How to Keep House While Drowning: A gentle approach to cleaning and organising

Have you ever noticed it’s easier to do something when a friend is with you? Even if they don’t help, there is something about the presence of another person that can make doing tasks easier.

Ignoring everything but that one category helps to keep you on track and not get distracted.

Having a goal of momentum is great because it frees you to start with tasks that actually matter to you.

No one just walks out the door to go to whatever assuming the other will watch the kids. Instead, we game plan what we need or would like to get done that weekend by way of both obligation and fun. It’s not about getting permission; it’s about giving respect.

Next time you are trying to talk yourself into doing a care task, what would it be like to replace the voice that says, “Ugh, I should really go clean my house right now because it’s a disaster,” with “It would be such a kindness to future me if I were to get up right now and do _______. That task will allow me to experience comfort, convenience, a

This is not a journey of worthiness but a journey of care. A journey of learning how we can care for ourselves when we feel like we are drowning.

I’ve learned that I do well with daily and weekly rhythms. So I started doing laundry every Monday even when there were still clean clothes left, washing the sheets every Thursday even if they weren’t “too dirty,” and running my dishwasher every night even if it wasn’t full.

Baskets of shoes, baskets of books, baskets in all my crannies and nooks. And here’s the key, here’s the trick: the baskets go where the stuff already went. Laundry that ends up on the dining room floor, put a basket there and there’s mess no more. The stress of a cluttered counter easily ends when you put it all in a box or a bin. If you’re feelin

Environmentalism is important. But we are not going to fix the earth by shaming people with mental health and neurodiverse needs out of adaptive routines they need to function.