Welcome to City-Data.com Forum!
U.S. CitiesCity-Data Forum Index
Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Non-Romantic Relationships
 [Register]
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
View detailed profile (Advanced) or search
site with Google Custom Search

Search Forums  (Advanced)
Reply Start New Thread
 
Old 09-17-2017, 04:57 PM
 
9,891 posts, read 11,723,300 times
Reputation: 22086

Advertisements

We both like a neat and clean house, so starting in the 1970s, we started having a woman housekeeper come in 3 days a week to clean it. We are both in our latter 80s now, and our present housekeeper has been with us for 4 years, and is more like a grand daughter than a housekeeper normally is as far as our relationship with her. She is definitely the highest paid housekeeper in town, and she looks after us like a mother hen. We have a 3,700 sq. ft. 4 level home, and we need her to keep it clean.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message

 
Old 09-17-2017, 06:20 PM
 
13,395 posts, read 13,459,503 times
Reputation: 35711
Tip: Hire a cleaning service. They can come in once a month, every two weeks, or whatever schedule you need. Unless your spouse is an outright slob, by the time the house gets dirty again, the cleaning service will be back.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-17-2017, 06:39 PM
 
2,951 posts, read 2,507,962 times
Reputation: 5292
Why we have a maid service.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-17-2017, 07:41 PM
 
Location: New Jersey
560 posts, read 538,046 times
Reputation: 872
My husband was a neat freak and I detested living among clutter but didn't mind dust bunnies here and there, few dishes in sink.

Upon living together and married life with two full-time jobs outside the house, our early married years was in a very doable 1,050 square 2 bed/2 bath condo which we both kept fairly clean and clutter free, it wasn't until we bought and moved into our current 2,700 square feet that we realized each other's quirks drove each other crazy. He hated my lassiare faire attitude towards neatness/cleaniness and I hated how he didn't mind the clutter of mail, mags, newspapers etc lying around.

Over the years since agreeing on hiring a house cleaner to come every 2 weeks which has been a godsend for us and our marriage! we also morphed into each other's, I became more fussier about keeping house cleaner and he became more adept in keeping the house/helping me clutter down to a minimum. I'm pretty ruthless at purging/donating/throwing out stuff which happens every 1-2 months easily, and now it's literally down as far clutter is our kids homework stuff which has a place that it stays when finished/waiting to be done, our mail/billing/organization which has its own system, and mail as well. I can't live with a mild/serious slob/hoader/clutterer as grew up with a parent who had a habit of cluttering and buying the most useless stuff all the time. Drove me crazy.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-17-2017, 07:50 PM
 
Location: New Yawk
9,196 posts, read 7,209,082 times
Reputation: 15314
Quote:
Originally Posted by HappyFarm34 View Post
For all of you with a spouse/partner who is opposite of you in cleanliness, did you notice any signs before marriage or living together?
LOL, I knew what I was getting in to; when we were dating, I used to fold and put away his laundry, just so I'd have a place to sit. Really though, I'm more into the day-to-day operation of keeping clutter under control, while he is great at tacking major, woefully-neglected projects (closets, tool shed, etc).
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-17-2017, 07:55 PM
 
Location: New Yawk
9,196 posts, read 7,209,082 times
Reputation: 15314
Quote:
Originally Posted by runswithscissors View Post

I'll also add this was the farce of the womens' movement in the 1970s. NO, you cannot have it all if you're unwilling to have mutual ground rules which never really worked out. The men were generally raised to do nothing around the house so women foolishly decided they were desperately needing to have jobs outside the house but continued to do the JOB of RUNNING the house. Because SOMEONE has to do it. Especially if you have kids. Why would people chose to have strangers raising them?
Meh, my husband wasn't "raise to" do housework either, but that's the reality of both spouses working. I grew up with a single father (who was raised by a single mother) and I was raised with the notion that shyt needs to get done, and it doesn't matter which gender does it. I expect nothing less from a life partner. Thankfully, my husband grew up to deeply resent proscribed gender roles, so we split the grunt work.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-17-2017, 08:40 PM
 
2,911 posts, read 2,031,291 times
Reputation: 5153
Quote:
Originally Posted by NickofDiamonds View Post
My wife and I are very compatible when it comes to the topic of house cleanliness.
I never argue with her when she is cleaning the house and always tell her what a great job she is doing !
This...plain and simple.

We are both "neat freaks" (thank God). We do not feel comfortable in a "dirty" house.

We actually make fun of people who insist on hiring a house cleaner (even though one of them doesn't work) since we managed all these years with both of us working full time jobs and having two kids at home. But to each his own.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-17-2017, 08:49 PM
 
2,911 posts, read 2,031,291 times
Reputation: 5153
Quote:
Originally Posted by oldtrader View Post
We both like a neat and clean house, so starting in the 1970s, we started having a woman housekeeper come in 3 days a week to clean it. We are both in our latter 80s now, and our present housekeeper has been with us for 4 years, and is more like a grand daughter than a housekeeper normally is as far as our relationship with her. She is definitely the highest paid housekeeper in town, and she looks after us like a mother hen. We have a 3,700 sq. ft. 4 level home, and we need her to keep it clean.
I agree with this. I stated in my post how my wife and I "make fun" of people who hire a house cleaner. But we both agreed that when we get up in age and can't do the normal things we used to do, we would be hiring someone to maintain the household like you.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-18-2017, 12:00 AM
 
6,192 posts, read 7,331,601 times
Reputation: 7569
Quote:
Originally Posted by diddlydudette View Post
I'm just curious how it works out if one spouse is a lot cleaner or messier than the other. How do you deal?
I don't think I'd marry a slob. I don't think I'd marry a super anal neat freak either. We're sort of even.

Quote:
Originally Posted by sheena12 View Post

So how do we deal with it? I tell him to clean his stuff up. He says I'm a control freak or something, I nag him to clean up - he does- and then he goes back to his old messy ways.

Been doing that for thirty years. Works for us.

I try not to bother my husband too much but I always have to ask him to clean out "his drawer" that somehow holds five hundred pounds of stuff and I ask him to clean his closet. He wants to have "his drawer" and tells me to leave him alone. But eventually he'll clean it and eventually it'll get messy again.

Anything else, if I ask him to clean, he'll do it. I told him he cannot die before me because I will not find another man so willing to clean the dishes.

I'm more of an organizational freak and I try to tell my husband what goes where.



I wouldn't make fun of anyone wanting to hire someone to come in and clean. I don't enjoy cleaning, I love being outside, so I'd rather spend my time with my husband on the little shared time we have together (since we work different shifts and have for years and I work every other weekend) as opposed to cleaning. I'd rather someone clean while I make my 20K steps in a day.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 09-18-2017, 12:52 AM
 
Location: Glasgow Scotland
18,504 posts, read 18,652,213 times
Reputation: 28714
We are totally different... He leaves things lying where he will find them, that means everywhere, when I tidy as I go. and Im forever putting things away in drawers..much to his annoyance...He never closed a drawer or cupboard. which drives me mental, but I continually shut them over and put away his never ending mess... He drapes jackets over doors, I had three to put away yesterday, as he had been out wearing his good jacket.. then his rain jacket to take the dog out.. and a heavy jacket as it got colder later... He seems to think this gives the house a quirky look............it doesnt. its messy and poor looking and drives me bananas..... Then we have bathtime for bonzo..... he needs three towels...WHY I wonder, he doesnt have that much to dry and very short hair.. so they al get left on the bathroom floor for Minnie the Maid to pick up along with the bath to clean for him.. Ive never known him in forty years to clean a bath..... He also says that making a bed is futile as it only gets messed up again........The strange thing is ... if I left the house for one day messy he d probably go crazy..... He asks me to hoover while hes at the park with the dog... as it annoys him.... I like other women love the noise of a hoover you understand... we dont get annoyed, we love cleaning , especially cleaning after some untidy man... When I dig out the hoover and steam cleaning each morning I see him peer over his specs in hatred. the love........maybe I should get him a set of mufflers to protect his delicate wee ears.. or move him gently to another area of the house to prevent his annoyance at me and that noisy machine... He claims too that houses dont need hoovered twice a day, and wonders how toilet bowls get cleaned on their own.. he thinks we have a self cleaning one. You may ask how I havent gone round the twist with all this... maybe I have and dont know..Im so well conditioned at being an idiot...
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.

Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.


Reply
Please update this thread with any new information or opinions. This open thread is still read by thousands of people, so we encourage all additional points of view.

Quick Reply
Message:

Over $104,000 in prizes was already given out to active posters on our forum and additional giveaways are planned!

Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Non-Romantic Relationships

All times are GMT -6. The time now is 04:40 AM.

© 2005-2024, Advameg, Inc. · Please obey Forum Rules · Terms of Use and Privacy Policy · Bug Bounty

City-Data.com - Contact Us - Archive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 - Top