How do Mums cope with cleaning the house with two young children?! I feel so deflated and exhausted.

[Biosblbay]

So I am currently on maternity leave but I go back to work full time mid March and I am freaking out! I don’t even have time to get house work done being off work, let alone being at work!
I have a 3 year old and a 7 month old. My typical day is wake up which is usually 6:30am, get my 3 year old ready for school and do breakfast, feed baby, do lunch for my 3 year old, feed the dogs, then my husband takes him school at 8:30 before he starts work. By this time the kitchen is a mess, living room is a mess, beds to be made, bottles to wash, dishwasher to unload, laundry to be done, by the time I have done these basics my baby would have woken up from her first morning nap and she would then need a nappy change, entertaining and feeding and then keeping her upright for half hour to let her food go down, then she would be ready for another nap at around 1pm. During her second nap I get about an hour to do something which is usually doing my lunch which then results in a messy kitchen again, I then get about half hour after lunch to do something else before she wakes up, but there’s honestly 101 things to be done, this even includes deciding if I can have a shower and wash my hair!. Then I have to collect my son between 3 and 3:30, which then I have 2 children to feed, bath every other day, kitchen is a mess again after doing dinner, bedtime routine. My son goes to bed at 6:30/7pm most nights but my baby would have a late afternoon nap and then be up from about 6 until 9pm, so I don’t even get evenings to do much (my husband works long hours so doesn’t usually get home until 8pm on average and travels a lot for work too) so a lot of evenings I tend to do most of it myself including dinner for me and my husband. But come 9pm when both kids are asleep I am too exhausted to do anything!

HOW on earth do I find the time to clean the bathroom, polish, Hoover, mop floors (I have dogs so it gets dirty quick!), look after myself when I go back to work?! I just don’t understand how people do it. I hate the idea of using every weekend to clean the house and get on top of everything. That to me is family time and we do go out a lot on weekends with the kids or we see family, we always have plans.

I know I could get a cleaner but I couldn’t afford one every day, maybe only once every 2 weeks. I seem to just have the time to do the living room and kitchen and I don’t get time to do any of the other rooms. I am struggling for sure. I sometimes get so overwhelmed with the amount I need to do that I end up staring into space for about 15 minutes stressing about what to do first and where to start!

I would love to know how mums cope with cleaning, especially full time working mums, it baffles me and I feel stressed thinking about it. The closer I am getting to starting work the more stressed I am feeling

There is probably a really simple answer here and It probably doesn’t help that my house is currently a mess due to moving all the bedroom around and a lot of stuff still only half done, but I just feel that a little tidy house is a tidy mind and having a tidy and clean home really does make a huge difference but I just can’t seem to get on top of it ever!!!

would love some tips, ideas, to know other people might be going through the same, how to cope etc…. Hoping for mostly positivity and no nasty responses from people 🩷 thank you x

Well for me "cleaning the bathroom" (with products and a cloth) involves:

Cleaning the toilet inside and out. Basically every inch of it.
Wiping the sink and taps. Scrubbing any marks round the plughole where scummy bits tend to be.
Wiping the windowsill.
Cleaning toothpaste marks off where the electric toothbrushes sit.
Wiping a tiered shelf unit we have and a fake plant that sits on it which gets dusty.
Wiping the heated towel rail.
Cleaning the shower tray including plughole as per the sink, spraying mildew cleaner on the tiles, cleaning the shower bits, what are they called, the actual silver metal parts you turn for the water and shower head.
Cleaning the shower screen and surround.
Hoovering the floor
Mopping the floor.

Oh and if it's one of the bathrooms the kids use I also clean their step stool, toilet insert thing and potty with antibacterial spray.

I'm further down the line than you as my DC are 8 years and 4 years now so been juggling work /kids /cleaning for a while. I work 30 hours a week so basically full time. One in school and one nursery.

My top tips are:

1. Declutter and give everything a home. It's short term pain but long term gain. Everything having a home means its quick and easy to tidy up before getting to the clean stage. I rotate what I declutter now with different rooms or categories a month but to begin with it was a few weeks of hell before going back to work (after the last maternity leave). Definitely made my life easier long term.
2. Do a tidy every night. Everything goes back. I don't necessarily clean in the week but I do tidy every night. Dishwasher and washing machine or tumble dryer goes on. Toys away. Shoes and coats back where they belong. Its only like half hour max before I go to bed but if you do it every night it doesn't build up. Clean obvious things that need it straight away (dirt, food marks etc).
3. I do sacrifice a few hours each weekend to clean. Upstairs one weekend, downstairs the other weekend. If everything is tidy and has a home from the above tips, its 100 time quicker to get done. I can do it in an hour if I'm not interrupted by the kids. A few times a year I do a full massive deep clean (moving furniture, in cupboards etc) usually when the kids are aware with my parents.
4. Lower standards. Ignore what social media and friends portray about having a constant clean home. 100% not the truth. I've learnt over the years people clean when they expect company or are putting things on social media. I keep downstairs generally acceptable but upstairs (esp our ensuite) sometimes get a bit grubby if I don't have time. Who cares if there is a bit of limescale or smeared windows in a room only I use, as long as its cleaned when it needs to be to be hygienic. Our office sometimes looks like a dumping ground for weeks on end (its my 'it doesn't have a home' dumping ground or storage area for selling things) until someone comes to visit or stay.

I've been on countdown until I can get a cleaner.....we can afford it when DC4 is at school in Sept. That I am hoping will make my life less busy. But for now its for sure a juggling act that some months works and some months just doesn't.

Of course you can!

at least in a standard 3 bed semi you can

7 minutes for each because I do wash the bathroom floor and usually there late a few bits of stuff to dump somewhere before I can vacuum

at least 1 minute is wandering around gathering a few cloths, and stuffing them in the washing machine , replacing loo roll

what the hell are people doing to take hours and hours ? I mean yes if I scrub the doors and wash windows ( rather than wipe the door handle) and wash the skirting rather than fluffy duster it but I don’t do that more than monthly

Well, lower your expectations in this period of your life.

Get a weekly rota that's not too difficult, this makes a big difference.

Make sure your husband is doing 50/50.

Lower your standards and be kind to yourself! I have a pretty clean and tidy home and I've never polished anything in my life (genuinely: what are you polishing?!).

Maybe 'treat' yourself to a full clean and declutter spring clean when you have some help with the baby so you're starting from a lighter baseload.

Here for the tips…going back to work FT next week after our third - and I feel you! My house is also a riot. ❤️

Some of it is making less mess in the first place, how is the kitchen getting so dirty you have to clean it just from making your lunch? Surely you just make a quick sandwich or something and put the bits in the dishwasher. Children have a bath rinse it after. Couple of times a week after you use the toilet wipe it round and give the sink a wipe. If you do little things as you go it doesn't build up. Only iron things that are needed I basically just do school uniform. Other things like shirts or certain dresses are put away and ironed before wear by the person wearing them. Bathroom and kitchen divide and conquer for a deeper clean you do over DH and does the other while you tag team DC on a Saturday or Sunday morning.

I agree robot hoover, finish in the kitchen put the hoover in there, finish in the living room before bedtime put the hoover in there. We have different levels and it still works. Also once you're all out of the house every day mess isn't being created. Forget Mrs hinch who wants to live in a grey box that smells of zoflora. Things like skirting, windows etc get done rarely no one dies. Just do the basics.

And yes - I put my son in a laundry basket with a couple of toys while I did jobs (pre crawling). Just moved him round the house with me.

No one aint got time for that!!!

Tell me about it 😂 To be fair I only do that every couple of weeks.

OP, you are not alone, I think every new Mum going back to work has experienced this and lots like yourself just look around the house and think where the bloody hell do I start.
I found that putting my daughter in her bouncy chair in the bathroom, was fine when I wanted a quick shower/wash, when I fed her I would feed myself not ideal and a bit rushed but it was ok.
I brought a lot of storage boxes/ikea storage system and that worked a treat as I could just chuck toys etc. in them and it was a quick task.
I also brought a hand held steamer so instead of having to cart the ironing board out and the iron, I just steamed an item whilst it was on a hanger, and I only did those items that were really creased.
A flash mop thingy has always been good, relatively quick to go over the floors
The main thing is to enjoy your children, get your husband to assist although it sounds like he is helping, try not to fret, it gets better, gets easier.

One of the things that is really unhelpful for people like the OP and leads to a sense of failure is exaggeration like this

We have a small 3 bed semi. I am of the low standard. It would take me around 10 mins to hoover downstairs, that involves getting the hoover out, moving where its plugged in once so that It can reach, adjusting the setting once so that Im doing it over hard floors and rugs.

Then I would go upstairs and do perhaps around 10 mins up there, perhaps a bit less. I would not do the stairs, that would take me ages

Then you say you 'clean the bathroom', including cleaning the floor and picking up stuff as you go. It really isnt possible in 15 mins to do all of that

Its not going to take more than half hour perhaps, perhaps a touch more, its not going to take hours as you say, but dont exaggerate, its really unnecessary and unhelpful. It does nothing to guide people how to plan out chores.

Stop following mrs hinch for a,start.
Get the cleaner. Thats the big overview clean and tidy.
Relax.
Cordless stick vacuum your dh can run it for 10 mins every day.
Cordless hard floor cleaner after dogs eg powerglide as needed. 10 mins a day .
Dishwasher..
Big basket throw all toys in at end of day . 5 minutes.

Ooh, what a treat!!

Lower your standards

‘How do mums cope…?’

By working with ‘Dad’, not working for him.

When you show your post to your husband. What does he say?

How do dads cope?

Well if mine is anything to go by, by not really being bothered if there are crumbs on the floor or theres marks on things.

I see it on this forum a lot that 'oh, he'd have to do it himself if you didnt do it'

Applied to all sorts of things from housework, to child care, to playing with the kids, to life admin or whatever its called.

But the reality is, some men, a fair amount in my experience dont care about these things, they would not spend their time dusting a skirting board.

I dont say thats right or wrong (I have never cleaned a skirting board in my life) but why do people think that is important? Its ok for it to be important and its ok for it not to be important, but not at the expensive of stress and exhaustion.

TLDR - but just lower your expectations. No one cares.

I say to myself “this is the best I can do”. This is the best I can do with the time, resources and energy I currently have. And then I breathe and let it go.

Diarise everything. Bathrooms are cleaned every Wednesday. Kids washes are put on every Tuesday and Friday. White wash is every Monday. Beds are changed every Thursday. Work out what all the weekly tasks are and write them in your diary repeating each week. And then just try your best with the daily stuff. (I plan in my hair washes too!)

I have a stick hoover in a strategic place, it's a game changer. It takes about 10 seconds to get it out.

Usually after dinner I just hoover around the table and the kitchen sides which takes 3 minutes tops. I have had to train myself to only do a small bit at a time though, rather than wanting to do the whole of downstairs at the same time.

Oh good grief - I pointed out that OP is struggling beyond what should be normal , spending time being overwhelmed rather than doing ? and am accused of minimising how long it takes to clean things? You want to come and inspect my home? And time me doing things?

I have more to do than clean my house to some stupidly high standards and you don’t need dad to step up because it is quite possible to keep clean house as a single mum which was my position for many years

women continue to waste their lives cleaning excessively but I still think it sounds like OP need external help or a complete break - I will
avoid diagnosing over the internet but it sounds like things have gone wrong.

The answer is simple - lower your expectations. It won't always be super-clean but it doesn't have to.
We both work full-time from home, so it does get messy, and have 2 kids at school. I vacuum twice a week. Wash the floor once a week and wipe it wet under the table if messy during the week. We clean the kitchen only after dinner.
Laundry 2-3 times per week. No dogs (I had one when I was a kid and it's so messy). When kids were little I did as little as possible with regards to cleaning, cause there was no time. It was a stressful time though. But it will get better.

Yeah I’d get rid of the dogs