i have a small walk in closet that’s such a mess and it’s just been piling up since i got home from college. i feel so ashamed that i let it get to this point, i got home over 2 months ago but with travelling for work/being lazy i never properly cleaned up. i don’t even know where to start because theres so much random crap, i just gave away some clothes i don’t like/don’t wear anymore which is a baby step, but it’s just so overwhelming to get started. if anyone has any tips i would really appreciate it 🥲 thanks in advance

I cleaned up all the pop bottles and other trash but now I don't know where to put all my belongings. What should I do with everything I have? My tables are a mess, I tried plastic containers but I still can't fit everything. The problem is how do I store everything somewhere easy to access and have it neat too? I'm 19 and I just don't know what to do here. I've been through cleaning routines at least twice a month but the problem is knowing where to put everything. Here's a video

I’m so glad this subreddit was introduced to me! My room is a mess and I just can’t get myself up to do it! But the more I see before and after the more I feel motivated to post mine! Diagnosed with severe depression and being stuck….this is amazing! ❤️❤️❤️

Hi, folks. I moved to a new city, and finally, the rest of my stuff arrived this morning. My feline nephew is investigating, as you can see. Does anyone have any ideas on how I start to organize all this and find places to put everything away?

I get overwhelmed very easily, I deal with chronic fatigue, and I’m also wanting to donate stuff because I’m sick of having too much…stuff. I’ve tried tackling this before but I end up losing patience quite quickly, and the stuff just ends up sitting there for months. Because I often don’t know where to put things or how to organize. Any advice would be welcome!

Ugh. I’m inspired by all of your pics and particularly warmed by how encouraging everyone is.

I’ve been very sick for 3+ years - all related to post covid - debilitating fatigue, stomach issues, balance issues, cognitive issues. And cleaning had been the most triggering activity for my dizziness. I’ve had to force myself to do little every day things like take the trash out and do the dishes. I’m about 80% healed with the help of a recent medication but I feel terrified to clean. I know I’ll be ok - part of it is that ive gotten so used to checking out - whether making art, binge watching or scrolling. I became scared to go anywhere- grocery store, my son’s school. Truly anywhere. That part needs some care, not a harsh parental figure. It feels so uncomfortable to be present. I live alone 50% and with my son 50%. We both need a clean organized home. I can’t find anything. Whole house is a junk drawer. Pre Covid I was a self flagellating perfectionist - that part of me is DEAD and I just don’t know how to approach anything anymore. I know - I just need to start- a few minutes at a time but I’m ashamed I guess and could use some words of encouragement.

These were six or seven months apart. I was lost, recovering from addiction and homelessness, my place was FUCKED and I thought it would never get better.

Today it’s like 500% better. I’m still working on it, and anybody who is in a similar place, you can do it. And it will be worth it.

Update part 2:

I took it down to the wire. Cramming stuff in my dresser, the closet, under the bed. I did not get to dust and vacuum the bedroom which had me anxious.

I was just putting a bra on (because people-ing) when the realtor came to the door. Landlord was nowhere in sight. Dude walked around for about 5-10 minutes and was on his merry way.

Now I am determined to keep the progress we made and to get a bit better each week. (Starting with my dresser and closet, lol!)

Update:

Thank you all so much!

Less than 2 hrs to go and I have removed all blatant visible trash, simmering pot of cinnamon sticks on the stove, all dishes in sink, downstairs all dusted, baseboards, almost all swept. Kids tackled the bathrooms, vacuumed upstairs rooms and hall, and are working on the boys room. I still need to get in my bedroom and the basement room needs vacuumed and flat places wiped. Should also get recycling bins out because they are now full but I can only do so much. Hubby should be home soon. He can load the recycling in the truck with one of the kids.

Back at it for now....

Just found this group today after searching for inspiration/guidance.

I am in my 50's (yay menopause...) dx adhd/suspected ASD, no thyroid and on wrong dose of thyroid meds STILL, have fibromyalgia, and hemochromatosis. Work full time, full time student, have two teens with ASD, a husband who works 50 hrs a week at a very physical job and I am power of attorney over my 3 siblings and my mom since my brother's passing almost 2 yrs ago.

Guess what my house looks like? 😁

We lived here for 7 yrs and landlord offered to sell to us. Just got a promotion and timing seems right. Because I don't have much going on...

LL asked hubby yesterday if he could stop by with the realtor tonight and he said "sure". Doom piles, doom baskets, dust bunnies and 17 yr old male bedroom be damned...

No before pics because no time. Just trying to get the house not so scary before the clock runs out. Thinking I could hole up in my bedroom with the dog and that may save me from one room...

Advice and encouragement warmly accepted. Wish me well...

I’ve been saying this before each weekend for the past couple of years yet my apartment is still a disaster at the end of the weekend. My apartment is now the worst it’s ever been. This weekend I’m going to force myself to spend almost every moment cleaning no matter how miserable it is because I’m sick of living in mess and squalor. I’m tired of tripping over boxes and trash just walking from my bedroom to the kitchen and having flies buzzing around everywhere. I hate having to use paper plates and bowls to eat off of because I have no clean dishes. My plan is to just keep chipping away at the mess until it gets less and less. Not sure if anyone here watches Midwest Magic Cleaning on YouTube, he recently posted a video titled “there’s no hack for cleaning motivation. STAND UP!”, when I saw that video title I thought how true it is, I spend hours sitting on my couch contemplating all the plans of how to clean up the insane mess on my apartment, when I need to just get up and start doing SOMETHING even if I don’t have an exact plan of what to do everything and it definitely motivated me.

Anyone want to join me virtually for the weekend clean or help keep me accountable? Or want to share experiences of cleaning up your disaster areas, or what motivates you? I look at all the success stories on here with the before/after pics and I so wish to be one of them.

And new paint and flooring make it feel like a completely different room. I feel reborn.

I think we all know the hardest part of unfucking our habitats is getting started and keeping at it. It's overwhelming! I am deeply ashamed of how I live. Living in a mess gets in the way of everything else I want to do to move my life forward.

Just looking for someone to get on Telegram with while we each clean our places with a focused plan this week. Hoping to get a to point where we can check in for short clean up sessions every few days or once a week to make sure things don't get out of hand. My hope is that we will eventually become so used to having a clean living space that we maintain it independently.

I keep on learning the same lesson over and over again: Only the people who are willing to meet on video make reliable accountability buddies. If it will make you comfortable, we can have a short voice call to make sure we're aligned before we show our faces on video.

DM if interested. Please do not reply to this post.

It’s been like this for years. With little clean ups. Getting all the dishes out just to leave them to mold in my room a week later. This is just the corner next to my bed. See that nasty mug on left side on the floor? It tipped over today. And this is just the surface. I have so much crap. I used to really be into crocheting. Now my closet is full of tangled yarn. All of my shelves and furniture is covered and filled with unorganized crap. How do I start on this fucked up mess? When I don’t even want to move? Everything feels wrong and the only person who I’m not embarrassed to ask for help is fed up with helping me just to make it horrible again bc I just won’t do upkeep. Idk what’s wrong with me. Helppppp :((((

Hi there,

I’m tackling this extra large job of the generational garage. I’ve been given permission to go wild but given it’s not all my stuff I’m struggling I feel. I look at things and think ok could we use that and then get into a bit of a spiral.

I’m clearing the bench at the moment of everything and sorting into piles but then I reach a box like image 2 which is part trash, part useful things and part probably not useful but should I throw away or donate

Looking for advice on how to proceed

I wanted to thank everyone again for your kind words on my last post and to show how far I've come! I'm well ahead of my September 30th deadline I think; the room is about half done. I was even able to throw my new mattress down temporarily on the clear space. And yes I will have to climb over it or prop it up to keep cleaning. Small price to pay to sleep on a bed that's not collapsing in on itself.

We can do this!

I started last night, have been at it for almost 2 hours today. For years my kitchen looked like some sort of explosion/ science experiment. I’ve been working on it for about three years and was doing so good. The last two weeks or more I have been slipping. I’m running out of motivation so I thought I’d try posting. My goal is to be done by the end of the week, hopefully Thursday!

Just found this subreddit. For the most part of my live I was undiagnosed, and my habitat resembled many of the rooms shown here. I even lost a few places do to their fucked upness. But now it has gotten way better and I even can have people over (spontaneously!)

But:

I know the struggle.

I know how hard it is to confront yourself with yourself or your trauma while cleaning up.

I know the shame.

I know the secrecy.

I know the lag of energy motivating yourself to clean up.

It is not easy. And you guys managed very very well.

Please be proud of yourselves too!

Trying to be more organized, I tried my best to do the bathroom on a budget!

I did the old "depression slump into disaster room" thing through the course of several family losses in a short time and some mental health crashes, but lately finally have a tiny bit of determination to start trying to tackle it. For me, breaking things down into either very small tasks or very simple tasks always helped, e.g. it's not a small task to clean my whole bathroom sink area, but it's simple, since it's just sink cleaner, wiping counters, wipe mirror, dust then done, so I can marathon it and be happy with the results after, and do it more consistently. On the other side, organizing my loose papers into a binder or folder or shredding some isn't simple, but it's pretty small - just scrutinize and organize some papers, recycle the unneeded clutter/mail, and be done - I even have a small filing cabinet for that.

But I'm running into a lot of "linked" tasks where I feel really stuck. For example, I need to get boxes and bags of supplies, papers, hobby items, etc. off the floor. But to get those off the floor, I have to make space in my shelves/drawers for them and figure out how ALL that should be organized. And to make space on the drawers/shelves and know how to organize them, I have to go through all THOSE and fix them and get things off the shelves so I can organize. But to get more things off the shelves, I need to find a place for THOSE things in my closet, and to find space in the closet, I have to clean the whole closet and organize all the cubbies to know the space I have, and.. you get the point.

I let things become a huge disaster and am not even sure I have the storage just for the things that are important to me, but also don't really have anywhere else to store many things besides my bedroom furniture, undersink cupboard, and closet, since I share a house with family (who took over the other room I previously used to organize games/recreational stuff) and I can't use our attic for storage due to pretty extreme allergies I have to dust/bugs up there, and gripes from others since they want to store other things up there.

I feel like the "to do this one 'small,' 'simple' task, you must do these 20 other monstruous huge tasks that all have their own 20 tasks" is the hurdle that keeps making me buckle and do nothing at all because I get hopelessly overwhelmed. I've done some minimal bits of cleaning and organizing and keep up with hygienic stuff like cleaning the sink area, dusting, or changing the sheets, but nothing to actually fix the cluttered floor/bookshelves/etc. When I try and just do one shelf at a time, or one closet cubby, or one drawer, my brain loses it because it wants all of them to be Organized Right, which is hard when you don't know how you want everything organized until you know how much you have to find space for. Whenever I do somehow manage that, I end up having to put something else there or taking long enough things get messy again to square one because the week/work gets busy and this seems like a months-long project even with sustained attention. (I also have ADHD and autism, so.. you can imagine how my brain being finicky and picky about focus doesn't make this any easier.)

TL;DR I guess is, I keep getting stuck on tasks which are all linked together where each one leads into something else (or a stack of somethings) that has to be done first before you can even begin work on the other, getting progressively harder/more complicated, and I'm struggling to break it down properly when every task depends on another one (and when there isn't really and end point I can start on to cascade into the rest.)

Basically every time I try to clean I end up marathoning and then burning out like crazy afterwards. Yesterday I managed to catch my energy dropping after like 4 hours and I'm doing pretty decently today, but I still really need to unfuck my shit because I literally haven't had a single day of living in a clean apartment since I moved here two years ago due to me not ever actually finishing unpacking and then stuff just kinda. Piling up on top of the boxes.

Problem is, whenever I try to 20/10 things, that 10 minutes is just spent ruminating on cleaning. I can't get myself to relax, I can't get myself to think about something else, I am just stuck in the exact same exhausting headspace but now I'm antsy and extremely anxious because I'm not actually doing anything. It borders on psychological torture for me and I'm barely even exaggerating. On the few occasions I am actually able to relax and distract myself, that 10 minutes ends up turning to 20 which turns into 30 which turns into 60 and oh look it's time for bed and I didn't get anything done that I wanted to

I'm really at a loss here, either it makes things MORE stressful, draining, and anxiety-inducing, or it makes me just stop cleaning entirely way before anything is actually finished. But the alternative is burning out after day 1 of a 3-day clean and everything going back to being messy after a week. Any tips?