Why is my teen 17 so disgusting?

[Queenofclean13]

Teen son 17yo and his room is absolutely gross.

Before anyone says it’s my shit parenting. From as soon as he was old enough to walk and talk I’ve made him participate with doing chores. Whether it’s taking the bins out, making his bed, loading/emptying the dishwasher/hanging washing out.

I taught him everything, he knew how to strip, wash and re-make his bed by the time he was in year 6. He knows how to keep things clean and tidy. He just doesn’t give a shit.

He’d never change his bedding of his own accord, left to it there’d be plates, cups, takeaway cartons galore just left to rot. Wet towels and clothes strewn everywhere.

I know people will say no food in bedrooms, but is that really realistic? He has his mates/girlfriend round and they order food. I always make him do the basics before he’s allowed friends over.

I tell him he’s got to at least change the bedding and vacuum fortnightly, as well as making sure there’s no rubbish/food left overnight. But I’m sick of having to force/cajole him.

I can’t just leave it either, because it smells like something has died in there and makes the whole house stink. Plus all my towels would go missing.

That’s just his bedroom, not to mention the mess he’d peace everywhere else if I wasn’t constantly having to tell him.

I work in a school and the majority of teenagers are scruffy buggers.

Facing same battle. Makes me feel crazy. DD was always dressed so cute for school, now looks like a slob every day. Always had her room just so, and so pretty. It's been years since we we have entered without completely losing our minds and no matter how much we tell her to clean or help her clean it, it is destroyed within 24 hours. I don't even understand how it is possible for a bedroom to reach this point, and I have threatened one thing after another with no luck. Nothing we say or do gets through to her about just putting things in their place after use. She will re-wear dirty clothes. She doesn't shower when she she should, and only then it's with us ordering her to (usually more than once). We have even installed a baby gate on her door for the safety of our dogs.

I take a lot of pride in my home so I don't know where she is learning this from, and she absolutely knows it is not acceptable.

I am very tired and sadly looking forward to her leaving the nest.

My daughter's room was like the bog of eternal stench. I'm sure that she'd grown new, sentient life forms in there and it was a place where towels went to die.

It got a bit better as she got older, particularly when a boyfriend was coming round. Now she's in her own place, she's really, really tidy.

Keep the rules around crockery etc coming out, threaten to go in with a rubbish sack occasionally and follow through with it, don't wash anything that's not in the specific place it's meant to be, open the windows every day. Otherwise, shut the door. Stuff around the house can be dumped on his bed.

This won't go on forever.

No food in the room isn’t unrealistic - I’m 38 and had the same rule as a teen. You could have a drink in your room, but all food was a strictly downstairs affair!

I do think this is a teen thing - I wouldn’t have changed my sheets often, definitely had a floordrobe and Ominous Chair in the corner that was a clothes horse, and these days I’m pissed off if DH doesn’t use a coaster

DS2 was like this!! He was so messy! He’s coming out of it now and keeps on top of it.

He still makes a mess but tidying up more frequently now. He’s 21 now. My other DS was never like this.

Mine will change the sheets and run the hoover about when he knows his girlfriend is coming over..

no Food in rooms is completely realistic. Mine have never been allowed food out of the kitchen and they’ve never asked to, it is just a rule for which there is a black and white line, it doesn’t happen

Does he still get pocket money? DS only gets his once his tidying/ jobs have been done. Paid weekly.

I was an utter slob, worse than you are describing. I also used to smoke and had ashtrays spilling over. Awful.

i genuinely could not understand why my parents were bothered as it was my space etc.

As anadult I am very tidy and like my environment clean and organised.
Just letting you know to give hope he won’t live in filth all his life (probably).

I knew a lad like this utter pig slob.
Now he lives on his own has done for years hes spotless he cant stand mess.
Knew a girl that was raised in a spotless home everything had to be in its place etc very very clean tidy every room.
She now lives like a pig.

I find you need to prompt them with very small manageable routines. Let him know, not in a nagging voice, that you want to help him keep on top of his room so you are going to remind him to do small easy things every day or once a week to build good habits. Tell him everything you will ask him to do will take less than 5 mins, more like 2 mins, so please not to argue or say he'll do it later or claim you are nagging.

If he's a gamer, and might get frustrated at being asked to do stuff mid-game, just ask him to do these things before he starts gaming.

So before you put the dishwasher on at night - or before he starts gaming - ask him to collect all plates and glasses etc from his room and stack them neatly in the dishwasher. When you say good night, if there are still some in his room, get him to take them downstairs and put them in the dishwasher. Then ask him to put dirty clothes in the hamper and at least drape clothes he might wear again on a chair. If you do it every single night, not in a nagging tone, just in a calm, friendly way, it won't be too much to cope with.

Saturday morning, once he is up (okay, Saturday lunchtime ) say you are doing bedding wash or towel wash and ask him to strip his bed/bring down towels.)

If his room is still a state, just ask him to do 15 mins on Saturday morning: 2 mins of putting rubbish in the bin, books etc back on shelves, 2 mins of dirty clothes in laundry hamper, 2 mins to strip his bed, 5 mins of making up fresh bed, 3 mins of collecting plates and taking them downstairs, 1 minute open the blinds and windows and let the fresh air in..

Oh God, mine is the same. We always had the rule, 'no food in bedrooms' but it sort of slid over Covid when he was 15 and he argues so loudly about 'FFS - I'll bring it down again, what's the problem? It's my room!' etc and ends up ignoring us.

Yes to the festering plates, yes to the 20 damp towels slung on the floor, with the dirty clothes, the takeaway boxes, the glass with moldy milk in it. I have no solutions. I am tired of hearing myself argue about it.

We're hoping he either outgrows it or leaves home soon. (He's 20).

And yes - he was taught to tidy up as a child, do his own laundry etc. Which he still does - just not often enough!

Thank you, but believe me I have tried all of this and more.

He doesn’t game either.

Ever since he was small one taught him how to clean and tidy, in small, basic, easy to manage steps. I’ve cleaned it with him millions of times. I’ve talked him through it.

He knows what to do. That’s the most frustrating part, he has the skills to change bedding, take a bin bag out, run a vacuum round and everything else. It’s pure laziness.

Id like to just close the door on it but his room absolutely reeks and stinks the whole house out. Plus all the towels disappear and he takes my towel too.