AIBU or is my DD - bedroom privacy

[Settingstory]

I have 2 DD’s in their 20’s and I am very happy to have them still living at home while they save up for the future. I’m lucky we can afford to offer this to them, they don’t pay any rent with the intention they are saving this for their future. They both work full time.

Backstory is I was a single mum to them their whole childhood, just us 3 living together and when they became adults I met someone and we got married he’s a great supportive stepdad to my girls. He is also fine with the principal of them not paying rent as we are in a good position financially and times are tough out there.

The deal with no rent is they are expected to keep their own room clean and tidy and not make mess in the main house. The girls can eat any of the food in the house if they want to.

My oldest DD1 is neurodiverse (AuADHD) she makes no mess in the main house and she keeps her room fairly clean and tidy because ‘that was the deal’. She says she appreciates she has a very good deal and I don’t go into her room for any reason. She often buys her own food, she’s respectful and always asks politely to use the washing machine, things like that.

You can probably guess where this is going. My DD2 is the complete opposite and it’s causing arguments. I’ve tried giving her the benefit of the doubt but I think she is mostly just lazy.

Her room is awful and I am often having to go in there when she’s out to turn off all the lights/TV she leaves on (I’m paying the bills and these appliances get hot)

take the glasses and plates down (so many of them) and retrieve the 10 bath towels she has taken to use (and we have none clean left).

There is always a full up bin and rubbish/food all over the floor, and that’s if you can even get into the door from the 7 to 8 loads of laundry all over the place blocking the door.

She leaves her shoes all over the hallway, never loads the dishwasher after she cooks.

It’s all kicked off in a ridiculous way of DD2 yelling ‘respect my privacy’ (South Park style) when I’ve been in her room yet again to retrieve 12 glasses, 7 plates, 5 towels and turn the TV off.

I’m asking DD2 just to do these things herself, nothing more and we now have a standoff apparently where she says she doesn’t feel like her own person and I am helicopter parenting and she wants to install a lock! I’ve said absolutely no way she is having a lock on the door, the room is a fire hazard. She has even offered to pay rent just so I have ‘nothing to hold over her’.

I did explain I have better things to do in life than sort out another adults mess so if she could keep it tidy, I would have NO reason to go in there.

AIBU? I do go in her room even though she asks me not to! But I think I have good reason!

Funny how she didn't consider the option of moving out so that she could be her own person. This is what needs to happen.

She doesn't follow the easy rules she already has, she's not going to follow a rule to only use specific crockery etc. She just won't.

Was she like this as a child?

Chaos and messiness can be a sign of ADHD and if that is the case, it really is extremely difficult to stay tidy. You don’t see the mess because your head is full of other things - often unbidden. There’s time blindness, which means leaving the house and transitioning between activities is often done in a hurry. And that does not leave time to put away breakfast things/ hang up the coat you‘ve knocked on the floor (clumsiness can be another ADHD trait). And, at some point you become so overwhelmed by the tidy up, you just freeze. While feeling shame that ‘everyone else can do it, so why can’t I’. Possibly also imagined or real comparison to a tidy sibling who becomes ‘the good one’, meaning you’re the bad one.

If there is ADHD going on, it’s really not as simple as just taking plates out. I actually don’t have a diagnosis but benefit a lot from ADHD advice. If life is going well, I can use lots and lots of structural strategies to stay tidy. But if routine changes, I’m stressed or tired, then it all goes to pot. And everyday life is exhausting if your brain is not standard issue - ND often has a component of sensory overwhelm you have to deal with.

I’d start with one non-negotiable, like not eating in her room. I’d also get her to research her brain - the websites A Slob Comes Clean and UnF*ck your Habitat are great places to start. Both also have books and the first has a free podcast series. UFYH focuses on getting started rather than perfection, and gets you to take before and during photos to see your progress in tidying.

Let her try out strategies for just one thing - maybe getting her laundry in the basket. Frame it like an experiment. Where does the laundry basket need to be for it to work? I had success with a soft bin in my wardrobe. Now in the bathroom. My childhood home involved walking through the entire house from bedroom/ bathroom, to where the washer was at the back of the very long bungalow. That wasn’t going to happen.

Good luck, all of you!

Explain to her that it’s nothing to do with rent. The way she lives is having an impact on everyone else so if she can’t sort it out then she needs to go pay rent elsewhere. She’ll soon find out that even in a house share she’ll have people complaining if she does the same.

I was prepared to come down slightly on your DDs side as I had a mum who used any excuse and just would not stay out of my personal space when I was in my late teens,

However, your daughter's behaviour is affecting the rest of the family if she's hogging towels, cutlery and crockery etc and leaving electrics on unnecessarily.

I would sit her down and make this point abundantly clear.

Any shared resources - towels, crockery, glasses etc must be dealt with appropriately

Electrics must me switched off when not in use

Any food waste must be dealt with as risk of encouraging flies or worse if you live in an older house

Based on your last post, I'd be encouraging her to seek help for her mental health, because that level of self-neglect is not normal (I say that as a woman with late diagnosed ADHD).

The arrogance of this! In the home you bought and paid for.

If there's no amount if rent that would make you comfortable with being her maid ( which wouldn't solve the "privacy" issue) I think she is leaving you no choice but to ask her to move out. She will become someone else's nightmare flatmate.

It does absolutely scream ADHD to be honest. And I’m not someone who is forever diagnosing people on here - plus it’s hereditary and her sister has it.

But people with ADHD (like me) can learn to cope in the real world with things like tidying etc - they need support from family to learn strategies to cope, just like I’m sure your DD1 has had.

”She’s always been lazy” is the kind of damaging narrative that leads people with ADHD to be very defensive like your DD2.

Hopefully you can have a constructive chat with her and find a way to move forward.

All that said, if she wants to be and adult and you have no “hold over her” then she does need to move out to her own place. She can’t be in your house hoarding plates in her room and leaving electronics on. It might give her the incentive she needs to sort herself out. I’m just reluctant to suggest it because it sounds like she’s been lacking in support growing up, and that dd1 might have been something of a golden child in your eyes.

This. Tell her to move out after the New Year.

I think your daughter needs a big, fat, healthy dose of living in the real world!!!! Tell her the arrangement's not working, and could she please look for somewhere else to live within x months.

Do not let her pay rent.

*alternatively, this daughter could be on some sort of spectrum or have ADD or whatever, too?

This is a really lovely, compassionate take. I once lived at home with my sibling (both of us are ND, my autism, their ADHD) which meant we had very different styles and abilities towards housekeeping. The problems were very much solved by there being a ‘baseline’ of chores agreed - laundry in baskets so anyone could put a load on, dishes in dishwasher.

i think those who would kick DD2 out are being a little unreasonable. There seems to be an assumption that once one turns 18 you are automatically An Adult with adult sensibilities and logic, and that just isn’t the case!

Blimey, our DDs could be sisters! Mine are also early 20s and DD1 is clean, tidy and thoughtful. Literally everything you've said about your DD2 - lazy, messy, room full of cutlery/drinks/wet towels, dirty bed sheets, period stained mattress etc matches my DD2. I do t understand how they can be so different (no ND in evidence here).

I would leave her to it and at that age yes I would respect her privacy no matter how bad you think it might get in there. I’d say turning things off is a non negotiable and you’ll go in there to do that if she doesn’t, but she can have as many dirty plates/sheets/clothes/binbags as she likes. Turning things off is a bit of a safety issue and if she realises that’s the extent of you going in, she might start to do it herself.

I think the fact she feels as though she’d be doing it for you, not for herself, because you’ve asked her to, is a major demotivator, and perhaps the main reason she’s not doing it. If you need more towels and plates etc, buy more; this will be a fairly short term situation. It must be very stressful for her living like that but she needs to start to take responsibility for herself and when she begins to do more for herself (because there will come a point when she will have to), she’ll feel a lot better. I would also only praise what she manages to do, no criticism or pointed comments.

She wants to pay you for the right to live like a pig in your home? Dim ffiars!

She should pay to live like a pig in her own place.

Sounds like ADHD. Give her some clear short deadlines. For example, all plates glasses down and in the dishwasher by 9 pm (Or whatever time works for you). Reminder at 8 pm. (ignore her moans about being nagged) Get her to stick a note on her door (her side) or wherever she will see it 'Switch off appliances'. You could limit her to one towel. Hers, let it get vile if necessary then swap. Or tell her she dries and dresses in the bathroom. Could her sister her help her tidy? If she is AuADHD she'll probably be away of body doubling and can help her. I very much doubt your daughter is enjoying living in the mess.

Sorry for the accidental quote up there!

How about she pays for a cleaner to clean her room and clean up the mess in the house.

Charge her rent in the first instance

Yep.

Sit her down and have a proper adult conversation.
I agree you shouldn’t be going in to her room but that means she turns lights and TV off when she’s not there.
The plates and glasses I would say she needs to bring them down once a day or she’s going to have to buy her own and not use the house ones anymore.
Same with towels, give her two of her own in a different colour to all the rest and she’s responsible for washing them, she’s not allowed to use the house ones. Laundry of her own clothes, leave her to it and she’ll wash stuff when she runs out.
Kitchen ground rules, everyone is expected to clean up after themselves, I would actually bring in a kitchen rota of making family meals and cleaning up.
Give her a probation period of 3 months, if she cannot stick to your house rules she needs to move out. She’ll soon learn how much housemates would be willing to tolerate in a shared house!

She needs to move out - at least for a few months. She'll either love living away from home, or realise she had it good at home and want to move back (when you can sledgehammer the rules home).

You're enabling her right now and she won't change if nothing in her situation changes. Yes house deposits are great to have but they're a luxury. Essential life skills of cleaning your space and respecting other people's are more important. She won't learn those at home.

She’s had so much help with this 😭 I am at a loss if this is ND, I honestly think it’s now just being really stubborn and not wanting me to be right about something or do it for me. I’ve tried all the compassionate and understanding methods but now this is a real issue between us.

I have bought extra everything’s, and she still uses it all.

She really is such a sweet lovely person this is just like a secret grossness habit. The stuff just doesn’t bother her

So are you going to start moving her out?