To make my 23 year old daughter tidy her room?

[Lola4545]

My daughter’s room is a pigsty. She has a lovely big room with an en suite bathroom. We moved in 2 years ago to the house which was a new build. After the pigsty she would leave her room in previously, she convinced my husband and I that she would appreciate the fact the house was brand new and she was excited to have her own bathroom. More fool us. My son is 18, has a smaller bedroom which is immaculate. The en suite is technically a Jack and Jill bathroom so although he could use my daughter’s bathroom, he doesn’t. He’s happy to use the main bathroom. Now, my daughter’s en suite is disgusting. Used shampoo and shower gel bottles all in the shower which has black grimy and slimy filth in the corners of the standing tray. Her bedroom is also terrible. She has takeaway boxes hidden in her wardrobe, plates under her bed, cups going mouldy. We’ve said no eating in the bedroom but she’s sneaking stuff up there when we’re not in. I’m now thinking of stopping her boyfriend coming over until everywhere is tidy and letting my son use the en suite instead. Is this fair do you think? Or should she have her own bathroom? Or should I just not go into her room and let her live in filth if she wants to? I’m so upset over this and would appreciate advice. I know I’ve probably been to soft on her and I’m mad at myself for this.

You are being far too soft I would switch their rooms and let your son have the bigger room. When I was at home any points I wasn’t in education, straight after school/once uni was completed, I paid my parents rent. Shes 23 working in a part time job living rent free!! What a cushy number she’s got. How is she ever going to learnt to be an adult? At 23 I bought my first flat. I get that everyone goes at a different pace but if by 23 she can’t look after a room and bathroom or manage her money to pay bills what will honestly become of her? Is she planning to stay there her whole life?

Agree. It sounds like a failure to launch. Surely, working full-time and respecting your home is the least she should be doing.

To clarify, OP, I don’t think it is punitive to say that DD must either clean or pay for cleaning as a condition of staying in your home. That’s a basic principle of family life.

Could she have ADHD?

At your DD's age, I was married with a mortgage (and I'm still under 30 so it wasn't the Victorian times). Most of my friends at the same age were either renting with partners or living at home saving like mad to buy their own place (which they have now achieved) on top of paying rent to their parents. I can't imagine what my mother would have said if I'd been working part-time and living like a slobby teen.

Edited to add that my DH has (diagnosed!) ADHD but has a full time job and manages to keep the house in livable condition.

Maybe you ought to show her this thread and tell her that she either clears up or she clears off.

I'd leave non-offensive mess, eg clothes on the floor alone. but she must make it hygenic/sanitary so no rotting food, bathroom cleaned twice a month. If she can't manage that, then give the bathroom to her brother!

Sorry OP but as parents you are failing her with your enabling and permissivness.

It's past time for tough love.

1. She absolutely blitzes her room NOW. No ifs or buts. She does it or she leaves. She can go live with her bf or present herself as homeless to the Council.
2. She maintains the standard and you inspect weekly, or she leaves.
3. She has 3 months to get a full time job and she pays 1/3 of her net wage to you for keep starting NOW. If she doesn't she leaves.

You MUST tackle this for her own sake. You won't be around all her life and she is acting like a toddler. She will not last long in the world without you unless you change things.

Why should her son get the smaller room when he is tidy?
i’d arrange an immediate swap and tell her you’ve been working out the household budget for 2024 and she needs to pay rent from now on (nothing to do with the messiness but she needs motivation to work full time).

I have a son that age although he's moved out of home. He was extremely messy in his teens but now he is tidier than me! We're all different, but the level of untidiness you mention isn't acceptable from someone of her age. Putting stuff in the bin and taking down things from the kitchen is something that I nag my 15 year old about but at 23 it's a different story. She can only do that, if she pleases, in her own house. Not yours. It's not a hard thing to do, and if she wants to live there and have her boyfriend round then it should be non-negotiable.

Doesn’t pay rent and only works part time despite having dropped out of uni? No offence, OP, but you’re far too soft on her. I’d give her an ultimatum. Either she cleans regularly and to your standards and starts paying rent or she moves out. As a pp said, my parents always said learning or earning, no other choice. Think I’d be telling her your ds can have the bigger room.

A friend of mine gave her grown up child the same choice re cleaning, after finding maggots on discarded dirty plates under the bed. Child (well over 18) moved out rather than clean. Made no sense to me. 🤷‍♀️

At the risk of being accused of wafty, permissive, over-liberal parenting, and having read your update op, in which you say she struggles overall with motivation, I would say that her room is an outward reflection of her inner struggles.

Why did she drop out of uni?

And why is she falling out with people left, right and centre?

Why is she only able to work pt at 23 years?

I would want to investigate those issues alongside her with the help of a licensed psychologist.

Of course she could just be massively lazy and entitled and spoiled, or she could be suffering from some form of depression or executive malfunction or both.

Sorry if I have missed this but when you say her bf comes over, does he stay overnight in her room? I’m quite surprised that she isn’t too ashamed of the state of it to invite him over!

Personally I would try my hardest to come to some sort of compromise. I know you have already tried this but she is obviously demand avoidant for some reason.

Treat it like we are all adults in this together sharing a space rather than from the top down. I know this is hard when she acts so defensively. That indicates to me though that she is massively ashamed with herself that she can’t keep on top of it. Instead of demanding, try and ask what specifically is stopping her from doing it? Listen to her. Ask her if there is anything you can do to help? (I know you shouldn’t have to when she’s 23 years old but you have to deal with reality.)

Maybe suggest she listens to TOMM guided cleans or you sit in her room and body double while she does it. Or suggest you help her get it back on track with the help of an App and then come up with a maintenance plan.

I know lots of people on here will howl in despair and say that this is infantilising her but I am an adult who has difficulties keeping on top of cleaning (not to an unhygienic level but to a cluttery level) and I know quite a few adults the same and coming down hard on them just doesn’t work, nor does it work for me.

I would definitely insist on her taking out old food, takeaway containers and old mugs of coffee etc or else you will have some sort of insect or vermin problem. If she doesn’t comply then you have the right to go in there and do it yourself.

I think I would probably insist on taking a day’s salary from her too and putting part or all of it towards the cost of a cleaner or at least cleaning materials. Then she will be more invested in keeping it clean.

I would swap the rooms asap. It would be quite a message to give her younger brother her ‘better’ room. And then she obeys ground rules with the shared bathroom.

For her sake too, you need to get tough.

@Centwafer thank you for your advice.

She dropped out of uni as she couldn’t keep up with the work. She struggled all through school with this but was bright enough to pass everything without revising. In terms of relationships, she has such high expectations of people and very low tolerance (which is surprising!). She gets obsessive with things which I think puts people off her. She once went on a night away with some old school friends who contacted her out of the blue. She had a lovely time and they all said they’d like to do it again so she spent that next week sending them links to places to stay and trying to get them all to commit to going away again the next weekend. I told her to calm it down and tried to explain that she would get an opportunity to go away with them in the future but not necessarily the next weekend. She was behaving almost erratically about it and ringing and texting them. These girls have never contacted her since. She couldn’t understand it because in her mind, they said “let’s do it again” so she didn’t think she was doing anything wrong by trying to arrange another night out for the next weekend. Friends she has fallen out with all seem to tell her the same thing that she needs to ‘chill out’ and stop getting wound up. I think they find it exhausting.

When she talks about getting a full time job she starts to worry about the people there. She definitely has a problem with authority and in her eyes ‘being told what to do’. I must admit, I worry about how she would form new relationships with work colleagues. Her part time job is working with a family member so she is comfortable but when the family member has employed other staff during busy periods, my daughter always seems to have a problem with them. She takes things the wrong way all the time and will say things like ‘it was the way they said it, I could tell they were being funny’ stuff like that. I try but there’s no reasoning with her. She’s black and white in that sense.

What’s TOMM guided cleans?

She sounds like she's on the autism spectrum. That doesn't mean she can't learn how to function in the world but she will need crystal clear boundaries and lots of coaching from you.

OP, I think this last update does point even more to the need for a psychological assessment.

What is it with all these 20-somethings still living with their parents on Mumsnet? All the young adults I know IRL would be mortified to be living with mummy and daddy. Even the ones still at university only seem to go to their parents for fleeting visits.

23? That's completely unacceptable behaviour from someone her age.

She would not do that in rented accommodation as they have regular inspections and she would be booted out.

Personally I think she needs to stand in her own two feet and I would ask her to leave.

I certainly wouldn't be letting her have any friends or her boyfriend over.

I agree. Your son sounds like he is more deserving of it. I'd feel pretty rubbish if I had a sibling with a bigger en suite room but didn't look after it when I had a small room.

She does need to learn. I was actually a bit similar to how you describe your daughter in the latest update, but I learnt. And I chilled out. I took thinks a bit too literally or was over eager or hung on every word someone said.

I struggled. I would say I was high functioning though.
I took my job seriously. Maybe too seriously which had a similar effect.

And the only way I learnt to adapt and chill out...... by being put in positions that forced me to adapt and learn. Wasn't easy but it came with time and life experience by being in new situations and having new experiences. Some things dawn on you and the penny drops, whereas if someone was forcing the same information onto you, you'd resist it.
Do think a tough love approach may be the best.

Without wanting to derail the thread, it's very hard in certain areas of the country for single 20-somethings on a standard wage to be able to move out. Just look at house prices vs wages in the last 30 years, and renting is practically the same price as a mortgage payment.

I would definitely insist on her taking out old food, takeaway containers and old mugs of coffee etc or else you will have some sort of insect or vermin problem. If she doesn’t comply then you have the right to go in there and do it yourself.

Hahahahahahah. Utter shit. "If you don't clean up after yourself, I'll, I'll, I'll, oooh I'll do it for you"

How about she does it without question?

My friend had a similar issue. Single parent of a 22 year old. To be fair, she was working full time though - I'd expect it at that age without a good reason to not be working. And she did pay rent although well below "market". But yes, she was a slob!!! He told her repeatedly, it made no difference so he raised her rent to pay for services and cleaning. She had a tantrum and said she was moving out. He told her fine and he expected her gone within 8 weeks...

It's a year later. She's still there. She pays more rent but still not "market price". And she cleans up! There's nothing more sobering than searching the "to let" pages....

with a Jack and Jill it's accessible from both rooms? so lock the door from hers, give it a clean and let your DS have it.

DD can use your bathroom but she has to clean it after use. If not she can move out and into a house share.

Or - switch DD and DS rooms, and block the J&J bathroom from her room and same applies as above.

No need for the cynical ha ha ha - ing.

The op’s daughter is NOT currently carrying this stuff out so if she doesn’t want vermin the op has to do it atm.

That doesn’t mean she will be doing it forever. That’s why this thread exists. To find solutions - which incidentally may not work overnight.

It wasn't cynical, it was sarcastic.

A solution would be in this instance to stop her eating in her room, not for the OP to do even more enabling.

Op it’s already been said but the difficulty with communication and the b&w thinking point to ASD. I would definitely support her to seek assessment.

Quite a few women with ASD also have ADHD which generally comes with executive function issues. A classic profile of ADHD is highly intelligent but fails to fulfil academic potential at school.

She still needs to learn to look after herself but Draconian measures are not going to work. She needs structure and different strategies. I would be seeking a therapist who specialises in ND.

TOMM is the organised mum method by Gemma Bray, at least I think that is her name.

She has a Patreon page, where, for a modest fee, you can access podcasts that you plug in to and they guide you as they clean. There are all sorts for bedroom, bathroom, quick resets, decluttering etc. I find them really helpful.