[punkypunky]

How do you do it? How do you keep your living space clean and still get everything else in life done?

I live alone and have 2 cats. I can barely keep up with weekly laundry let alone actual cleaning and organizing.

Any tips or tricks? Websites? Books? Phone apps?

[purpledaisy]

I don't.

Once in a while, I'll try. But then it's so overwhelming and I become exhausted and feel overwhelmed, and give up.

I live alone with pets.

I have not washed or changed my sheets and blankets on my bed for about 4 weeks.

All of the dishes in the house are dirty and sitting in the sink.

There is clutter everywhere.

There is room for one person to sit on the couch in front of the TV, which is fine because it's only me and I never have guests.

But the things that normal people do on a regular basis? Nope. Not me.

• Dusting
• Folding/hanging/putting away clean clothes
• Cleaning out the kitchen sink and wiping off the countertop
• Scrubbing the toilet and the rest of the bathroom
• Keeping up with laundry (clothes, towels)
• Making my bed
• Mowing the yard (when it gets a little warmer)
• Cleaning out my car

Forget it. Who has the time or energy?

[punkypunky]

My place is too messy to have any guests. There is only one spot open on the couch. I have piles of laundry in my bedroom and on the floor of my closet. Books and papers everywhere. Random wrappers and boxes everywhere. It is so overwhelming!

I feel like I would be so much less stressed if my home was clean, but I am too stressed to get it clean. :-(

[purpledaisy]

Originally Posted by punkypunky

My place is too messy to have any guests. There is only one spot open on the couch. I have piles of laundry in my bedroom and on the floor of my closet. Books and papers everywhere. Random wrappers and boxes everywhere. It is so overwhelming!

I feel like I would be so much less stressed if my home was clean, but I am too stressed to get it clean. :-(

Your place sounds a lot like mine.

I've been taking some time each day for the last several days to open drawers, throw stuff away, and take stuff to be shredded. A lot of the papers and envelopes I'm finding are bills and notices from collection agencies that were sent to me in 2006.

Along with those bills, I found an large, open package of Chips Ahoy chocolate chip cookies. It's amazing there werent' bugs everywhere.

Oh, I don't vacuum or sweep either. The carpet and floors look terrible.

As soon as you walk through my front door, you are hit with the smell of cat pee.

I've tried getting this under control. Several times, I have paid people to come and go through stuff with me. We have thrown away trash and clutter, separated things to take to be shredded, and done deep cleaning.

Each time, I thought it would be a great way to jump start my efforts, and then I'd be able to keep the house clean after that.

Guess what?

I don't.

I just start the whole process over again, with more clutter, more trash, more bills.

[punkypunky]

Well at least I am not alone!

[Confusedinomicon]

I live with someone and we throw trash out every week. He does dishes if I leave them too long.

Having a uniform to work has increased the amount I do laundry.

I try to do floors/bathroom every other week and carpet once a month. I live in a 1 bedroom so it doesn't take me very long. I think it helps to live with someone.

[catsrhelm]

I settle for neat.

If I have a lot to do, I write a to-do list and then cross things off one by one as I do them/

[notALICE]

I've never been a list maker. Try to - but lose the list...

I do ok with housekeeping when I'm slightly manic, but when I am depressed I get overwhelmed just looking at the mess. I don't know where to begin.

I wish I could wiggle my nose like Samantha on Bewitched & magically clean the house.

Right now I am coming down from manic - outside my bedroom everything looks neat - inside (where I am currently spending 90% of my time) it looks like a cluttered laundry pile. Sigh. At least I can close the bedroom door if I have (rare) company.

LOL - phone app would be great!! There are reminders apps, note apps, list apps, but I never use them - just the calendar for appointments & things I have to remember.

[Silent Void]

I gave up. My house is neat and uncluttered, but dusty. I do things when I feel up to it.

I recently horrified my perfectionist mother when I told her I don't fold my sheets but stuff them into the top shelf of my linen closet.

Who cares? Nobody. It doesn't matter.

[faerie_moon_x]

I used to read this thing that I can't remember what it was call. Fly lady or something. You'd sign up and it would send you these automated e-mail reminders to do things. But there were so many reminders it cluttered up my e-mail instead of helping me clean.

But, there were some tips on there I took from it that I try to follow.

1) In the morning get dressed and put on your shoes. Getting out of pajamas and feeling ready will help you get motivated.

2) Pick not only one room at a time, but one thing that needs to be cleaned at a time. Make a list of the order you will do things in if that helps and always do that order. (This is good for us with bipolar because we do well with routine, yes?)

3) Baby steps. Get a kitchen timer. Set it to 15 minutes. So let's say you have a very messy kitchen table with lots of bills and papers and dishes. Set your timer for 15 minutes and work only on the table. When the timer buzzes, stop. You'll be amazed how much you actually get done in 15 minutes.

[notALICE]

Originally Posted by Silent Void

I gave up. My house is neat and uncluttered, but dusty. I do things when I feel up to it.

I recently horrified my perfectionist mother when I told her I don't fold my sheets but stuff them into the top shelf of my linen closet.

Who cares? Nobody. It doesn't matter.

Hahaha - my ex-mother-in-law used to iron her sheets & everyones underwear. I iron wrinkles into clothes. I'm all for stuffing things in closets. Out of side, out of mind.

In the grand scheme of things as long as things are not filthy and unsanitary, you're right, it really doesn't matter.

[thebelljar12]

Originally Posted by punkypunky

How do you do it? How do you keep your living space clean and still get everything else in life done?

I live alone and have 2 cats. I can barely keep up with weekly laundry let alone actual cleaning and organizing.

Any tips or tricks? Websites? Books? Phone apps?

Hi Punkyx2. I try to do lists, and I try to reward myself when I finally get something done. It's a little more complicated for us folks with bipolar, especially since ADD/ADHD are usually co-morbid with it. I struggle with finishing a task once I start it. I get bored very easily.

Some tricks I use are: a. think of how good you'll feel once its done, and if you have a boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse, it will make them happy to see you put in the effort

b. treat yourself to something small like a coffee, tea, latte, trip to the dollar store, something little and not too expensive. also, if you get too bored/distracted, tell yourself you're going to go outside for a short walk but once you're back, you have to spend at least 20-30 minutes intensely working at something.

c. set a timer, even if its for 5 minutes, so at least you feel good about that.

d. I have a book about organization for people with ADHD, and the author's number one tip for organization is: FUNCTIONALITY, not VISUALLY PLEASING. If something "looks pretty" but you never use it properly, then what is the point? Give your things a permanent PLACE.. one really cool idea she had was to get rid of all your missmatched socks in your drawer, because youre never going to find them. Try dividing your underwear and sock drawer and keep them together. This lasted a few good months for me!

e. Its better to GET RID of something than to keep finding new storage places for it, or to "get to it later". The more you do that, the more hassle and baggage it is for you.

I hope these little tidbits helped

[notALICE]

When I was a kid - cleaning my room consisted of shoving everything under the bed & in the closet.

[Nessa213]

Originally Posted by dark_heart_x

3) Baby steps. Get a kitchen timer. Set it to 15 minutes. So let's say you have a very messy kitchen table with lots of bills and papers and dishes. Set your timer for 15 minutes and work only on the table. When the timer buzzes, stop. You'll be amazed how much you actually get done in 15 minutes.

I did this for the longest time and it really worked wonders. I would also try to clean during commercials of shows instead of fast forwarding through them (if I was watching on DVR).

Now though, my husband does a lot of cleaning if I start slacking. Like someone mentioned before, it REALLY helps to live with someone. But our house is more of a cluttered kind of clean. Not really "guest-worthy" if you know what I mean, but it's not filthy either.

It is very strange also, I have a two year old who LOVES to clean. Yesterday she got on her hands and knees to wipe up milk she had spilled. She HAS to have all the cabinets closed and locked in the kitchen. And she'll pick up ALL her crayons and toys when she's done with them. I'm not kidding at all when I say that I think she might have some OCD issues. Already. At the age of two. Makes me kind of sad if we're being honest.

[purpledaisy]

I live alone, so there is no one to help me clean or look at me with total disgust when it gets really bad.

When my son was still here (moved out 2 months ago), he got to the point where he had his own room spotless and only spent time in his room. He came out to get food, but would go right back to his room. The last 2 years he lived here, he did not come sit in the living room with me to talk or watch a movie or eat a meal like he did the rest of his life.

If I know in advance that someone is coming over, it's sheer panic.

If someone knocks on the door, I come outside to talk to them. I do not invite anyone in.

It's a very small house, but if I were to decide to work (without stopping) on nothing but cleaning the house until it was to the point of being presentable, I would be here for days doing nothing but cleaning.

I laugh when people tell me it takes them "four hours" or whatever to clean their house. A friend recently told me her two-story house took her four hours to clean, as if that's a really long time.

I'm thinking, "Try days or weeks of cleaning, and even then not having it look presentable."

Not presentable here because I've lived in this house for a VERY long time, but never have hung anything on the walls or painted or done any of that type of thing to make it feel like a home.

[venusss]

my friend used to say "if guy cares more about mess in my bedroom then me, then he's not somebody whom i wanna have in my bedroom".

I never got the cleaning thing. As long nothing crawls out, it's fine with me. Mom has sometimes cleaning fits which end up in passports being hidden carefully in book "Zionism and Politics in Israel" and driver's licences end up among in eye-shadow boxes...

as long as I can orient in my mess, it's all fine. I find trying to organize a waste of time since some stuff is just... where to place it? Yes, among other random **** in random cupboard.

[unaluna]

There's a social group here but I don't know if it's still going on. I was one of the messies who joined. But I'm so lazy, if it takes me an extra step on the computer to get there, it's too much! If I weren't this lazy, my apartment would be clean, right?

[LovelaceF]

Hubby and I have worked out a system that keeps our 3 story house very clean without too much pain. We have a schedule of tasks that are done in 15 minutes or less each, and these tasks rotate so that the entire house is cleaned once per month and spot cleaned constantly. So, one day tasks will be to spend 15 minutes cleaning the kid's bathroom, 15 minutes cleaning the girls' room, 15 minutes cleaning the master bath, 15 minutes cleaning the master bed. Then the next day will be 15 minutes on the living room, 15 minutes on the dining room, 15 minutes on the breakfast room, 15 minutes on the office, etc. It only takes 30 minutes a day for each of us. Of course the kitchen has to be done on top of this, and washing up, clearing tables, etc. I don't go so far as to iron sheets and definitely take a "good enough" attitude rather than striving for perfection. My ADD hubby is very good at keeping up with his part of this. He just has to do two 15 minute tasks per day.

[Silent Void]

Hey purple, thanks for your post. I was supposed to move and took everything off the walls. I ended up taking my home off the market. I think I'll hang everything back up tomorrow.

[hamster-bamster]

Originally Posted by punkypunky

Well at least I am not alone!

I am exactly the way you are. The only difference: I currently have three cats. But back when I had two cats, my situation was exactly the same as yours is now.

[hamster-bamster]

Originally Posted by VenusHalley

my friend used to say "if guy cares more about mess in my bedroom then me, then he's not somebody whom i wanna have in my bedroom".

I wish I had met your friend early in my life. I did arrive at the same place she is at, on my own and independently of her, but only at age 42. It would have been better to have her attitude at age 15. Or at least 20+. On both occasions I did not invite guys (two separate guys) who were romantically interested in me and I was in them, especially the one I met when being 20+, but I considered it embarrassing to invite them to a messy apartment.

Good for both you and your friend to have the right attitude from the start.

But even for me, better late than never.

[punkypunky]

It is surprising how many of us have similar cleaning/organizing problems!

I think my first step is to clean my bathroom (smallest/easiest room) then my bedroom closet and kitchen closet (so I have places to put stuff/laundry away to.

It is super annoying that my bedroom closet is walk through to my bathroom and has my washer/dryer in it. There is no way to keep the cats out of it!

[faerie_moon_x]

It can help to live with others or it can be the oposite. When my mother-in-law is manic I can tell because my house is clean. Also when she's depressed I can tell because it's an utter nightmare.

My 6 year old I call my tazmanian devil because he walks through a room and suddenly there are toys everywhere. The baby seems to be similar. My husband will clean up but only after himself because he gets resentful of all the bipolar nature of the rest of the house.

[punkypunky]

I did seem to keep a cleaner place when I lived with others. Then I would feel self conscious and clean sooner or they would notice something and say something about it.

Now since I live alone, it is NO RULES, so it is just mess everywhere all the time. If I owned more stuff my place would be on that tv show Hoarders. :-p

[~Christina]

I can't handle clutter at all, not a bit of it.. it makes me wacky.

Good trick is grab a laundry basket and sweep through a room and pick up everything that doesn't belong there and set a timer for 15 minutes and I bet its possible to get all the stuff put away in that time frame. The timer being set helps keep your mind on getting the job done.

Little things here and there really do turn into big changes.