Clutter, it drives me crazy!

Post Reply New Topic

I like to think of myself as a minimalistic kind of guy. Yes I have my splurges but have reasons for them.

For the past few year my wife has slowly accumulated clothes for her and our two children. We live in a sizable house, but over the past few months I’ve reached a tipping point. There is stuff everywhere! My kids drag out things, my wife has piles of clothes stacked on dressers and in our closet. I just can’t deal with it anymore.

I try to talk to her about it and get met with opposition. If she only had more help from me, if she had more time, there are plenty of things you don’t need have all been excuses. On the latter I responded find anything we don’t use of mine and I will throw it out. She found three items that later went into a garage sale (one of which she asked to use recently and then gave me an earful for selling it). I will watch the kids, clean up, but I just don’t understand it. I’ve hit a point where I just started walking around the messes.

And instead of solving the problem with organizing it just gets moved around. Drives me insane. I’ve explained if the kids have access to all of this stuff at once it will get thrown on the floor. I suggested a library checkout system to minimize. Time wise I could easily spend 10min to every hr they play picking up. This equates to over an hr of cleanup everyday.

I don't understand it either. Clutter drives me crazy, it's like living in a rubbish dump.
Where I am now someone has a hoarding problem. Just keeps all this garbage - yesterday I found these plastic figurines of naked baby angels all over a kitchen shelf. What possible use would anyone have for plastic naked baby angels?
My system is minimal. I only have what I need, and minimal equipment for my interests. Everything is designed to be streamlined - e.g. kitchenware is silicone and compresses, smaller items stack inside larger etc so it all compresses down to a flat disk. With everything orderly and minimal it's easier to keep living spaces clean. If there's clutter and crap everywhere, nothing ever gets cleaned.
But I move about, so everything must be movable, and I don't think I could ever manage a wife and children. Im not sure how you persuade especialky children not to be messy.

It drives me crazy as well. I am trying to do the minimalist thing myself.

I can't stand it either which is why I am often cleaning and I have taken toys away from my kids for not picking it up.

Clutter, especially at work will drive me to absolute madness and I end up stimming aggressively for the whole day. Work period makes me stim endlessly but if its disorganized and takes longer for me to find the boxes I need in this warehouse I work in then I'll be angry for the whole day. And after work for several hours.

It just feels like there's so much more "on my mind" and I have a much harder time concentrating on my job. When it's a little empty in the warehouse and there's fewer people (oh... fewer NTs... awesome) then I can relax a little more. Things have to be efficient for me at work and at home or else... fireworks baby.

_________________
*** High Functioning Autism - Asperger's Syndrome ***

ADHD, OCD, and PTSD.

Keep calm and stim away.