How do you keep your home clean or tidy? I really really can't do it?!

[smugtandemfeeder]

There is dirt on the dirt. Everyone except me and DH has weed and pooed on the sofa and all the carpets. The laptop hard drive has broken for the second time due to DS being rough with it. We have mess everywhere. As soon as I put stuff away DS sort of rolls it all back out again. There is a pile of clean nappies on the sitting room floor which DS has 'sprinkled' flour all over. There are numerous little bags full of random shit which DS has collected and stored throughout the house.

I can't keep on top of it.

And don't even get me started on the washing.....

Is there any point getting a new sofa or new carpets?

It's utter chaos and madness here.

Ben10 - I have added you to the list of applicants. Please can you tell me in less than 50 words what qualifies you for the role?

I think I may need to buy furniture from this place They sell what they claim are attractive plastic reinforced urea proof sofas. I kid you not.

Dear Smug

I clean a full size potty chair/commode every day, the carpet around said potty chair every day, often the bed that the user of said potty chair has wet and I have cats that shit.

Can I send you my CV for further perusal?

Kind regards

Ben

This is actually quite nice BTW

It's hard work! and requires going round and round and round in circles

A mner made me laugh the other week when she came round to my place and asked me if we actually lived in a different house and just arranged to meet people at this one I thought HA! If you'd seen the place last night you wouldn't have said that

When the boys were little, they were VERY destructive. It was very hard then. As they have calmed down, it has become less difficult. My eldest used to love throwing books and ornaments around and smashing everything. Rather than battle - I just packed everything away. For years we had no ornaments, no books on display - just the bare essentials. Now they have changed enough for us to be able to put things back out. I just thought - why make life hard for myself by having things around that didn't need to be there. I thought I'd just deal with the most important things first - speech, violence etc and teaching them to stop chucking books around could wait

I remember being on my hands and knees, playing Hunt The Poo

Trying to peel spaghetti off the carpet.

Cleaning walls that had been liberally coated with poo. And one memorable occasion - cleaning a child who had liberally coated himself with poo...

God, the mess!

Just do what you can do, when you can do it and don't worry about it, is my advice. Some of it will sort itself out over time, and what doesn't - doesn't matter so much anyway.

Havent had time to read all the thread, so I may well be reiterating whats already been said, but, if its an option;

Wooden/laminate floor.....soooo much easier...wee and poo and meds and ANYTHING comes off a treat! Would NEVER have carpet again.

Curtains? What about replacing with low maintenance blinds...either roller or venetian. Just need a wipe every now and then. And you dont need to take them down to clean them!!!

Rugs? Dont bother. Will be used as anything EXCEPT a rug IME

Safety film on all glass doors etc then if it gets smashed, glass wont go everywhere and you wont need to clean it all up.

Try and make dc eat in the kitchen...this has been my big mistake and I am paying for it wrt crumbs everywhere!

Limit the toyboxes/shelves/cupboards etc that dc can reach to stash things in! Perhaps get them a "special box" of their own for the "special things" - my dnephew has one with a lock and key!

If you can live without cushions on your sofas that another thing(s) you wont need to clean.

HTH

Ben10 - Thank you for your application for the advertised role. We have added you to the short list.

I can just imagine the Mother in Laws face if she turned up to find a load of autism friendly furniture in our house. Might be worth trying just to see her reaction.

TheMagnificent - you are welcome to apply for the aforementioned role.I have actually gone a step further than your excellent advice and now have less than the bare essentials. Our lovely expensive corner sofa has been removed to the garden.

Oh, and the ubiquitous (brown) leather sofas!!! Stuff wipes off them too!

Magnificent Don't even think about it -it's my job

Oh, and promise you wont tell anyone??

Babywipes!!!!

I use them clean EVERYTHING, not just bums, hands and faces.....I wipe down walls, sofas, floors...you name it!

dh is mystified how we get through so many "Ds only has one bum, right??"

ah x posted with ben

Ha. You're bloody kidding, aren't you? No chance. I nearly lost my mind the first time!

But seriously - I can't tell you how important it is for your sanity to stay relaxed (as possible!) about it all. Or you will get really really depressed about it.

Leather sofas here too. Crappy old things. No point replacing them. I agree that baby wipes are fab for cleaning them up.

I've spent what must add up to years of my life cleaning poo off walls and floors. we had to take a carpet up once and couldn't afford to have another one down, so made do with polished floorboards.

Have you ever tried to get poo up from the gaps between floorboards?

I ended up using a toothbrush and then a credit card and I STILL couldn't get it all up. I have flashbacks to being on my hands and knees, sweeping a credit card between floorboards and wiping it into a tupperware pot!

My sanity went some time last week. DH has just been put on anti-psychotics, my mother called this morning to tell me I was just jealous she had signed her house over to my brother (this is after I have spent the last 4 weeks trying to help her move to new sheltered accomodation and to get the right medical care) my sofa is in the garden covered in foulness, and we have some kind of head of Barnardos ringing our social services and CAMHS to shake them up into helping us. When did things get so serious?

I can still manage a weak and this thread cheers me up!!

DH has taken DS away to his grandmas tonight and she said to him "he's all there you know" and my DH said "so why did he spend all of today weeing and pooing on the sofa and wiping poo on the walls grandma" Response from Grandma "How's that then?" Ummmm im sure we have told you HE HAS AUTISM!!!!

Right back wiping poo up........

Oh god, I'm so sorry for being flippant. This must be a really horrible time for you.

Dont be silly, you werent being flippant, you were being ultra helpful. And you were not to know about the antipsycotics I have asked for advice on cleaning my house, the other issues are another thread or two

Can anyone recommend a good carpet cleaner? My dining room carpet hasn't been the same since ds1 acted out "thomas in the snow" with his train set, persil, sugar and water.

I find a hoover with a really good suction and a drinking straw taped to the long thin attachment is good for poo in the floorboard crevices if the poo is dry. I'm dreading potty training ds2, I've already got one child leaking poo and wee on the sofa and carpets I don't need another one thanks.

I keep a pack of baby wipes in every room and try to do the flylady thing but my house still looks like a bomb went off in it.

thanks, smug. Hope things work out well and speedily for you!

ellie - I recommend rug doctor. But don't bother buying their rip off cleaner at £20 a bottle! Get a bottle of super concentrated washing liquid - persil small and mighty or similar - and use that instead. Does the job just as well and leaves the carpet smelling gorgeous!

But don't tell them you are using it. They don't like it if they ask you, you have some of their cleaner left over from last time

I bought a vax upright carpet cleaner that does the job fine and I do use the vax cleaner for pets. It is quick and easy to use but I do have to do my carpets every 10 days or so due to animals as well as kids. I dont know if the persil washing liquid would work in it as you need a built in defoamer for that one though which is a shame as it would be much cheaper if you could.

would love to have a leather sofa for the spilled drinks/wee but the cats unfortunately like sharpening their claws DOH!

I've been avoiding this thread as thought it would be full of guilt inducing good tips to keeping your house smart! Should have known better, love this section!

I am very lucky that I have a DP who is obsessive about cleaning, I mean actually obsessive btw so it is annoying at times but also means I mostly have a clean house. My job is the bathroom and yesterday I spent a good forty mins cleaning our (tiny)bathroom while DP was at work. In the mean time DD came in every now and then and hit or kicked me so some of that time was taken in dealing with that. Then at one point I realised it was quiet so went down to find her pouring washing up liquid down the sink, running her trains through it and then running them round the kitchen to spread the bubbles! DP came back and as he was weeing he said did you clean the bathroom?? I then turned into a ranting swearing mess and nearly cried!

Also DD is now getting obsessive about marks on walls so I have put a sticker on one such mark which pulls the paint off if removed. She now wants them on every mark-argh!

Oh and recently while I was trying to clean upstairs DD poured washing up liquid all over the floor, rubbed it in and poured glitter over it. there is still glitter in places.

ooohhh...glitter is evil

Still some in the cracks in the floorboards in my old house!

Yes it is it was all over my old flat too! We are moving in a month or so so goodness knows whqt we will leave behind!

Meant to add, when I was a single parent I had a lovely flat which DD had trashed some areas of, riding into the walls on her digger etc. Anyway it really got me down that I couldnt keep the place nice, I was constantly tidying and never got round to the proper cleaning iyswim then I hurt my back badly and couldnt hoover or bend down at all for weeks. I ended up having my friends cleaner come to do my place and then had her every two weeks for an hour and a half. It didn't at all mean I did less cleaning but it did meant that the place was properly cleaned and it really took the pressure off me. I felt embarrassed about it but really, at a difficult time in my life for £30 a month I had less stress and a cleaner place so would seriously recommend it. TBH I would have just had once a month if I couldn't afford twice as it was such a load off my mind.

I dont know why you are so apologetic about it, used2bthin !

I would have a cleaner if I could afford it...back is buggered and am in process of being dx with RA so I do struggle and it does get me down sometimes...had to ask dh to hoover and mop floors for me on friday and I HATE to have to do that. Going to have to get more organised with shopping too...struggle with trolleys now

Realistically we need all our (limited) cash for ds1 and getting him the help he needs. Have realised that the NHS wont help, so private it is!

oh no, no need to be apologetic about getting a cleaner, wouldn't most people if they could, I certainly would without a moments hesitation.

becaroo, my back is knackered too although my gp isn't taking me seriously, she's told me it's not going to get better and that I shouldn't lift anything as that will just make it worse like that's going to happen with a disabled 5yo and a 2yo I can't go shopping without dh now and often have to sit down before we're finished, have you considered doing it online?

I do sometimes ninja but dh gets shirty about the delivery charges (which I dont like paying either but hey, it means I am not knackering myself!)

Am seeing about some osteopathy today...think my back is complicated by my last pg and the RA tbh but hopefully they will be able to do something

Sorry yours is so bad Its really difficult to explain to people the effect on everyday life, isnt it? I dont sleep well due to pain and then have to struggle on all day with 2 dc who dont always understand that mummy cant crawl around on the floor and wrestle anymore

Could you see a different GP? Yours sounds like crap on a stick, frankly, and I know that I have been going backwards and forwards to 2 years to my GP with various pain/inflammation etc and yet it wasnt til I saw a locum that ordered blood tests that anything got done!

Another messy house here - and too ashamed for visitors! I have had many a long moment trying to scrub between the cracks of our bare wooden floors - never borrow an old toothbrush in our house! Funny how almost all the other sn families I know have laminate flloors and dark leather sofas!
My personal favorite floor cleaner is the nighttime baby bath - the lavender smells nice and covers up less pleasant smells. No good for the carpet though (! use vax cleaner for that). When the respite head visited she noted the very worn patch on the leather sofa ( it is paled and cracking from all the wiping) and carefully sat well clear of it!!