Really struggling with cleaning/ household tasks

One has to clean or things get out of control.  I force myself to clean.

This was my late mother's house when she refused to clean for years.  I discovered that she refused to vacuum for around ten years despite owning a working vacuum cleaner.

With age she lost all perspective and put the plant pot there so no one would notice the mould.

Without cleaning the black and red mould got out of control  and spores in the air affects people breathing.

I always look at the above image to motivate me to clean.

Morning.

That's a great list of cleaning tips.  People will find that list very helpful if they are struggling with cleaning tasks too.  It's a really kind thing to give in one of your first posts here.

Welcome!  Hope to run into you again soon on these pages.

Have a happy Tuesday.

Kind regards, Number.

Bio family constantly criticised me for a this on top of everything.

I do not only suffer from Autism and learning disabilities and difficulties but things like;

Bpd

Severe depression

Anxiety

C-ptsd

Inflammatory disorder which puts me in agony every day as well as mild asthma.

To also note because of my hygiene, I've been living in black mold for YEARS which makes all these things worse, its ruined for mint condition furniture and has cost me 1000s.

Family also came at me for making excuses, hiding behind my disabilities as excuse, call me names and look down at me like I was this disgusting thing,  they were never satisfied no matter what I did so I stopped trying.

Reason I'm putting these things down cuz if this sounds familiar, really consider if remaining with people who criticise you for what you struggle with is a good idea or at least try talk to them.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------CLEANING TIPS

•As for cleaning, I've made rules such as, you use something put it back or clean right away, clean things associated with it or areas, anything comes to mind do it right away deoending how much work youve done already, do what I can do till finished finished or my body starts to play up.

•It might also be worth setting up prompts on your phone and do them right away and put yourself on a timer.

•Have a playlist for cleaning or only ever listen to music while cleaning.

•Put your shoes on everytime you go clean.

•Break it down into smaller tasks to do everyday or a room a day if you are up to it

•defo reward yourself after you've done

With mine I had help from family who arent horrible to me, so I have to keep it up for them after all theyve done for me and I plan not to go back to that again.

I really hate Chores with a passion but I have to do them, I've taken it apon myself since I'm always tired and a little achy plug music in and get started until either finished or if I get too achy.

I don't even think too into it and work through it, I have pets so I HAVE TO lol, for you do it for yourself, no one else and just think it'll be great for the long run! So many problems avoided and life is easier plus if anything were to happen to ya or recieving unexpected visits at least house is tidy.

Obvs you don't have to do all of these listed, just pick a couple and see if they work for you, take care!

So do you guys have any advice clening your room very fast

it's fine, I thought one of naughty boys is trying to make a prank on me

That would be me, sorry if my netiquette is a bit rusty, been a while since I posted anything online.

The only thing I can suggest, which helps me, is to break any tasks down into manageable chunks where it is easy to complete one chunk at a time. That way, you know you won't be doing it for long and not get bored with it. Then, wait a while before taking on the next chunk and so on...

haha who brings those 2 years old topics to the front?

@Bluemoon has a nice idea, that would work normally, but won't if it's burnout

if you live with someone I vote for division of labour, e.g. I do dishwashing because I can't stand dirty plates so you take rubbish out, etc.

I lived with many flatmates, cleaning rota never works. after a month I was the only one doing any cleaning

cookies78 said:

been criticised

they shouldn't be doing that

it eventually leads to feeling resentful, and then you start ghosting them

Could it be burnout? I've just recovered from one, and when it hit me I couldn't do anything, except going from bed to the toilet for 2 months, and eating what I found in a kitchen

you have ADHD as well, mine gets out of control at higher temperatures, basically over 25 degree C I can't focus on anything, ADHD keeps distracting me finding other things to focus on

so they shouldn't critise you, they should up their sleeves and do it for you for as long as it is neccessary for you to recover, otherwise you just prolong burnout

I have exactly this problem, explaining it to anyone is seemingly impossible. Going to try some of these suggestions and see if they work for me.

I really struggle with this too. Its a mix of my mental health and autism. I lack motivation and drive to do every day chores. Im sorry ive no advice but i understand. My boyf doesnt understand snd thinks im lazy. 

I often think I need an autistic neighbour, I would pop in and clean their house and they would do mine.

There's something about being able to enter and leave.. And be objective and unemotional about what I'm cleaning.. that I can't apply to my own home. 

Thanks for reminding me to put the bins out, LOL! Yes never like a big list, one small step at a time.

Hmm, yes; I have rather a problem with this myself - I find it hard enough to keep my person clean and tidy, never mind my home.

As suggested in the OP, it's certainly an attentional problem at some level. The people who I share my computer programs with always comment on how meticulously neat and tidy they are - I wouldn't dream of uploading something with graphics that look skewed by so much as one pixel, or lining up all of the "=" signs in the code. I was once nicknamed "Midas" by a supervisor because I could never resist "gold-plating" everything, and writing a couple of paragraphs for a forum post can  take me an hour or two sometimes, by the time I've obsessed about every single word (or rather, I write fifty paragraphs, then struggle to edit down - hence my rather TL;DR posts quite often).

Meanwhile, I could have a bag of rubbish that needs putting out in the middle of the kitchen floor that I'll step around for weeks, apparently not conscious of the inconvenience or even the existence of the thing (until  I trip over it and it bursts, followed by the inevitable melt-down!). If archaeologists carefully chipped away at the brown encrustation sat next to my computer, I might rediscover what made my favourite coffee mug so appealing!

Lists don't work for me at all; they just end up becoming a focus for procrastination, and I have really bad completion anxiety, so I don't feel like I can start until I have a detailed plan for acheiving everything on the list - and I'm never satisfied with the plan, so I just tinker with it until I give up because the list is just a mess of arrows and crossings-out.

Favours required by other people are never anything like such a problem as self-directed tasks - I'll happily visit a friend to have a go at fixing their washing machine even when mine's been broken for months (there's never a "round tuit" in my toolbox!) It removes the element of "deciding", which is far more of a problem for me than the "doing". I've been noticeably better since I moved into a bedsit with the landlady living downstairs; I even do all the hoovering because she has a disability which prevents her from doing it herself.

Something that I have found works quite well is to make use of the ubiquitous camera-phone. Rather than writing lists, I take a picture of the offending mess, and put it up on my PC somewhere that I'm bound to notice it (the desktop background even). Besides the reminder, it really helps me to feel like I've achieved something if I can directly compare before and after - it makes what I've done seem more "real" somehow, even if the "after" is still not as tidy as I would really like.

I also use my PC's calendar a lot, too. For example; I get a notification every Thursday that it's bin-day tomorrow, and try not to let mysef dismiss it until I've completed the task. Rather than a long list, I get presented with just one thing to do right now, which is much less overwhelming. The "do anything rather than nothing" tactic can work quite well too, sometimes - if I find myself procrastinating about which task to do out of a list, I'll choose one completely at random to take away the decision making part of the problem (I have a little computer script that I often use, but dice or pointing without looking would do just as well, I guess).

The most frustrating part, I find, is that I just don't seem able to describe this problem to anyone in a way that they'll understand. Social services etc. just don't get why I need help with it; the usual response is to suggest that I'm depressed, or at most, to offer remedial lessons in the practicalities of how to clean things. You would think that with more awareness of ADHD, Alzheimer's, etc. these days that they wouldn't be quite so clueless.

I totally get your problem. I work from home a lot and my wife is always giving me grief for not doing the house work. She says I leave it because I think she will do it but I don't. I simply don't look at it because today I am doing something else. Each morning before I get up I make sure I give myself a manageable task for each day. Like today I am painting some cupboards, yesterday I did the hoovering. . We did have a cleaner for about 6 months and it was great, can't afford it now though. I would just take things one small job at a time and in a month you will have made a great deal of diffrence.

Hello,

yes too. I've always berated myself for never being interested in cleaningor home improvement. Now I know since diagnosis, I put it down to a task that that is just not on my list- too interested in other things to do. Now that I can see why. Cleaning is an anxiety thing- it gets too much.

I tried cleaning once - the dirt came back.    I leant my lesson. 

I really enjoy coming here because i can totally relate to you all. For the first time i feel i'm not alone.

I could have written this myself. My flat is a mess, i can understand quantum science but i can't keep a house cleaned. My fridge is a nightmare... at home i just don't know what is supposed to do.

I really believe that autistic adults need formal tutors to help us in household.

Anyway, here are my fragile strategies:

saturday

1st - clean the toilet - 20 minutes

2nd - clean the hall - 15 minutes

3rd - clean my bedroom - 1 h

4th - clean the kitchen - 2h30 min

sunday

1st - clean the living room - 1h

2nd - clean my desk - never  ending job

I can't do this every weekends, sometimes can only do this twice a month. My flat is never cleaned and i feel ashamed of having visitors because of that, which is not quite an issue for me, as i have no friends and no relation with any relatives, whatsoever.

We really need formal care in this area but do you believe that NT will ever help us in our homes?

I did try one.. I planned to have ''one productive hour' instead of aiming to finish something, and in the end I achieved both those. Baby steps, but I shall be doing it again this week.