The Bree van der Kamp effect: why are tidy women considered deranged?

[Caligula]

This is the title of the discussion Woman's Hour are going to have tomorrow and it made me LOL. So I thought I'd tell you lot about it in case anyone wants to find out a) why they're deranged or b) why they're justified in being a slob.

Radio 4, 10AM Thursday.

am fairly deranged with occasional slob tendencies

Am a totally deranged slob. Trying to be Bree. Got the derangement bit, just not the tidyness.

Can this apply to men too????? Dp is def OTT tidy and deranged enough to have stayed with me for 11 yrs . Im have definite slob tendencies but of course am not dernged at all honest!! [innocent face emoticon]

Well I'm sane then

Because they are. You have to be to be that tidy (Runs away at 180mph)

dh has DEFINITE bree tendencies

Phew Glad its not jsut me taht has a partner like that

he is almost obsessive

ooh i'll be listening to that I think.
I am very untidy and am quite deranged too.

Dp is a bit obsessive too Enid. He hates leaving the house before its tidy!!! And he was moaning about dss the other day cos he took a cd out of the cd player and didnt put it into its case Horror of Horror.

Really should not complain tho as I come home to a tidy house every evening with dinner either cooked or preped ready for cooking and he insists on washing up after so dd and I can have some time together.

Funny I just passed through the sitting room and Houses Behaving Badly cane on and said to dp aggh well that's enought to send me back to work because the woman on there drives me nuts, i think she is mad..soo enthusiastic about dust and damp cloths, she is possessed..I can't imagine her ever talking about anything else..she has a definite glint of other world alien about her

My problem is I HAVE to be Bree-tidy or else I FEEL stressed and deranged.

The tidiness keeps the derangement at bay.

I am desperate to be BREE like but Im just not and its not fair

Im desperate to be tidy but am just not naturally tidy and that makes me deranged

ithink i am basically Bree type- but try hard to fight it, for the sanity of dh and family.I am one of those women who does an entire spring clean before going on holiday. It would be devestating for me to come home to a messy house.
Have had to learn to live with mess, but not dirt.
Don't often put Dh's handcuffs in the dishwasher these days either

theres always something better to do than tidy up

I want Enid's husband - he sounds perfect for me.

Enid, you can have mine. He's crap at clearing up and tidying.

Mind you - since you are 'fairly deranged' you're probably not keen to part with your dh...

This is probably a stupid question but...

Who is Bree van der Kamp?????

My sister has always been very very tidy. When we were still living at home and had to share a room (grrrr), I found it hellish because I'm the opposite to her.

Aged 6, she would save all carrier bags and sweet packets, fold them neatly and store them in shoe boxes, precisely lined up under her bed.

Her house was/is always pretty immaculate, even when her twins were tiny.

My dh pokes fun at me because wherever I sit/sleep, I gradually surround myself with a "nest" of books, newspapers, magazines and notebooks. I'm not good at tidy, but I have learn to try to keep the mess that 2 toddlers make under some sort of control for all our sakes!

I did a stupid "Which one are you" quiz on the dh website and it said I was Lynette - but secretly I know I skewed my answers away from the horrible truth that I am Bree....

It's on now - just bumping it. Mad women on R4

career housewives?

I'm listening

polite laughter at the deathbed comment!

one woman said something like 'people who live in cluttered houses always say how lovely my house is' and then in the next breath admitted she would sometimes take a coffee cup away before it was finished just in case it was knocked over and she then had to clean it up! Madness! (unless it was 2 different women saying these things, may have been, was only half listening)