Cleaning and Your Role

COH & ACOA Joined: Jul 22, 2006 Posts: 2049 Location: Cabo

Cleaning and Your Role :
Were you responsible for cleaning the home, or not allowed to? What was your parents' reaction when you cleaned? Did you adapt a crisis cleaning mind-set, or not at all? Did you have chores? Were you taught how to clean and routines? Experiences/Thoughts/Feelings

Posted: Mon Mar 17, 2008 2:07 pm Post subject:

Thinking about the issues from the past is very interesting. Thanks for the prompt Donna.

In our home we were taught how (admonished?) to do things perfectly AND we crisis cleaned. For example, I remember being taught how to make hospital corners with the bed sheets, but I don't recall ever making my bed- on a regular basis anyway. I know the importance of washing glasses and dishes in a certain order and how to stack them in the drying rack correctly, but most of my memories of actually washing dishes are from the days I knew our father would be home for dinner rather than working late as he did a few nights a week.

On the nights that he was expected home everyone was on crisis clean mode. I'd hustle home from 4th or 5th grade and wash as many dishes as I could while someone else stuffed pots and pans in the oven and miscellaneous crap behind the easy chair or in the closet.

Posted: Fri Mar 21, 2008 8:10 am Post subject:

Yes, we were allowed to clean, mum wanted more help than we gave. I guess it just seemed so hard and almost pointless to try and clean around all that was there. Discouraging and insurmountable, so that even the basic everyday things seemed too much to bother with.

She didn't really blame us a lot or get really angry... an occasional "I do wish you kids would help me more" and we probably deserved that ... especially as she genuinely had a lot of health issues. But she got discouraged too, or was quite ill at times, and didn't keep up with things. Occasionally we'd find her in her room crying in discouragement and hopelessness. The state of the place really distressed her. Dad's opinion was generally that he worked so he shouldn't have to help, and as long as his chair was clear and he could find what he wanted, it didn't seem to bother him too much. They are both hoarders, just in different ways, with different ways of dealing with the situation.

Yes, we did learn the basics- I know *what to do* and *how to do it*... we just didn't do it very often, so it never became habit, and I struggle with this daily now. It has never become instinctive or easy... and I'm 47 and have lived away from there for 25 years or something now.

Valued Member Joined: Mar 25, 2008 Posts: 3

Man, I was in high school when I was suddenly assigned all the normal housecleaning duties.. which I hated. I remember letting the dishes go for days and getting taken home in the middle of a school play I'd attended, in front of everyone, when she marched in. She was compulsive about having the floors vacuumed and the dishes done and the living room straightened when she came home at the end of the day... while all the clothes piled up around the house and all the boxes filled the garage until there wasn't any room. At the same time, when my friends said she took advantage of me, I defended her because she was a single mom. I didn't realize until years later how messed up it was.

Augh, and I just remembered when I was 10 the time she told us that a "magazine photographer" was coming to our house, so the house had to be perfect. My sister and I spent hours and hours trying to clean our room and the house, covering the piles with blankets, doing what we could... and it turned out her friend was just coming to take pictures of the place for fun, and she never came over at all. I still don't know what she was trying to accomplish.

Valued Member Joined: Mar 20, 2008 Posts: 27

I didn't have a routine that I was held to. It was mostly self-motivated because I liked a clean room. Also, due to my dad's messiness, I didn't want to be like that. He drank a lot, so I would pick up the empty beer bottles, soda bottles, candy wrappers, etc. because he was more a child than I was. I never saw him lift a finger to clean, ever. It was my Mom or I. He was a totally self-focused and selfish person.

Active Member Joined: Mar 27, 2008 Posts: 54

No, no chores, absolutely no responsibilities and not allowed to do much, either.
(I'm new, HI!)
I was allowed to start the washer/dryers, but not load them. I wasn't allowed to cook, alone, not even as a teenager. I certainly couldn't open the door.

I remember cleaning the sink. I did it for 'fun'. Looking back, it must have been one way to express control over the situation. I didn't clean much else, I didn't know how. Mom would come help me crisis clean, occasionally. I couldn't do it alone.

My kids are BETTER. They love to clean up their (the two older girls) room, their baby sister's room, the bathroom, the dishes, etc. YAY!

Valued Member Joined: Mar 20, 2008 Posts: 27

This is really about the dynamics of our own home when the children still lived with us. I should have guided and directed my children more. They got away with too much, like going out or watching tv when their rooms weren't clean. When they were in the 8th grade, the best thing I did was announce to the family (including husband) that everyone was responsible for their own laundry - period. I must have been really fed up one day from the lack of cooperation. That made life soooooo much easier, that I just took care of towels and my own laundry. The kids had to wash their own sheets too, but that took quite a bit of prodding. I was mostly home, so I gave in and spoiled them by not insisting they do x number of chores per week.

Interestingly, our home was pretty traditional, and while I worked part-time, I still did 99% of the housework.

If I had it to do over, I would have laid the law down from the early years.

Both are grown now and live out of state (and the country), so I am wondering how clean their homes are right now - lol.

COH Under 18 yrs. Joined: Feb 15, 2008 Posts: 98

So far it's pretty much been the same way for me as atroyer, but I had scouts and that let me work and do stuff and learn how to clean. It's funny because I get really serious about cleaning and take too long making everything perfect when I'm at scouts (having my own area and people and stuff) so sometimes it's like "dude come on!"

New Member Joined: Apr 06, 2008 Posts: 1

We were asked to clean and given jobs, however we couldn't do them perfectly enough. You know how there could be ten different ways to do a job correctly . . . well you had to wash the dish Mom's way . . . you had to wash the bathtub Mom's way . . . she had to control how it was done. The goal was impossible to achieve to her standards. Then of course we were at fault because it wasn't done correctly. The killer was when you were asked to clean your room, but there was no place to put things (insert a big eyeroll).

Posted: Wed Apr 09, 2008 1:47 am Post subject:

Who else remembered "raking the rug"?

Valued Member Joined: Apr 23, 2008 Posts: 5

WE DIDN'T HAVE CHORES THAT WE DID BUT SHE WOULD MAKE US CLEAN IN WAS SUCH A MESSED UP WAY SHE WOULD GET SOOO MAD IF WE WOULD THROW AWAY EMPTY SOUR CREAM CONTANERS OR MOVED THINGS OR TRIED TO PUT THING "SOMEWHERE" WE WOULD RUSH TO COVER CLEAN OR "MAKE IT LOOK NICE" WHEN SHE KNEW SOMEONE WAS COMING OVER. SHE WOULD YELL AT US TELLING US WE WERE MESSY AND SHE WOULDN'T HAVE SUCH A MESS IF WE WOULD PICK US ARE STUFF AND HER STUFF WAS TO MAKE THE HOUSE BETTER ( HOW DOES BANNANA CREATE MAKE THE HOUSE BETTER AND I DONT MEAN 12 OR 15 I'M TALKING 6 OR 7 DOZEN) MY SISTER AND I WERE TALKING ABOUT WHEN I WAS LITTLE MY ROOM WAS OCD CLEAN MY DOG TURNED OVER MY RAT CAGE AND GOT SAWDUST ALL OVER I SAT AT THE END OF THE STAIRS AND BEAT MY HEAD WITH A PAPER TOWEL ROLL AND CRYED SHE SAID IT WAS BECAUSE MY ROOM WAS THE ONLY PLACE I HAD CONTROL OVER AND WHEN IT GOT MESSY IT WAS OVERLOAD FOR MY BRAIN I FIND I'M STILL THAT WAY ABOUT ALOT OF THINGS IN MY LIFE. AND I STILL RUSH TO CLEAN WHEN PEOPLE COME OVER IT HAS TAKIN ALOT NOT TO LEAD THE LIFE MY MOM SHOWED UP GROWING UP. IT'S SOMETHING I REMIND MYSELF EVERYDAY " DO YOU NEED THIS, WILL YOU BE LESS WITHOUT IT, DOES IT MEAN ALOT TO YOU. IF THE ANWSER IS NO IT GO'S.

Valued Member Joined: Apr 28, 2008 Posts: 13

This is really helpful. I am so grateful I found this site. Didn't realize I still needed a support group. I was the only one who cleaned up. I had an older brother who did nothing. My mom did nothing. Left food on plates all over the house. Dried up molded food ok... So I'm getting ready to say something that hurts a lot. Considering I used to get hurt in the house often because of the way it was, that didn't make me start cleaning. When I got raped, I started cleaning. My brother was in the navy boot camp and his buddy asked for some water because he knew my brother wasn't around. I said ok. I told him to wait out in the hall..we were in an apartment then, and I closed the door. Because we never had clean dishes, I had to climb on a chair and wash a glass out. As I was washing the glass, he was in the house and had locked the door. I was 11 years old. After that, I was cleaning up like crazy regardless if the house was going to look the same the next day or not. I kept that to myself until I was in the 10th grade. And cleaned up every day after school before I went to work at a fast food restaurant. I started working at 14 to get away. Was failing high school but none of that mattered. Cleaning up and and putting blankets over the piles to pretend the place looked normal was the only thing I was there to do. To this day, when I am angry...I clean up. This is serious therapy for me right now.

COH & ACOA Joined: Jul 22, 2006 Posts: 2049 Location: Cabo

Chell,
I am so so sorry for what happened to you at such a young age.

As I'm sure you know, (and I'm no mental health pro- Going nuts

just a COH who can relate), what happened was not about sex, it was about having *control* over another person.
By cleaning, I bet it was your way to get a feeling of control back. Control over your environment-visible proof you were in control. Kind of like what hoarders do to feel in "control", but just the opposite direction.

There are worse coping mechanisms out there than cleaning to have as an adult! (read: drugs, booze, etc.)

I hope you have received some healing therapy to deal with such a traumatic event in your childhood.
Thank you for sharing with us here.

friends & support

Donna

Valued Member Joined: Apr 28, 2008 Posts: 13

Thanks you Donna. I had counseling and am able to express what happened to me freely. It was horrible and I am finally adjusting to life.