motivation to clean house

This may seem like not a big deal but I lack the motivation to clean the house. Before going onto medications for OCD, Seizures & severe manias, I had tons of energy to clean Every Day. I am devoted to taking my meds because they stopped most of the seizures, calmed the manias (for the most part) & I am much easier for my husband to live with. But it is really really hard get myself to clean! I read a book once (forget the title). A father was having trouble understanding why his daughter who had bipolar & was on meds was so "lazy." Her room was a mess, she couldn't get herself to study etc. So, with his daughter's pdoc's supervision, he took her type of meds for 4 weeks. He found himself utterly unable to be motivated to do things like pick up a dropped, broken coffee cup or mop up the coffee he'd spilled. He came away from that experiment much more understanding of his daughter. I wish we had the money to hire a cleaning service once or twice a month!

Motivation to clean my house lacks for me, too. Part of the problem for me is, I feel like it's never clean enough, good enough...my perfectionism is tiring.

I suffer from Bipolar I and OCD as well. Looking back at my ups and downs I see the lack of motivation to be partly from the meds just dragging me down. It was hard enough most days just to function at work. Right now I am not sure exactly what I am going thru. I was manic for 4 months and I could not seem to focus on one thing at all. I would get started and then switch to something else. It is hard for me with the mania and the OCD, I feel as though they play back and forth with each other and I sometimes don't know what is what. Currently I am in between meds and as of this moment in time I am energetic and have the motivation to do everything. I do this and I don't know if you do as well, but I make a list of everything that needs to be done and I get overwhelmed at the big picture. I have been working in therapy at just trying to accomplish one tiny bit at a time instead of killing myself with the anxiety. Maybe if you can just think of one small task that needs to be done for a day and do just that, or even attempt it, you might be surprised at what you can accomplish. I wish you well.

BP 1-mixed episodes/OCD

Lamictal 400mg
Haldol 2mg
Latuda 40mg
Klonopin 1mg

I agree. Just have one small project as a start. I feel overwhelmed otherwise.

What works best for me: having company over! Many years ago when my children were small, every now and then I would get into a major cleaning mode, demanding help from evreybody, and my children would ask, "Who is coming to visit?!"