Cleaning dilemma!

[Doglover2440]

So, I’m 24 and live with my mum. However, she literally NEVER cleans and it’s starting to make me quite anxious because she won’t let me clean either!!! She cleans the bath and bathroom sink once every couple of months. The toilet is never cleaned. She gives the kitchen sides a wipe using an antibacterial wipe every other week. The floors are mopped once a month using a Flash Speed Cleaner with a Flash wipe despite us having an unclean dog. The kitchen bin has never been cleaned before. The hob is never cleaned and is completely stained. The dog’s food bowls she cleans once a month and he eats raw meat!

I try and clean regularly, bleaching the loo, cleaning the bathroom and mopping the floors.... cleaning the hob, HOWEVER she completely flips her lid (swearing etc.!) if I use any water and says I make too much mess. I don’t. Tonight, I attempted to bleach the loo and she caught me and went mental. Has anyone else been through similar?? I’m really at a loss here

Very close to reporting her right now. She’s just blown up again because I’ve said I will be hoovering and mopping the kitchen floor because it has been 4 weeks now and we have a dog. Apparently doing so damages the lino?

Report to who? The nmc?

Has she always been like this?

I would just clean when she's out and deny it if questioned

Yeah the NMC and possibly the community mental health team, if one exists. She has just locked all the cleaning products in the outside cupboard and hidden the key. I’m so fed up of this now

@ChangeChingyChange
Omg she is a NURSE?! around children?? Jesus fucking christ - my own mum or not I'd report the dirty mare (sorry no offence intended!!) She has got serious issues and it's a major hygiene risk to her patients.

Report her?! Report her to who exactly?

I'd clean the bathroom after taking a shower so at least it gets a wipe down after each use. Re cleaning the loo, buy baby sterilising tablets and put a few down the loo last thing at night. Ditto the sink, fill the sink with cold water and put a tablet in whilst your having a shower.

When she goes out to work do little clean ups in whichever room you're in. Buy your own cleaning products and hids them in a suitcase in your room. Keep windows open a tiny bit and put baking powder in small bowls or mince pie cases and put them high places. They absorb bad smells and don't announce that you're going to clean, just do it by stealth.

@Doglover2440

Yeah the NMC and possibly the community mental health team, if one exists. She has just locked all the cleaning products in the outside cupboard and hidden the key. I’m so fed up of this now

Good luck with that!

This is despite the cleaning products and mop belonging to me

Sigh

@ChangeChingyChange

God. Move out. She's vile. Definitely a mental health issue.

Please can we stop reframing every unpleasant / bizarre attitude as a mental health issue?

She must be sick if she thinks this is normal or acceptable. I can understand when people are depressed or just extremely busy and exhausted so cleaning falls by the wayside but she’s actually blocking you from cleaning which is just weird. I couldn’t live like this at all, I’d have to move out.

Where I worked the infection control nurse apparently lived in a really dirty house.
Beggars belief!

@Hemingwayscatz

She must be sick if she thinks this is normal or acceptable. I can understand when people are depressed or just extremely busy and exhausted so cleaning falls by the wayside but she’s actually blocking you from cleaning which is just weird. I couldn’t live like this at all, I’d have to move out.

I agree. Fair enough if she doesn’t want to clean, but to not let me clean either is too far. I am just going to the shop to buy some more products and maybe a pack of sponges which I will have to keep hidden somewhere in my room if she is going to play this game!

Her Christmas present has just arrived. It’s a massive Biscoff hamper. Tempted to hide that too, but I’m more mature than that

I've been in your situation, OP. I moved out as soon as I could, and won't even stay overnight there now.

This was my parents house. I boomeranged back to theirs in my mid 20’s after getting out at 17.
I cleaned the kitchen once she went absolutely mad about the bleach smell. Opened all the windows started ranting. The stuff I found in that kitchen was disgusting, bread from 5 years + ago. Infested cereals.
If you needed to use the kitchen it was a slice of bread size space on the worktop you could use the rest was full.
The floors hadn’t been cleaned for years either.
I Cleaned the bathroom and threw away the collection of plastic bottles again she went utterly mental shouting at me.

It’s a mental health condition when it gets like that, it’s really really hard living like that. Keep your room nice and save hard to get out as soon as you can. She won’t accept the condition and she won’t accept you cleaning.

It’s shit. I know it’s shit

Are you living in a gingerbread house? Otherwise I cannot see a bit of soap and water doing any actual damage. This sounds like a control issue. Does she want you living there or trying to get you out? Or has she always been so grubby?

So what are the plans for Christmas Dinner if the kitchen is a hygiene hazard?

You poor poor kid
Yes, she's "not right". It's going to be very hard to change her, that sort of thing is tough enough for professionals.

Have you got any friends or relations who might take you in for a rent within your budget? "I want to clean more than I'm allowed to at home" is a very attractive line, you know!

Otherwise the stealth cleaning :/ you can get a lot done with wet wipes and a spray mop (I guess you could hang the latter in your wardrobe).

I'd be surprised if there wasn't some trauma behind all this - but it still doesn't make it any easier to deal with.

I am really sorry you're having to go through this.

I have come across this before with nurses...not frequently but not very rarely either. The only woman who would talk about it said it was because she was so fed up of all the cleaning and disinfecting at work. This was way before covid but when MRSA first took hold and cleaning and disinfecting got ramped up. None of the people I saw tested as having any kind of dementia or appeared to have any kind of mental health issue.

[quote DropYourSword]@ChangeChingyChange
Omg she is a NURSE?! around children?? Jesus fucking christ - my own mum or not I'd report the dirty mare (sorry no offence intended!!) She has got serious issues and it's a major hygiene risk to her patients.

Report her?! Report her to who exactly?[/quote]
The hospital, her employers, the NHS. Anyone that will listen. Would you want your child treated by this person??

She is doing nothing illegal and how clean or dirty her house is in no way impacts how she performs her role as a nurse!!

I think it’s grim. But it’s also bloody ridiculous to think there’s anything reportable here!!

I know your struggles, my mother is a hoarder, house is just terribile.

In her case she does not see the issue. She says house is clean. I tried to suggest to her some Therapy but she does not want to go.

I moved out.

@DropYourSword

She is doing nothing illegal and how clean or dirty her house is in no way impacts how she performs her role as a nurse!!

I think it’s grim. But it’s also bloody ridiculous to think there’s anything reportable here!!

I agree, also my mom as mentioned is a hoarder with a terribile house, but she overclean herself.

I have experience of this . They take it as a personal insult if you attempt to clean and become incredibly angry .
The person I knew was a narcissist, I know that's not a popular thing to say but she really was .
You will not change her . You need to get out .
Does your uni have some sort of welfare person that could advise you ?
You need a room in a house shard , it'll be like a 5 star hotel compared to what you're living in now.
She's letting you down .