021 08:40

It’s interesting people saying it’s a generational thing, I had a friend being horrified at me hiring a cleaner supposedly on feminist left wing grounds! It turned out she thought it was in some way exploitative, despite paying decent hourly rate (more than one of my part time jobs at the time), so I pointed out that was quite patronising and sexist a judgement over what can largely be a working class and female industry. It’s weird. I think the snobbery can come from all directions. Surely if the person is paid a decent wage and treated with respect for doing their important work there’s no problem, like with many jobs?

ageingdisgracefully · 03/02/2021 08:42

I'm the same. I would never get a cleaner unless I was actually incapable of doing my own cleaning. I'm older so perhaps a generational thing.

When my mother became ill before dying of cancer the last thing she gave up was cleaning. In the end, she had to get someone in and it was a source of great distress to her.