Feminism and housework and hoarding and Flylady...

[solidgoldbrass]

I would love to get some feminist perspective on this because I am struggling at the moment. I have always been a housework avoider, always had a messy house, and I used to say that it was a good way of making sure any man i shagged never got any ideas about me being a little home-maker for him.
It's gradually dawned on me that I actually have a bit of a problem WRT hoarding, and I would like to sort it out, I know some MNers love Flylady but one look at the site made me queasy because it seems so very much 'Women! Embrace housework, it';s your destiny.'
Any thoughts anyone?

I would happily cook if someone would dust for me. I'd make cakes and everything. DH has an allergy to dustmites lucky man

How about combining decluttering with Women's Aid type charities?

Link to sell on ebay and donate between 10 and 100% of the profits to Women's Aid.

You could also contact local branches by phone and see if they need/accept direct donation of eg clothes, toys etc.

That's a really good idea, narkypuffin

That is a top idea Puffin.

Lexi, past is gone. What a fab earner!

Tip for selling CDs/DVDs, if you have a lot to get rid of, but can't be bothered listing them all on ebay individually you can list as a 'joblot', professional re-sellers will buy them and you get a little cash for little hassle.

Ooh, I know it's water under the bridge. But someone said up the thread that hoarding is a reaction borne out of personal memories (or cultural memories) of scarcity. I've never been what you'd call poor but always conscious of money and trying not to waste it. So I am embarrassed that I've had an asset which someone would have wanted to live in and I've squandered that value. Nobody's actually been made homeless because I didn't make that flat available, and my child hasn't gone hungry because we've been paying two mortgages to live in one house, but it's like buying too much food and not using it before it starts to go off - just pointless waste.

I took some stuff out of the flat today and I had to force myself not to put the boxes straight in the car "to sort out later". I made myself go through it and put things in the bin rather than bring them home to fester here and be sorted through in another few months.

If DH is going to drive to work after rush hour tomorrow I will get him to drive me to work (I usually walk with the boy in the buggy) so I can take in the SSAFA box. One more thing removed from the house...

I'm trying to figure out if I have a feminist problem I have with this and I don't think I do. I briefly had the sensation today of being looked down on by the letting agent because the grass wasn't mowed, and last time I was there (his first visit) he said it looked a little unloved because it had been empty. I just sort of said well yes, you've rightly identified it's been empty.

But still, it's me alone doing all this organisation and tidying and "making it so". Even the decluttering of our front room last night I was doing alone. I said I wanted some company (because sorting through stuff I can see has no value makes me feel sad and ridiculous). But he was busy with some work problem that had just come up late at night (genuine, definitely not an excuse). I think that new ways of living - tidy ways of living - have to be fully engaged in by everyone in the family, everyone keeping to the same standards of putting away/cleaning/mucking in. That's fine if couples come from a reasonably similar cleanliness background, but if you have to start from a 'problem' that belongs to one person, then it's more difficult.

I know exactly what you mean, Lexi. It's just me in my little space, and I struggle. I cannot imagine what it must be like to have two, three, even four or five extra people's stuff - with only one person in the household responsible for cleaning, organising, and washing it.

It has to be a feminist problem. It can't be coincidence, can it, that my girlfriends who have had children or are TTC all worry about slowly shifting into the 'housewife' role, and none of my male friends worry about it? It's one of the giant reasons I don't want to live with men - because I believe those statistics which state that though single men and single women do roughy the same amount of housework, the instant they co-habit the woman instantly does more.

Children, too, highlight the problem. Maternity leave is obviously a great thing, but it also seems to be the start of the link between 'woman' and 'housework', particularly if that link didn't exist before. It takes a lot of discussion to establish that 'childcare' is not 'housework'. It really should be more straightforward than that.

Lexi I said up thread that I thought hoarding was a technique that worked well in a scarcity environment. I was thinking more that it might be a genetically primed behaviour that is instinctive rather than a social behaviour passed on through seeing others do it. If that's the case (and I have no qualifications in this area ) passing up an abstract resource (money) to keep a tangible resource (a safe place to live) open to you is quite understandable and rational, though not necessarily the wisest thing to do in our current society. A tangible resource is likely to be emotionally much more significant than an abstract one. If you could make the leap to seeing money as the thing to hoard then you'd have rented the flat out ASAP and you could do really well in capitalist society. But you might not be as nice.

Just to say this is a really good thread (which I am currently catching up on). With regards hoarding, DH and my Dad are both hoarders. My Dad has to be world-beater in this respect. His hoard includes 2 tractors and various bits of farming equipment - none of which works, an ancient Mercedes Benz, a school hall's worth of parquee flooring, a roof's worth of stone tiles, 2 cement mixers, a selection of bikes, a spare 3-piece suite, a Baby Grand piano (not working), a huge LP record collection, enough fire wood to last about 3 years and a variety of tables/bookshelves/odd chairs etc.

At some point it will be down to me and my brother to sort this out. Oh. how. I. am. looking. forward. to. that. I mean where the hell do you start??

I am currently considering getting a cleaner due to our inherent laziness in this respect but lets face it they can't do anything about the shit clutter everywhere, especially when there is nowhere to put it. I often wonder how cluttered the house would actually be if I lived alone with DS.

VG you make a good point about drifting into housework along with children whereas men don't tend to. The biggest shift I found was that I was round the house so much more and noticed it more. As a result I get pissed off with it much more quickly although not enough to actually do anything substantial about it.

Also agreeing with pretty much everything sakura has said especially about allowing ourselves to half do a job.

However, this thread is going to prompt me to declutter the bathroom on Friday (smallest room in the house but it is at least a start and DH has no vested interest in the mess in that room so I can just get on with it!).

I have this rule: I don't take seriously any post which calls women "females".

Moving on.

SGB, I think this is such a complex issue. I have heard a book called clutter Busting by Brooks Palmer recommended by (feminist, academic!) friends several times, because apparently he's very good at delving into the psychological aspects of hoarding. His website is brooks-palmer.blogspot.com/here - he's not so much about ths systems and the practicalities, but about the stuff behind that. And really there are so many motivations behind clutter, that it could well be a feminist issue for you, or a fear-of-poverty-related one (which is what my mother struggles with), or simply - well, you run two businesses, raise a child almost completely single-handedly and make time for hobbies and friends!

I am an excellent declutterer and purger, and one of those freaks who enjoy housework, as long as I don't have to do it with a small child wrapped around one leg. So I will have lots of thoughts on the sociological aspects of this. But here's a start: we've debated before about whether outsourcing housework is just transferring a feminist problem, and certainly where it's done to hide the inequality of a relationship I think it is. But how do you feel about outsourcing the decluttering/organisation stuff? There are professionals out there who do this stuff. I have looked into being one.

Bad link, Try again

I'm mulling over thoughts about house-as-domain here, too. I have caught myself wishing that my husband wasn't so involved in decisions about home decoration and whatnot, because a strange retro part of me feels like the house is a female domain and I should have veto power.

I have no idea where that's come from, as neither my mother nor my grandmother were enthusiastic homemakers. In fact my maternal grandmother died when my mum was 13, and mum was expected to take over the entire housekeeping role from then on. So she did all the cooking and cleaning for her father and her older brother, whilst at school fulltime, from 13. Unsurprisingly, she then rebelled against this, and brought us up as a fulltime working (single) parent who took as many housework shortcuts as she could and paid for a cleaner when she could scrape the money. Which was fine. I had a great childhood, I love my mum to bits. So where does it come from with me?

I didn't finish that thought, sorry, I'll stop flooding the thread in a second. But I wonder whether - if you want to change your attitude without feeling like it's 'embracing your destiny as a housework slave', you can reframe it as taking charge of your domain? Like: you deserve to live there. You pay for it. It is your castle. You are worthy of having a good, enjoyable space around you, which is not a rag-and-bone yard?

I think of it as just being something that's part of my personality, rather than something that's part of my personality because I am in possession of a vagina. :) I'm a born potter-about-the-house type, and though I'm not very good at cleaning and tidying I love it when things are nice and I'm working on getting better at it. And I like decorating and baking and being with small children. I don't think it's because I'm a woman, I just think it's because I'm me.

I have a friend who is a very high-powered executive type at a radio station. The woman cannot be still, any of the rare time she has at home when she's not doing things with her daughter, she is making headband-type things that she sells on a website. Her DH is the baker, cleaner, main child-carer, etc, etc, and it all works out extremely well.

As irritating as Pat's post is, I think it bears repeating, feminists do not think men are incapable of doing housework. Quite the opposite.

Tortoise, the veto thing is interesting. DH is hardly here, he works very hard, but that means I do all the household stuff. Therefore him having an equal say in decisions that affect my 'work' would be unfair. We discuss things of course, but if I want to box up all the ornaments so I don't have to dust them, that's what will happen.
Housework isn't my job, it's just me that has to do it.
I'm always on a quest to reduce the amount of time and energy expended on it, there's hundreds of other things I'd rather be doing with my time.

Tortoise, that Clutter Busting blog is great. Really insightful.

About the half a job, I saw something on a thread the other day where a poster was bemoaning the fact her husband only ever did half a job (and not as in not finishing it, just not doing it to her standards) So I think if women in general can accept half-jobs and shortcuts more, that might help. Even if you look at adverts - those flash ones for example, I don't even know if they're still on - where the man uses flash to clean and it takes him a few minutes whereas presumably his wife would have spent hours scrubbing that same stain, and he's shown as canny for doing it, but you never see a woman using a shortcut product on an advert and then sitting down to watch the TV, or play with her children, as the man does in the adverts I can remember.

Flylady advocates half jobs as well. I know this has already been mentioned, but I mean things like her "swish and swipe" over the kitchen/bathroom surfaces once or twice a day rather than a big clean when they get grubby. And hoovering, instead of doing the middle of the floor and the edges, she advocates doing one or the other and alternating. That would be completely pointless for me with a toddler, but I see the point.

I think Tortoise has a very good point.

I really nodded with recognition when reading the posts about that feeling of total helplessness when faced with a shit mess.

My house used to be look like the scene of a terrorist incident most of the time. It was a nightmare. I constantly felt stressed and out of control, I was always late because I could never find the item I wanted and if by any chance I had a half hour spare which I could use to read, I would spend that half hour increasingly desperately and angrily rummaging through all the crap to find the book. Then the half hour would have run out and instead of having sat and used that leisure time to relax (and/ or learn if it was that sort of book), I would have spent the time in a frantic hysterical state of wishing that I didn't have to look for every single item I ever wanted to lay hands on.

And then for some reason something changed and I think it was to do with taking control of my environment. I think a lot of my slobbery was my way of making it absolutely clear to any man who lived with me, that I was not going to do the domestic service role and when I no longer lived with a man, I didn't need to send that message out. Plus what Tortoise said - I realised that when my environment was calm and ordered and tidy, I felt calm and relaxed and actually have time to read occasionally because I don't spend the reading time looking for the book.

My house isn't one of these obsessively tidy houses, but it is basically ordered most of the time and when it isn't, I no longer feel that sense of desperation and powerlessness - I know that I need a couple of hours to sort it and then it will be sorted. I just feel in control of it and that's where the difference is.

Is that any use to anyone?

I let DS clean the bathroom sink with washing up liquid, and to be fair, he does a pretty good job. I just wipe over the bits which are left and it looks great. I clean the toilet myself though!

And thanks for sharing HerBeX :) I wonder if it's one of those things like leaving an abusive relationship - you really have to make a shift in your own thinking. I know I would be more in control if I kept the house cleaner, but I still don't.

I have been doing FlyLady for a couple of years and consider myself to be a Feminist.

To be honest, when you initially read the emails, it does look like a housewifey sort of site where the little woman is expected to clean up after her man but the more I have gotten to "know" her the less true that seems.

FlyLady was, years ago in an emotionally abusive marriage. I have seen posts where a wife writes in to complain about her husbands expectations and where she has been told not to tolerate any such treatment from a husband.

FLY = Finally Loving Yourself. The first rule of the day is, before you look after the house, look after yourself. Brush you hair, get dressed, put on make-up, be ready to face the world. I have also seen her say to women who object to putting on make-up "Well then, just moisturise!" Also built into the routines are things like drinking water and taking exercise. The idea is to take care of you, first and foremost.

She is not keen on Perfectionism. She does not advocate a perfect house, just a house where you feel happy and comfortable and where you don't isolate yourself because you are too ashamed to have anyone over.

She does advocate a relaxed attitude to cleaning and housework. Most of it does not involve mad cleaning sprees involving skips. It's a little and often approach which means that you don't wear yourself out, and she does build in time for coffee breaks! Everything is done in 15 minute steps, after that you stop, whether the job is done or not. The next time you tackle it, you do another 15 minutes and so on.

Personally growing up, I had no guidance as to how housework should be done. My mother is a hoarder. My father did his best but anyone who has ever lived with my mother usually gives up because her hoarding and disorganisation actually prevent other people from cleaning.
Last year, I was in her house and found an unfinished cardigan which she had long since stopped knitting. I told her we should throw it out and she wouldn't. I asked her why and she said she might finish it if she could manage to buy the right wool. I then asked how long she had been knitting it and she said, before I was born! I am 42!!! If I didn't have FlyLady, that would be me!

I just ignore any God references and fit it in around my own job and kids.

Dh doesn't follow it but does a big clean up with the boys on Saturday. He is naturally better at cleaning than me so doesn't need a system.

That's an interesting perspective, Chip. I also use the Flylady system and consider myself a feminist. There is a lot that makes me cringe about Flylady, but I think that if you strip those bits away it leaves you with a system which works. I want a tidy, organised house so that I can get on with the rest of my life and Flylady helps me to achieve that. I tried setting up my own routines before, but they were never as effective and were very 'all or nothing', whereas Flylady advocates 'little and often', as well as establishing new habits.