My house is immaculate! I cleaned all the things!
Not really. My house IS immaculate, but I didn't clean any of the things. I hired a maid service, and they come every other week and clean all the things. And you know what? I'm absolutely, completely, 100 percent okay with paying someone to clean my house, even though I am a housewife and I should be doing it myself.
In my career, I spent a lot of time trying to work on my weaknesses so that they were not impairments in my ability to do my job. And through my work with students with disabilities, and my own struggles with ADHD, I've also learned to accept limitations and/or find ways to accommodate learning or functioning differences. For example, my students who had difficulty reading were given text-to-speech software to read their textbooks to them. They gleaned the necessary information from the textbooks, just in a different way.
In my career as a housewife, I recognize I have many strengths, but cleaning is not one of them.
I tried. I made cleaning schedules. I told myself to clean one extra thing each day. I tried to put things away after I used them. And all that happened is that I got frustrated and mad because I couldn't do it, and the house just got messier and dirtier. I finally had to accept my limitations and figure out a way to accommodate them. I had to find my reading software.
Enter MaidBrigade. They clean my house for me while I am doing the sixteen other things I need or want to do in a day, and I give them a check for doing what I can't do. Yes, it's an additional expense. Yes, it's a luxury. But it's also stress relief for me. I have 32 years of life experience that tell me that I can't keep anything clean for an extended period of time (Hello! Tell-tale sign of ADHD! Blinking neon sign! Anyone?!?) Rather than listen to everyone tell me that it is my job as a housewife to clean the house and then ultimately feel like a failure at my job because I can't do this simple, normal task, I found my accommodation.
I found a way to clean all the things.
(Thanks, Allie Brosh, for my post title... AGAIN!)
1. Going to look up more on that reading thing for my son. 2. Glad you got a maid; thinking of getting one myself. 3. Followed your blog from SITS. Visit me anytime at Redo101.blogspot.com
ReplyDeleteVisiting from SITS! Thanks for sharing your blog! My husband and I just moved from Milwaukee (technically Tosa, that's right, I said Tosa just like I'm a local)! We lived there for five years, and now we're in St. Louis!
ReplyDeleteGreat blog post. I came over from SITS. :-)
ReplyDeleteGood for you! Ya know, I'm a big believer in knowing your weaknesses and accepting them as well. Develop your strengths... why spend so much time and energy trying to undo your weaknesses instead of really excelling at something you're good at? Get a maid service, and focus on things that are more important, enjoyable, and fulfilling to you!
ReplyDeleteP.S. I'm so glad you're blogging again. PLEASE continue...
Cool, you're a famous blogger.
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad you've cleaned all the things. I'm all for it!!! :)
And please keep sharing your housewife of milwaukee thoughts.. even though you won't be a housewife much longer.. :)