Anonymous wrote:Also agree it's a generational thing. My mother told me other married women will judge me by the cleanliness of my house and that once I got married I needed to step it up (this was back on the day after I finished the bar exam and she was harping on me that my un-used for the past 3 months tv had a layer of the dust on the screen....yea mom, studying for the bar or dusting my tv, priorities there).

She's still horrified that I don't routinely wash my walls and take down on the curtains and wash and iron them every season. I've told her she's more than welcome to do these things when she visits (and she also lived with us for 6 months after my baby was born) but I just can't care. So I agree with the "if it bothers you mom, you are more than welcome to clean" sentiment.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If I see a dirty or cluttered house I judge. I don't care how busy a peron is there is no excuse but laziness. It doesn't take long to clean a house unless you let things completely go in which case it takes forever.

I edit people like this right out of my life.

Anonymous wrote:We have a 7 month old. I went back to work 6 months ago, and entered pumping hell. My mom moved in with us to take care of LO. She has the entire finished basement to herself. We moved into a new house after LO was born. So, I didn't have a chance to get the whole house ready while waiting for baby. Been slowly finding places for things. Small house. I had a lot of anxiety for awhile about not keeping the house clean enough. I realized that I knew my mom had another pair of eyes on us and since she had free time every night and all weekend, would judge me for not keeping a spick-and-span house. I decided two weeks ago to let go of what I perceived to be her expectations of me and just clean when I could. That has been about the same amount. I seriously clean every chance I have. I spent my one free hour cleaning last night while LO was sleeping. She doesn't sleep well on her own. That hour was a miracle. I clean every morning. I at least try to get all of the dishes done and the table/living room picked up. My husband just did the floors yesterday. Of course, the pre-baby me would have kept the house cleaner, but that's just not possible when my husband is never home and the baby is on me from the time I get home at night until almost the time I leave in the morning. We were making lots of chicken stock, so we have two crock pots on our very large dinner table. I have been so busy, I forgot they were there. Should have been put away last week when we stopped making stock. She cited those as a major issue of contention. But, there is 80% of unused table left to work with! We have a few piles of stuff, but they are rotating piles that we deal with every week. We just throw stuff in a pile in our office or on the stairs until we can deal with it in our free time.

She said to me "I come from the 'Leave It To Beaver' era. Running the household came first before anything else." She was a stay at home mom for almost 4 years. I have worked since my baby was 5 weeks old. I am not a lazy person. She has seen me put my all into taking care of my baby, my family, and my house. We all had to schedule it so that I could have 10 minutes to myself. We would have hired a housekeeper, but she would not have liked that. She does not like non-familial people. I told her that I am not a stay at home mom, so I have less time to work with. And, our house is small, so it takes time to find places for things. She said, "Your father was always bringing stuff home that I had to find a place for. And, we had a trailer, so it was harder to keep it uncluttered."

I was highly offended by her verbal assessment that I don't do enough to keep the house clean.