Why do people get obsessed over laundry?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:ironing pillowcases?

Some people here enjoy doing laundry.

Some people enjoy catching their food. If it isn’t stressing you or family, then there no need to delegate or simplify.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t imagine doing laundry for my kids over the age of 10. They are completely capable and should be doing their own. If you’re doing it for them consistently then you are babying them.

That's a real lack of imagination. Imagine...other households running differently than yours!
Here's one of MANY examples. My teen Ds gets home from high school basketball practice at 9:45. His practice uniform needs to be washed and dried and in his backpack by 7:15 am. Should he stay up late doing laundry? Not the best use of his time. He needs to eat, shower and go to bed.

Simple. Tell Ds to get a second practice uniform.

You know nothing. The practice uniforms are issued by the public HS. Each kid gets one jersey and one pair of shorts, and they must be washed every night, worn to every practice and brought to every game. You don't "just go get" another one.

You get another if you send your child to practice with a note explaining how the laundromat lost the uniform and you need another - Yes. I’ll pay if necessary.

This makes it easier for the child to manage their own laundry, and teaches problem solving skills.

This is especially necessary for young boys who should never be allowed to let women do their chores. He’s washing his basketball uniform, period.

You really have no understanding of high school sports. There is no "buy another one". The practice uniforms are hand me down game uniforms. They have exactly enough. The players are expected to show up with clean practice uniforms every day. The player would be punished severely for a lost uniform. No excuses.
The parent doing her HS kids practice laundry so he can sleep understands this. You don't.

I have high schoolers. What school/sport do they go to where they get 1 practice uniform for 5-6 days of practice a week? There would be an absolute rebellion on any team my kid has been on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People also have lost the ability to cook, do their own grocery shopping, and pick up their own takeout. We are the laziest society ever

You can't take it with you and time is precious.

Well this attitude is your problem right there.

If you view your time as something that should only be "spent" on things you find enjoyable or rewarding in narrowly defined ways, you are going to be a dissatisfied, impatient, unhappy person.

Being a human being in a living, mortal body requires a certain amount of caretaking. Even if in the modern world and with enough money you can outsource some of that caretaking, some of it you will NEVER be able to outsource. You can't pay someone to go poop for you, or take your showers. I guess you could outsource brushing and flossing your teeth but... why would you do this.

Learning to efficiently but diligently perform basic caretaking and hygienic functions, including laundry, is just part of being a person. Laundry truly does not take that much time unless your clothes are very hard to clean (which is a choice, especially in this day and age when most jobs allow people to wear machine washable clothes that don't need to be ironed). If you cannot dedicate the 30-40 minutes a week to laundry, then what else are you considering to be unbearable drudgery? This is such a basic activity.

This is why some religions and philosophies advise learning to engage in a form of mindful diligence, particularly while doing these daily chores. If you can find pleasure in the act of folding laundry, flossing your teeth, trimming your toddler's nails, packing a lunch, you can find true and rewarding joy in life. And when you find this, you stop having this attitude of "my time is running out, I can't waste it on these pointless chores!" Instead, you realize that true happiness comes not in clearing your schedule of all drudgery so that you can spend it laughing uproariously while sky diving and inventing an app. True happiness comes in the ability to enjoy the something as simply as the physical act of folding a t-shirt and placing it in a drawer.

When I outsourced laundry it was because I had two small children and a full time job and I was exhausted. Time can be precious for reasons that have nothing to do with whether you enjoy chores.

No one who spends time posting on DCUM on New Year's Eve should be trying to argue that their time is too precious to do laundry, sorry.

Nine times out of ten the "time is too precious for laundry" people are using their time savings to scroll tik tok, watch reality shows, or other useless activities. Outsource it if you want but don't try to pretend it's because your time is too precious. It's not.

Life is boring and full of things that we have to do but are not enjoyable. If we try to get out of too many of them, we become jerks. Look at celebrities and high level of executives - they are an extreme example of what happens to you when you remove too much friction from your life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People also have lost the ability to cook, do their own grocery shopping, and pick up their own takeout. We are the laziest society ever

You can't take it with you and time is precious.

Well this attitude is your problem right there.

If you view your time as something that should only be "spent" on things you find enjoyable or rewarding in narrowly defined ways, you are going to be a dissatisfied, impatient, unhappy person.

Being a human being in a living, mortal body requires a certain amount of caretaking. Even if in the modern world and with enough money you can outsource some of that caretaking, some of it you will NEVER be able to outsource. You can't pay someone to go poop for you, or take your showers. I guess you could outsource brushing and flossing your teeth but... why would you do this.

Learning to efficiently but diligently perform basic caretaking and hygienic functions, including laundry, is just part of being a person. Laundry truly does not take that much time unless your clothes are very hard to clean (which is a choice, especially in this day and age when most jobs allow people to wear machine washable clothes that don't need to be ironed). If you cannot dedicate the 30-40 minutes a week to laundry, then what else are you considering to be unbearable drudgery? This is such a basic activity.

This is why some religions and philosophies advise learning to engage in a form of mindful diligence, particularly while doing these daily chores. If you can find pleasure in the act of folding laundry, flossing your teeth, trimming your toddler's nails, packing a lunch, you can find true and rewarding joy in life. And when you find this, you stop having this attitude of "my time is running out, I can't waste it on these pointless chores!" Instead, you realize that true happiness comes not in clearing your schedule of all drudgery so that you can spend it laughing uproariously while sky diving and inventing an app. True happiness comes in the ability to enjoy the something as simply as the physical act of folding a t-shirt and placing it in a drawer.

When I outsourced laundry it was because I had two small children and a full time job and I was exhausted. Time can be precious for reasons that have nothing to do with whether you enjoy chores.

Millennials are always EXHAUSTED

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People also have lost the ability to cook, do their own grocery shopping, and pick up their own takeout. We are the laziest society ever

You can't take it with you and time is precious.

Well this attitude is your problem right there.

If you view your time as something that should only be "spent" on things you find enjoyable or rewarding in narrowly defined ways, you are going to be a dissatisfied, impatient, unhappy person.

Being a human being in a living, mortal body requires a certain amount of caretaking. Even if in the modern world and with enough money you can outsource some of that caretaking, some of it you will NEVER be able to outsource. You can't pay someone to go poop for you, or take your showers. I guess you could outsource brushing and flossing your teeth but... why would you do this.

Learning to efficiently but diligently perform basic caretaking and hygienic functions, including laundry, is just part of being a person. Laundry truly does not take that much time unless your clothes are very hard to clean (which is a choice, especially in this day and age when most jobs allow people to wear machine washable clothes that don't need to be ironed). If you cannot dedicate the 30-40 minutes a week to laundry, then what else are you considering to be unbearable drudgery? This is such a basic activity.

This is why some religions and philosophies advise learning to engage in a form of mindful diligence, particularly while doing these daily chores. If you can find pleasure in the act of folding laundry, flossing your teeth, trimming your toddler's nails, packing a lunch, you can find true and rewarding joy in life. And when you find this, you stop having this attitude of "my time is running out, I can't waste it on these pointless chores!" Instead, you realize that true happiness comes not in clearing your schedule of all drudgery so that you can spend it laughing uproariously while sky diving and inventing an app. True happiness comes in the ability to enjoy the something as simply as the physical act of folding a t-shirt and placing it in a drawer.

When I outsourced laundry it was because I had two small children and a full time job and I was exhausted. Time can be precious for reasons that have nothing to do with whether you enjoy chores.

Millennials are always EXHAUSTED

I would be exhausted if I did my laundry using a washboard. Is using a washing machine cheating? Of course not and neither is delegating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:ironing pillowcases?

Yes. We have percale cotton pillowcases and percale cotton pillowcases need to be ironed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People also have lost the ability to cook, do their own grocery shopping, and pick up their own takeout. We are the laziest society ever

You can't take it with you and time is precious.

Well this attitude is your problem right there.

If you view your time as something that should only be "spent" on things you find enjoyable or rewarding in narrowly defined ways, you are going to be a dissatisfied, impatient, unhappy person.

Being a human being in a living, mortal body requires a certain amount of caretaking. Even if in the modern world and with enough money you can outsource some of that caretaking, some of it you will NEVER be able to outsource. You can't pay someone to go poop for you, or take your showers. I guess you could outsource brushing and flossing your teeth but... why would you do this.

Learning to efficiently but diligently perform basic caretaking and hygienic functions, including laundry, is just part of being a person. Laundry truly does not take that much time unless your clothes are very hard to clean (which is a choice, especially in this day and age when most jobs allow people to wear machine washable clothes that don't need to be ironed). If you cannot dedicate the 30-40 minutes a week to laundry, then what else are you considering to be unbearable drudgery? This is such a basic activity.

This is why some religions and philosophies advise learning to engage in a form of mindful diligence, particularly while doing these daily chores. If you can find pleasure in the act of folding laundry, flossing your teeth, trimming your toddler's nails, packing a lunch, you can find true and rewarding joy in life. And when you find this, you stop having this attitude of "my time is running out, I can't waste it on these pointless chores!" Instead, you realize that true happiness comes not in clearing your schedule of all drudgery so that you can spend it laughing uproariously while sky diving and inventing an app. True happiness comes in the ability to enjoy the something as simply as the physical act of folding a t-shirt and placing it in a drawer.

When I outsourced laundry it was because I had two small children and a full time job and I was exhausted. Time can be precious for reasons that have nothing to do with whether you enjoy chores.

Millennials are always EXHAUSTED

Are you this awful in real life? Did this prevent you from holding a job or something?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People also have lost the ability to cook, do their own grocery shopping, and pick up their own takeout. We are the laziest society ever

You can't take it with you and time is precious.

Well this attitude is your problem right there.

If you view your time as something that should only be "spent" on things you find enjoyable or rewarding in narrowly defined ways, you are going to be a dissatisfied, impatient, unhappy person.

Being a human being in a living, mortal body requires a certain amount of caretaking. Even if in the modern world and with enough money you can outsource some of that caretaking, some of it you will NEVER be able to outsource. You can't pay someone to go poop for you, or take your showers. I guess you could outsource brushing and flossing your teeth but... why would you do this.

Learning to efficiently but diligently perform basic caretaking and hygienic functions, including laundry, is just part of being a person. Laundry truly does not take that much time unless your clothes are very hard to clean (which is a choice, especially in this day and age when most jobs allow people to wear machine washable clothes that don't need to be ironed). If you cannot dedicate the 30-40 minutes a week to laundry, then what else are you considering to be unbearable drudgery? This is such a basic activity.

This is why some religions and philosophies advise learning to engage in a form of mindful diligence, particularly while doing these daily chores. If you can find pleasure in the act of folding laundry, flossing your teeth, trimming your toddler's nails, packing a lunch, you can find true and rewarding joy in life. And when you find this, you stop having this attitude of "my time is running out, I can't waste it on these pointless chores!" Instead, you realize that true happiness comes not in clearing your schedule of all drudgery so that you can spend it laughing uproariously while sky diving and inventing an app. True happiness comes in the ability to enjoy the something as simply as the physical act of folding a t-shirt and placing it in a drawer.

When I outsourced laundry it was because I had two small children and a full time job and I was exhausted. Time can be precious for reasons that have nothing to do with whether you enjoy chores.

Millennials are always EXHAUSTED

Are you this awful in real life? Did this prevent you from holding a job or something?

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:ironing pillowcases?

Yes. We have percale cotton pillowcases and percale cotton pillowcases need to be ironed.

I have percale cotton bedding and I never iron it. I've practically never ironed anything in my life, and yet I show up well dressed to formal events and do casual preppy the rest of the time. Somehow, I get by without ironing my cottons and linens!

The truth is that the laundry complainers don't understand how to simplify their lives. They're a little mentally rigid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why do people get so obsessed and overwhelmed by laundry?

It’s not like you a washing it by a river-you put it in the machine and it’s done.

The only person I see obsessing over laundry is the one who came on here to post an entire thread about it.

Personally, I just finished washing, pressing and folding the laundry for a family of 6 (two of which are club swimmers- IYKYK), washed our sheets, pressed our pillowcases, cleaned two bathrooms and made cinnamon rolls. I’d offer you one for your heroic achievements in laundrydom, but you’re probably too busy judging people for things that have absolutely no impact on your life.

Pot Meet Kettle

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:ironing pillowcases?

Sorry NP here and I wont go back to unironed pilllowcases. It takes 30 seconds or less and even my elementary schooler notices the difference. It’s the tiniest luxury and has a big impact on my quality of life. Also makes them much easier to fold and store if you have extras.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s never JUST the laundry. It’s usually because one parent is doing 90% of the heavy lifting while the other parent does 10% and thinks he should get recognition for anything beyond that while remaining oblivious to all the little things that need to get done in order to have a reasonably well functioning family.

If you had commented earlier you could have saved all of us a lot of time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s never JUST the laundry. It’s usually because one parent is doing 90% of the heavy lifting while the other parent does 10% and thinks he should get recognition for anything beyond that while remaining oblivious to all the little things that need to get done in order to have a reasonably well functioning family.

If you had commented earlier you could have saved all of us a lot of time.

Right?
I mean, this is the issue. It’s one of a list of chores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who tells their kid to lie to their high school coach in order to cadge a free extra practice uniform? That's sketchy. If they are caught lying, they will be running laps and benched.

I’m paying for the uniform.

This is only the case if they are not making a uniform available and the child cannot do laundry in the morning. This edge case is highly unlikely because PP is exaggerating and being dramatic.

You don't pay for high school practice uniforms. They wear hand me downs from previous seasons. You can't buy more. They aren't available for purchase. You don't seem to understand how public high school sports work. Its OK! Just admit you were wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t imagine doing laundry for my kids over the age of 10. They are completely capable and should be doing their own. If you’re doing it for them consistently then you are babying them.

That's a real lack of imagination. Imagine...other households running differently than yours!
Here's one of MANY examples. My teen Ds gets home from high school basketball practice at 9:45. His practice uniform needs to be washed and dried and in his backpack by 7:15 am. Should he stay up late doing laundry? Not the best use of his time. He needs to eat, shower and go to bed.

Simple. Tell Ds to get a second practice uniform.

You know nothing. The practice uniforms are issued by the public HS. Each kid gets one jersey and one pair of shorts, and they must be washed every night, worn to every practice and brought to every game. You don't "just go get" another one.

You get another if you send your child to practice with a note explaining how the laundromat lost the uniform and you need another - Yes. I’ll pay if necessary.

This makes it easier for the child to manage their own laundry, and teaches problem solving skills.

This is especially necessary for young boys who should never be allowed to let women do their chores. He’s washing his basketball uniform, period.

You really have no understanding of high school sports. There is no "buy another one". The practice uniforms are hand me down game uniforms. They have exactly enough. The players are expected to show up with clean practice uniforms every day. The player would be punished severely for a lost uniform. No excuses.
The parent doing her HS kids practice laundry so he can sleep understands this. You don't.

I have high schoolers. What school/sport do they go to where they get 1 practice uniform for 5-6 days of practice a week? There would be an absolute rebellion on any team my kid has been on.

This was accurate for public hs boys basketball and public hs boys soccer. FCPS. Practice or game 6 days a week. One practice uniform per player and no one has ever complained or made an issue of it as far as I've heard.