Not a cleaner but not a housekeeper either …

[Chipsriceandgravy]

Does anyone have a person like this to help them around the house?

We are DROWNING. Drowning.

I need someone to come and help me for a few hours every week. Basically be the me that I should be. A bit of laundry, ironing, sorting out. I really am not sure yet specifically.

It’s definitely not a cleaner that we need because that would imply that the house was kept tidy enough for this person to come in and clean. I need ongoing, regular assistance rather than someone to come and shine the sinks and floors once a week.

Please tell me about the help that you have that isn’t just your average cleaner.

I just outsourced laundry. They wash, dry, fold. Amazing. I hold back dh socks, undies, shirts. And any sweaters to try to reduce cost.

@EmmaH2022 I guess a professional organiser is worth it if you need a short sharp shock kind of organiser, but I need someone who puts socks in drawers, folds stuff up, or irons it/ puts it on a hanger on a weekly basis. As I told our cleaner, I (and dh who actually pays her and increased her hours the other week as he really liked having ironed shirts etc and she didn't always have time) just don't want to have to think about the housework any more than I have to. That frees up my/our energy for the other stuff

Oh that’s kind of what I need
just for a couple if weeks maybe

I suspect the £50 an hour type comes preloaded with inspirational crap.

this thread has incentivised me though. I’ve done a load today and I have hardly posted on here 😂

My cleaner told me she'd had to think of an excuse why she stopped working at a friend of mine. She couldn't do what she'd been asked to do in the time she'd been asked to do it. And my god - this lady works hard- if she couldn't do it - then no one can.
So instead of saying that she couldn't manage it all- she decided to quit.
I told her that sometimes we (the employer ) would like some guidance in what is possible.

So make a list of what you want done. And then see what the fairy godmother can manage and take it from there. You want someone to stay. You won't want to be finding some one new every couple of months!

It’s area dependent. I’m in London and the going rate for a cleaner, without the home help bit, is £25 per hour in my area.

You need a organiser and declutteria , this is what I do for a job, my business partner and I go in and get a home sorted and organised , we clean at the same time as we organise. When we have finished a home then most of our clients then get in cleaners for a few hours each week to keep it up. Sometimes people just get In such a pickle they really don’t know how to get out of it and they need help.

It sounds very dated now but these people are called a mothers help. Whether you can find one or not is another matter.

Sorry used to be called a mothers help

I don’t think I personally need someone as formal as an organiser or a decluttering person. We almost certainly need regular and ongoing help. I know if I paid a decluttering person to come it would just end up back in the same state within a few weeks.

For others though I’m sure it’s the perfect solution if they just need a fresh start.

I feel like I’m admitting to being really lazy by needing help to do the absolute basics but if it makes our lives easier?

I basically do this for friends of mine. They work full time & three days a week, and have a 6 year old and 2 year old who's in childcare on the three days mum works, neither of whom sleep well. Plus a house that is both too small and too cluttered, without enough storage space, so stuff is everywhere and half of it doesn't have a home or clothes are stacked up in Ikea bags because all the wardrobes and drawers are full to bursting.

I visit one evening a week after school and on Saturdays, and just get stuck in doing things like attacking the kitchen which is usually pretty overwhelmed with washing up and food waste since that's bottom of the priority list, making meal preparation more difficult till it's sorted out. I'll cook a meal which we'll then all eat. Taking bins and recycling out, collecting worn kids clothes that typically get left everywhere and putting in the laundry, tidying the toys that get strewn even more across the place at least into one area so sofas can be sat on and the table used and the floor is less of a hazard. Collecting together important paperwork and school forms and things before they disappear under sofas or get lost somewhere else. Just trying to make the house more livable in, and being an extra pair of hands. Sometimes I can put out laundry to dry if that's been started, or I'll clear airers and fold things up - the drawers are all too full to properly put clothes away, but it's a start.

On some days I end up doing stuff with the kids most of the time instead, and that then gives the parents a bit of time to either do jobs or chill for a bit.

@givemushypeasachance that’s really helpful and sounds similar to what we need. I have ADHD and it does look like laziness so a lot of the things most people do daily I don’t. For example I’ll realise all of a sudden that I haven’t done any washing for three days which is obviously problematic or that the washing in the machine has been in there wet for three days. I am untidy and even if we decluttered to the absolute bare minimum I struggle to put things away do it would still be messy anyway! I really feel I shouldn’t be paying someone to do this for me but people pay for meal services etc so it’s not really that different is it? What you do sounds absolutely perfect to me!!

@Chipsriceandgravy - yes I wouldn't be surprised if my friends, at least one of them, had undiagnosed ADHD. She wasn't the tidiest of people when I lived with her at uni! Very organised with some things, like she kept all her paperwork more sorted than I did. But clothes would just be everywhere.

It's a compounding set of problems in some areas. Say the kitchen - it's small, so very limited surface space. Once dirty plates and saucepans are in the sink, nothing can be washed up till that is taken out, and if they then run out of surface space, it makes it more difficult, and then the drainer needs to be emptied first. And they don't like washing up after the toddler goes to bed as noisy clanking pipes and plates and pots bashing together might wake him up, his bedroom is above the kitchen. But finding time to wash up when a toddler is awake is a challenge too! And food waste will be full up and need emptying, but that's out the front door and they don't want to go out there when the toddler is asleep for the same waking up reason... All means it just gets left and then piles up more. See also: no space to put clothes away in drawers, so they get piled on the sofa, then get mixed up with dirty clothes again, washed, sit on airer as nowhere to go, repeat.

I can't solve those underlying problems but I can do a bit to make the place more liveable day-to-day. Hopefully you can find someone willing to do it for a part-time job rather than whatever my weird family friend/aunt/housekeeper situation has become!

You need a cleaner but one who is flexible and happy to take on any task.
You also need one who cleans to the level you would rather than focusing on unrealistic things.
Our house needs three hours to do a standard clean, so the cleaner comes for five hours. With the extra hours she folds all the clothes, changes the beds and then does a different big task each week (cleans out fridge, or kitchen cupboards.)
What you also need to evaluate is where someone else can do the tasks at the same speed as you (e.g. folding clothes) and where they are much slower (e.g. tidying toys). Outsource the same speed ones.
I have fallen off the wagon recently but for a while I was decluttering a different very tiny space each evening, or setting a timer for ten minutes of decluttering each evening. It seems like it won’t make a difference but it’s much more than doing nothing.

I had a cleaner who tidied. She also did laundry, would pop out to the shop to replace items we were rubbing low on, then ended up walking the dog too.
I miss her so much.

Advertise for a cleaner and explain that you need someone to do additional activities. At the end of the day, a self-employed cleaner can take on whatever job they want so might be happy to do other tasks, and charge accordingly.

A job like that might suit a school mum who has a few hours free in the morning?

I have a cleaner (word of mouth from a previous cleaner, 15 years ago) who over the years has expanded to do laundry (including changing beds, putting it away, putting a wash on), fridge sorting and cleaning, freezer defrosting, window cleaning (inside), recycling, sorting through clothes with the kids to see what’s too small, taking things to the charity shop, after school and holiday childcare, babysitting, taking kids to activities on public transport or just to the park, doing craft activities with them, cooking tea for the kids, helping out at birthday parties, being in the house for the online shop delivery and putting it all away and probably a load more I haven’t remembered!

I paid her right through the pandemic when she couldn’t come to our house, and make sure I always am flexible about when she is here (apart from childcare) and sensitive to her personal needs (eg last minute time off for an urgent appointment). And I’ve given her advice on careers, finances etc over the years as she’s not British so she sometimes asks for help with stuff like that. In return, she is our house fairy who puts everything in the right place and makes things sparkle. She’s here twice a week now the DC are older, it was more before, but I find a day of cleaning and a day of other bits works well for us - and I let her decide how to use the time, and how much she needs.

I’d suggest making a list (maybe start with the things in my first paragraph, then add to it) and see if you can find someone who’s up for doing that. Then have a six week trial period, and see how you go.

You had me at wrapped Christmas presents.

I would definitely pay for this service.

I did this for a woman with 4 feral kids & a dick DH, donkey years ago. She was literally drowning in overwhelm.

Ironically, I'm crap at housework but was good at going round to a strange place & getting stuck in. She got a bit freaked that I got stuff done tho. But it's way easier as you're not emotionally attached to the crap & don't have to manage the DH.

I loved it as a job, way better than the things I'm actually qualified to do. 😁

Following! I need this

On the strength of this thread - and reaching a point this week where the domestic chaos made me completely lose my shit - I’ve hired a cleaner to come twice a week, who is also willing to do laundry and tidying.