| Massive cleanup |
[Sep. 30th, 2007|02:55 pm] |
Teenager's rooms are like toxic waste dumps. Dear sweet god. I found an entire loveseat and two end tables in there! A new hole in the drywall... and sadly some mold and mildew due to an air conditioner that was leaking. That couldn't have been helping his asthma, which I why I was cleaning it the first place. I have cleaned about 80% of it now, and hope to have the rest cleaned by tonight. What a mess! I tried everything short of child abuse to get that kid to clean his room, but it was like pushing rope.
Sadly, me complaining about it HIGHLY hypocritical. My room, at that age, was in a terrible state of affairs. As a kid, I was asked to clean my room frequently, which I did with the usual "make it visually clean," with lots of junk pushed under furniture or stacked in the closet. Thinking of my mental state at the time, and why I did this, I think could be broken down into the following thought process:
1. I did not understand WHY my room should be cleaned.
2. I did not want to spend time doing this when I could be doing other things.
3. I had to clean the rest of the house all the time, and my room was my vacation from that.
4. I always knew where everything was, anyway. The system sort of worked like "what I can reach I need, everything else under a pile or tossed aside."
5. Putting things away was often inconvenient. When I washed my clothes, for instance, they could stay in hampers. Folding them and putting them away was time consuming.
6. I had low self confidence and didn't care how I appeared to others.
7. My parents nagging me led me to subconsciously resist because I didn't like them very much, and had no desire to please them.
These things ended when I moved into my own room at the FanTek house. While my room was never "clean and neat," it never got as bad as it got back home. Then, people saw my room, and I gave a damn. Pride in my appearance and things just came on its own, when I was ready.
So, to my readers, please help me round out my perception of rooms.
1. Was your room usually messy or clean as a little kid?
2. Was your room usually messy or clean as a teen?
3. Did your parents make you clean you room at those ages? If so, what was the motivation/threat/bribe?
4. How do you/will you approach this with your kids? Obviously, if you never plan to have kids, you don't need to answer. |
|
|
| Comments: |
1. When I was little I had no choice as my room was cleaned either by my mother or my grandmother.
2. When I was a teen my room was a disaster the majority of the time. About once a month I'd get tired of it on my own and clean it myself.
3. My parents didn't care when I was a teen. If it was dirty I had to close my door and if I wanted my girl friends to come over I had to stay out in the living room if the room was dirty. (Boys *had* to stay in the public areas of the house.)
4. When the girls were little I cleaned their rooms, or had them help me. Now that they are both teens I let them do things on their own. I do tell them that their rooms must be vac'd occasionally and when I decide that their rooms have lived in chaos for long enough I tell them to make their rooms ready for that... I usually give them a few days notice. If the room isn't ready for me they have to do it right then no matter what their plans may have been (going out with friends, playing games, etc.).
In CR's case he needs to keep his room clean for medical reasons and for that alone he should be motivated to keep it clean. If his room was clean you would have noticed (or he would have) the mold/mildew that was growing in his room and fix it before it bacame such a health problem.
I don't know CR's personality so I can't help you with what will motivate him for cleaning up... I do know that here we have 1 day on the weekends (usually Sat.) that when school permits we have family cleaning day. We all clean the public areas and help each other clean bedrooms.
Hope this helps!
What I did was to threaten to throw whatever was on the floor and didn't belong there. It worked. Of course, his stuff went into a box which he got back later after he got really tidy. Now he's Mr. Super tidy and is slightly OCD. Oops, did I do that?
Teenagers are just clueless. They just don't get it. They also figure if they
don't clean you will. (Actually, they are smarter than we are). Good luck!
1. Clean. I would have to help my dad clean it, and once we moved to the USA (age 4) and my dad was the income earner, my mom.
2. Once we moved to Cali (age 10) dusty, but fairly tidy as I spent most of my time in front of the computer in the living room or outside reading. After we moved back to Sweden (age 14) I never heard any moans about cleaning my room, and it grew a thick layer of dust, books and clothes that didn't get cleaned up properly until I moved out (age 18). It was never yucky things like plates or muddy trainers or pets, just a lot of dust and lack of hoovering and my closet was too small for my clothes and held mainly jackets and fancy dresses.
3. I can't remember being affected by any threats or bribes. I can't have taken them very seriously, and have clearer memories of helping my four years younger brother clean his room and my mom cursing all his sharp plastic toys everywhere. And he was really bad for plates and apple cores and mud...
4. Make it a game when they're young. When they're older? Unplug/hide battery of computer/whatever favourite pastime is until it's done. Consistently and with Mark's full support. No excuses and no change of policy. I don't anticipate a problem as I'm finding keeping Mark motivated much more difficult that I can currently envisage children would be.
My room was clean on the floor and the dresser, but the desk was always covered with all kinds of stuff. Since I did my homework at the dining room table, it wasn't a big deal.
When I was 11, I moved into a teeny tiny room (my brothers had to share my old, bigger room) and it was always clean. I didn't have a choice! I think the room is about 7 feet wide and 10-12 feet long. I had a twin bed, a big stereo (a console and two tall speakers), and a dresser in there. I couldn't have moved if it wasn't clean.
My parents never made me clean my room because my mom raised her sister, who was 9 years younger than my mom. Apparently some of their biggest fights were over my aunt cleaning her room. By the time I came around, my mom decided that it wasn't worth fighting over, so there was never any coercion over cleaning my room.
I'm never having kids, but I think I would start when they were young and teach them how to clean up after themselves. As teens, I would have a one-a-week requirement for removing any biohazards (used dishes and glasses, anything that could become a science experiment) and require that the floor can be seen. | |
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}