AIBU to be pissed off by the sheer level of laziness in my home

[Akiddleydiveytoo]

OK, full disclosure, I can be guilty of being a little bit lazy at times but fucking hell - my family can turn it into an Olympic sport 🤬. Here are some examples (for context, I live with my DH and our 2 DDs (13 & 16)).

1. DD1s (only) chore is to empty and load the dishwasher which she has to be nagged and nagged to do Every. Single. Day. As a result my kitchen is ALWAYS full of dirty dishes. Occasionally I will get fed up and do them myself (as I'm sick of seeing dirty dishes everywhere and I actually need to free up some workspace to prepare dinner) but I know that by doing that, all I'm teaching her is that if she leaves it long enough I'll do it.

1. Similarly, DD2s (only) chore is to empty the bins and take the recycling out. Again, despite repeated nagging this gets put off and put off until we're playing bin Jenga and we have empty tins and bottles etc all over the kitchen.

1. Nothing ever gets put directly into the bin. Last night we had a rare MaccyDs and DH plated all of our food out and just left the empty food wrappers on the kitchen worktop - less that 2ft from the bin!

1. Both DDs pull everything out of their wardrobes when deciding what to wear and just dump them on the floor. When I ask them to tidy up their rooms they just scoop up all of their (unworn, washed and ironed) clothes off the floor and put them back in the dirty laundry basket so they don't have to hang them back up again.

1. DH is completely incapable off lifting the lid on our laundry bin to put his dirty clothes in and just leaves them sitting on the top which means that when I have to put my dirty clothes in there I either have to put his in there as well or just lift up the lid and let his clothes just fall on the floor (which I've started doing more and more often but it doesn't make a difference - they just stay on the floor for a week).

1. All our clean towels and bedclothes get stored in our airing cupboard where most of the shelves are above my head beyond my reach. I keep a little step ladder in there so I can put stuff on the higher shelves but this often goes walkabout. In these cases, I usually leave the clean towels/bedclothes on our bed until I locate the ladder to put them away. DH will go to bed early and, instead of putting the stuff away (as he's over a foot taller than me and can reach the shelves easily) will just move the stuff over to my side of the bed and go to bed. He does this with anything that might be left on the bed during the day (he always goes to bed first) e.g. it was DD2s birthday the other week and she opened her presents on our bed and left most of them there all day (as we went out for the day). Sure enough, when I went to bed they were all neatly moved over to my side of the bed and DH was snoring away on his side.

1. Our spare room is in desperate need of decorating. We haven't painted it once since we moved in 13 years ago. We bought new wardrobes for the room a couple of years ago so said to DH we need to paint the walls before putting the wardrobes up. I go to work for the day and come home to find DH has painted the wall BUT only the patch that will be covered by the wardrobes - the painting literally stops halfway down the wall. DH said he just wanted to get the wardrobes up and that he'd finish the painting at a later date - that was 2 years ago!

I could go on and on but i won't. I really am despairing, honestly. The sheer level of laziness is really starting to piss me off. I'm generally a pretty laid back, easy going sort but years of this shit and constantly living in a messy, dirty (as I can't get to any surfaces to actually clean them) house has turned my into a whinging, nagging harridan which I hate.

So make me feel better - tell me your stories of lazy fuckery.

Two Monday mornings of standing by the dryer waiting for his uniform and having to choose between a demerit for lateness or going to school in damp pants helped his memory.

Non-fatal, natural consequences are my favourite. It's not you punishing them, it's life.

I'd do a chore rota so everyone has to do the chore at some point and therefore appreciate how annoying it is so it's fair. I'd also simply stop cooking for them and make it your husband's problem so he stops being as lazy as them.

Going into his bedroom at 3AM and turning on the lights to wake him up and take out the trash bins to the curb

3am!! But you had to get up at 3am in order to do this (unless you get up then anyway?)

I don't understand why you were saying that the sanctions only work for a short time?

If they go back to not do anything then you start the sanctions again surely?

The only way your daughters will learn as if it hits them in their pockets or you don't give them lifts etc.

DH behaving as he is does not provide a good role model for your DCs. Its very disrespectful.

@EarringsandLipstick what a fantastic post. I'd love to hear more about you organise your rota. We struggle to get teens to do more than the minimum and I am planning a shake up after GCSEs.

Rubbish and dirty dishes would end up in the kids rooms for them to deal with. If no room to make dinner id refuse to make it and take myself out for food. If he moved toys to my side of the bed he get worn up by one being thrown at his head. I wouldn't be doing the washing for these girls. I helped my mum with washing at 13 so no reason they can't. DH dirty washing would end up on his pillow. Warn ur husband he has 2 weeks to get the bedroom painted or you will be using his Christmas/ birthday budget to pay for a painter and decorator. No way could I put up with this behaviour constantly.

Thanks for all the responses. I guess the problem I have is that I HATE nagging and always being THAT person. I'm actually quite a laid back person normally and I do have trouble getting my voice heard when I pull them up on their behaviour. It's not always been this bad but I guess it's been slowly building for a while and I've been too permissive and enabling their behaviors.

That's not too say I don't pull them up on their behaviour and I regularly 'lose my shit with them' - it's just not very effective.

I guess I just need to put my big girl pants on and work on being more assertive.

And, although DH is a lazy arse fucker, his good qualities do outweigh his bad. He does help out when asked - it just winds me up that he needs to be asked and reminded to do stuff that you'd think a normal bloke in his 40s would do automatically. He's not malicious, he's just thoughtless.

Calling you a nag is their way of stopping you asking.

Oh thanks! 💐

I don't think I've anything too exciting to suggest!

I'm a single parent, kids with me full time & we've had a hard time with their awful father. They do lots of sports necessitating my involvement 7 days a week, and multiple sports / training at a time.

So to a degree they have to pitch in!

But while they drive me demented (I've just ranted at DS2 about the smelly football gear he deposited right inside the hall door, despite being reminded, as he sat in his smelly kit watching TV!) they are pretty good at recognising they have responsibility.

Honestly I have been guilty of shouting & giving out - and some of that was my own stresses. We don't have a rota for each person but I keep track of the overall household jobs & asssign them as needed to an available child.

I try to play to their strengths a bit too! Youngest DC is great in the mornings, will make lunches, help with a wash etc. older 2 are grumpy then. Middle child will help if he thinks it'll make us quicker at getting to his sport so his jobs are pre-training / match.

They are probably overall good kids, but it's still startling how much dirt & crap can accumulate. With that in mind I try really hard to keep on top of what are my basics - bathrooms, laundry & floors as it reduces my own stress.

Nah it’s the same in our house 😞 I have to deal with DH and three boys - 2 are teens. I’ve given up trying to get real help. I just want little things done that prove they’re not complete animals. My wish list:

• use the bin. No the worktops aren’t the bin.
• toilet paper needs to be replaced when finished. I am not the loo roll fairy. Please do not howl ‘mum!! I need toilet roll!’ and expect me to fly in and deliver in lightening speed to save you. If it’s me sitting on the bog crying out for paper, I can guarantee no one will hear me as they are ‘too busy’
• again, there is no laundry fairy. Clothes can be worn more than once. Employ the sniff and look method before throwing essentially clean clothes in the laundry basket. I want to kill myself every Sunday afternoon when I survey the pile of ironing I have to get through. Whilst the four of you are gaming, tinkering in the garage, at the gym, playing football, I’m stuck ironing watching Midsomer Murders or teen mom uk - not cool.
• piss in the toilet bowl. Not on it, near it or across it. Thanks.
• when I leave things on the stairs, it means they need to go up. I especially get irritated when it’s your hairspray or shower gel. Not mine.
• speaking of shower gel - please place them in the bin when done instead of leaving me to shake random bottles of products littering your bathrooms. Again, I am not the empty shampoo/gel/hairspray fairy.
• and lastly, when I blow my fuse and refuse to do anything anymore, don’t sheepishly do all of the above for 24hrs and then promptly return to the status quo.

@Akiddleydiveytoo

I think you need a family meeting then. So that you can calmly tell them how you are feeling, what you need & your bottom line.

I get that you don't want to be giving out so you have to find a way to make it clear why this matters to you.

Correcting their shotty behaviour isn't nagging and even if it was, so what?

They obviously need it.

But you don't even need to do that.

Just stop paying for their phones. Ban the WiFi . Don't wash their clothes

No nagging required

He does help out when asked

Here is your problem. It is not helping out. It is called adulting.

Just stop paying for their phones. Ban the WiFi . Don't wash their clothes

See, I don't think this works or honestly is fair.

Teens need phones as much for us as them.

Not washing clothes leads to more chaos.

I tend to feel the way to approach it is modelling the behaviour & communicating why you need them to do certain things.

I mean, that's what I aspire to! Not necessarily achieve.

I suppose different families will respond differently. Mine tend to pull back more with 'punishments'

You’re going to have to get tough. As fuck. No more Mrs Nice Muggins.

@EarringsandLipstick

Except that approach isn't working, is it?

Those things aren't punishments. They're consequences.

Her eldest is very nearly an adult

I think the OP is too far down the road for this. As nice and measured as it sounds, it sounds easy to ignore. ‘Modelling the behaviour you want’ sounds like ‘do it all yourself and hope they follow suit.’ Can you really see that being successful?

They’re not going to give a shit.

@Akiddleydiveytoo

Channel Adrian Mole’s Mum!

SUNDAY MARCH 8TH
First in Lent
My mother has gone to a woman’s workshop on assertiveness training. Men aren’t allowed. I asked my father what ‘assertiveness training’ is. He said, ‘God knows, but whatever it is, it’s bad news for me.’ We had boil-in-the-bag cod in butter sauce and oven-cooked chips for Sunday dinner, followed by tinned peaches and Dream-topping. My father opened a bottle of white wine and let me have some. I don’t know much about wine but it seemed a pleasant enough vintage. We watched a film on television, then my mother came home and started bossing us around. She said, ‘The worm has turned,’ and ‘Things are going to be different around here,’ and things like that. Then she went into the kitchen and started making a chart dividing all the housework into three. I pointed out to her that I already had a paper round to do, an old age pensioner to look after and a dog to feed, as well as my school work, but she didn’t listen, she put the chart on the wall and said, ‘We start tomorrow.’

MONDAY MARCH 9TH Commonwealth Day
Cleaned toilet, washed basin and bath before doing my paper round. Came home, made breakfast, put washing in machine, went to school. Gave Barry Kent his menaces money, went to Bert Baxter’s, waited for social worker who didn’t come, had school dinner. Had Domestic Science – made apple crumble. Came home. Vacuumed hall, lounge and breakfast room. Peeled potatoes, chopped up cabbage, cut finger, rinsed blood off cabbage. Put chops under grill, looked in cookery book for a recipe for gravy. Made gravy. Strained lumps out with a colander. Set table, served dinner, washed up. Put burnt saucepans in to soak. Got washing out of machine; everything blue, including white underwear and handkerchiefs. Hung washing on clothes-horse. Fed dog. Ironed PE kit, cleaned shoes. Did homework. Took dog for a walk, had bath. Cleaned bath. Made three cups of tea. Washed cups up. Went to bed. Just my luck to have an assertive mother!

What about making their chore to do their own washing? It's no inconvenience to you if they don't do it and if they sweep up all their clean clothes into the wash it just makes more work for themselves.

I'd pay someone to finish painting the spare room. I'd go deaf too, every time the girls asked me for a lift somewhere I'd smile sweetly and point to dishes or recycling and not say a word or move a muscle to take them where they wanted to go until they'd done their chore. I'd give them an extra chore to do each as well. I might stop cooking for DH too unless he made more effort. If he kept putting stuff on my side of the bed I'd move into the newly painted spare room.

I have the same situation. Two teens who do nothing really. I have to beg them to tidy just so the cleaner can clean! Responsible for laundering their own clothes. My son just has a basket full of clean clothes mixed in with dirty cos he can't be arsed to put them away. He is 17 and I am just not doing it. I try to ignore it all and not get cross as I work full time and they are good kids otherwise. But it pisses me off. No one does anything properly except me. Don't have the energy for rules or charts. Tried all that before and I don't have the energy to police it.

@EarringsandLipstick that sounds like a good balance. I probably err too much on the side of trying to put it on a rota, and then it is a chore for me to make it stick.

I'm not sure WiFi would work for mine. It would turn into self hatred that they are such awful people for not doing what they're asked. They are basically good kids, just very easily overwhelmed (one autistic, one anxious) and it is just exhausting.

I honestly thought I had nailed it when they were about 5 and could work a sweeping brush 😆

Any way you could move out for a few weeks? Stay with a friend or rent a nice airbnb?

It might not change their ways but it would be nice for you to have a break from tripping over their mess.

I've adopted a saying my kids love, when they haven't done their chores and there are no clean clothes, or I can't cook a meal because there are no clean pans etc?

I ask if they did their chores so I could do mine.

No?

"Well then that sounds like a you problem"