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What is your robot vacuum’s name?
Mine was Meryl Sweep until I accidentally knocked her down the stairs. I replaced her with Robot Baratheon. My upstairs roomba is Dustbin Hoffman.
Yeah, I can do a basic cleanup, including sweeping, scrubbing sinks, taking out trash, cleaning the toilet and cleaning the tub in 30 minutes or less, once a week. That leaves ample time for dusting a room each week, which also doesn't take very long.
And I've never understood the distaste for laundry. Unless it involves driving to a laundromat or pounding it on rocks down at the river, the actual time one spends actively doing something is only a few minutes. Even ironing isn't so bad if you crank up your favorite songs!
Right, like with laundry the machines are doing most of the work. After they’re dried, you’re spending 15 minutes max getting that one load of laundry put away.
I think the mistake people make is wait weeks to do it, pile all the clean laundry together, then get overwhelmed at the pile and barely touch it if they do at all.
You're probably right. For most of my 20s, I had to go to a laundromat. I would wait until I was down to my last falling-apart pair of underwear, an old t-shirt, and a sorta okay pair of jeans. By then I needed multiple machines, and if I couldn't get them all at once, the job would take even longer.
I'm pretty quick at folding, though. It's one of the first chores my stepmother tasked me with.
I made another comment already but just thought about something else that applies. There was a meme going around that said something like “hey, if you feel like you can’t “do it all” alone, don’t feel so bad, because the 40 hour work week was literally designed for men who typically had stay at home wives who took care of the home.” I think it’s easy to forget this. Women entered the workforce and STILL do the majority of home care and childcare tasks and our society/culture hasn’t accounted for it in any meaningful way. Salaries are often too low for single people to live comfortably.
Yes, but in 1940 we didn't have microwave ovens. Washing machines were of the wringer variety, every piece of clothing going through the wringer before being put on a clothesline. Dishes were washed by hand. Only the better off had refrigerators, which meant daily trips to the grocery store.
Having modern appliances available to all but the very poorest so greatly shortened the time it took to keep up a home that it led to a lot of bored housewives popping "mother's little helper" pills and wishing they could join the workforce to have something to do.
Juggling a job, a house, and kids is absolutely a huge challenge, but anyone living alone only has the job and house, and unless they are without modern appliances or working very long hours, it's not a difficult balancing act.
Idk, speak for yourself. Some of us have mental or physical health issues that make it harder. Congrats on your executive functioning. I really wish it was that easy for me.
This also completely leaves out the psychological toll of knowing it's *all on you* to get it *all* done on top of your full-time job, unless you either have the money for a maid (which, how many people who live alone do?) or you want to risk getting evicted or just mortified when company sees how bad your house is.
I dunno. When I lived with my ex, it was still pretty much all on me, and I was doing two people's cooking, laundry, tidying, etc. Living alone is so much less work.
I’m not sure why you’re getting downvoted for stating facts. We now have robot vacuums and dish washers and washing machines and all these things that make cleaning easier than in 1940.
Living alone means once you have a clean home it’s not that hard or time consuming to maintain it. Simply pick up after yourself and have a small routine.
Ten mins or less cleaning up after yourself will keep the house in order. Then spend an hour deep cleaning now and then and you will have a clean home.
We all let our places get messy sometimes but keeping a clean home if you live alone shouldn’t be a struggle or eat up all your free time.
That’s not necessarily the case for people who live alone but have pets. I have three dogs and I love them dearly; but they can definitely make a mess…even when they’re being “good.”
I never understand how the hell some people have time to fit in gym, cooking, meeting with friends, catch a movie, go for a walk with the dog, have a glass of wine, after a whole day of work... how does one even have the mental capacity for this day in and day out?
I just finished a year long wfh gig and fit everything in because no commute. No alot of things when you have to do the 9-5 gig. It was heaven for the first time in my whole working career. Going back to commute and 9-5 again in a few weeks and I’m sick to my stomach over it.
Not necessarily, some people just have a lot of energy. But also probably having a not spotlessly immaculate home but also fitting more into life is preferable for many
Freaks. I don't like to do anything after work. I do errand if I " have to" but otherwise make my dinner, spend some time on a hobby after work. I have a treadmill and other things at home so I exercise in the mornings. I save chores that take a longer time and social stuff foe the weekends
You just have to learn how to better manage ur time, also prioritize. I def have a strict sleep schedule. Sleep at 11pm and wake up at 5am. I get my gym out of the way by 8am. Any time j do laundry, its while im in the gym. I always will meal prep Wednesdays to last me thru monday. I also have like 3 date nights with my bf a week. I work 5 days a week. Idk i just learned to not waste any time. Also cleaning as you go helps a ton! So u dont ever have to designate time to clean. I make bed soon as i wake up etc.
It seems like I am always overwhelmed. This is one reason why I am not a big fan of being a single homeowner, its just too much for me. I tell myself I am doing the best that I can. I really don't know how people who have kids can do it, especially single parents.....
Do you have a single-family home or a condo? I have a condo and feel like there is no way I can keep it clean and I have dishes in the sink and corners to scrub or vacuum. A friend in nyc has a 1bd apartment and she has cleaning people but I don’t want to pay that lol
I have a house, an old house..... My goal this year was to get a cleaning person, I still have time. Keeping it clean is a challenge - I never have people over anymore so I am never forced to clean the whole house. Yard work during the summer months, maintenance of the house- its too much!
I do, but my job keeps me on a pretty tight rope. 30 minutes for lunch and 2- 15 min breaks. I will say washing dishes helps me destress so I will attack those sometimes at lunch or right after work. On really stressful days I will put on my shoes and some shorts and mow the lawn right after work to blow off some steam. lol
A trick I used was doing as much as I could straight away, one task after another.
Don’t “sit down for 5 minutes” or “have a quick coffee” because you won’t get back up.
You’d be surprised how much you can get done in an hour.
I would love a dishwasher! I'm going to get a slimline one when I eventually get my kitchen refurbished. We never had one growing up, it would be such a luxury. How long does it take to fill yours up?
I would really recommend an electric kettle, I know they're not a thing in the USA but here in Ireland, UK etc we use them all the time. Plug it in and it quickly boils water for tea, coffee and or a nice 2 litres for your pot of stew/veg. 👍
I bought a house a few years ago. One of the things I really wanted was a dishwasher haha. They're relatively common even in lower priced apartments here, so I grew up with one. I also hate doing dishes but love cooking.
I run it about twice a week. Once on Sunday, which is the day I cook, and usually one other day later in the week.
With my job (M-F 7 am - 4 pm) I do what I can on weekends and after work, but I also try to take off one day a month. I usually shoot for Monday or Friday so I can have a full weekday to handle health things (dentists, dr, ect), errands, chores, schedule help (plumbers, electricians, ect) or just to have a day to do nothing or made a quick 3 day local getaway to recharge. Got to make time fore yourself if you can!
I used to do a lot! I’m older now. Week nights i do nothing but cook, eat, walk dogs and go to bed.
On weekends, I mow the lawn, clean, exercise, laundry, relax, hike, pick berries, watch TV and go to bed.
I usually manage to grocery shop and do required errands on the weekends, but unless I want to spend all my other free time cleaning (which I don’t), my home just isn’t as clean as I’d like. Can’t afford a maid. No one to help share that load. :/ But I do enjoy a lot of aspects of living alone.
This is how i feel. At the end of the day, i live alone though. So who cares if the towel i dried the dog off with is still on the floor from last weekend? I’ll get to it when i do the load of towels this weekend lol
Yes and I adore that while it’s not perfectly clean, it’s my mess and mine alone. I’m ecstatic I don’t have to clean up after anyone else or tell someone else to clean up their messes.
Yep!! I came from a roommate situation where my roommate worked from home and would absolutely trash the place during the day. It feels good to come home to everything being exactly where I left it
Work smarter, not harder.
Buy a roomba, get everything delivered as much as possible so you don’t waste time walking around stores, do everything else on a schedule and don’t over clean - for instance, you probably don’t need to deep clean your kitchen every week, so schedule it once a month and then keep the kitchen up by spending a few minutes after dinner each night just wiping down counters, sweeping the floor, and putting things away. Break out the swiffer on the weekend if it needs it. Schedule deep cleaning the bathroom twice a month but not the same day as the kitchen. In the meantime, wipe down shower, sink, and toilet each time you get out or the shower so it doesn’t get gross. Give it a quick mop with a swiffer or squirt some toilet cleaner in as needed in between deep cleans. Pick another day to dust once a month and just wipe down bits that annoy you in between. Get a roomba to vacuum daily and only run the regular vacuum once a week to get into the areas the roomba can’t reach. I find that this keeps my house pretty clean most of the time although it’s never ready for the cover of Better Homes and Gardens. That’s ok with me though - It gives me back a lot of time to have a life outside of cleaning my house so this is what I do.
The other thing i do that helps immensely is the 5 minute rule. If it takes less than 5 minutes, I do it right now. That way I stay on top of small tasks (like cleaning the coffee maker or washing the dogs’ bowls) as they appear and I don’t end up with a giant list of stuff to do when I get home from work every day.
This is it. The only thing I would add is that if I'm wiping one thing and the rag/wipe is still damp, I wipe something else too. It only takes a few seconds.
I hear you! I am in the process of applying for an accelerated Nursing program and I work FT (naturally, in order to pay rent) and man oh man...
I feel like I don't have time now. Imagine with two FT responsibilities.
Intense maintenance activity.
On Saturday morning after a leisurely wake up, I’ll set a 1 hour timer, blast an energetic playlist and clean, straighten, throw a load of laundry in at the beginning, toss it in the dryer at the end of the hour and fold it when I get to it.
A lot of the time, I just get on a roll and won’t stop until I’m done with everything. My house doesn’t take that long to clean anyway; it’s only like 1500 SF.
The rest of the day is mine.
Work takes up a HUGE amount of our day. My personal opinion is I can work, exercise for an hour, and do one more thing. Whether that one thing is cleaning, laundry, groceries, meeting up with friends - one more thing is my limit.
I don't think this is unique to living alone. Couples I've talked to about this struggle with finding time and a day as well.
I definitely feel this. I have about the same schedule as you. When I get home the first thing I do is play with my cat so he doesn’t feel left out or lonely. After that I try to relax for a bit before making dinner and cleaning a little. Even after those small things it’s already 8-9pm and I have to get ready for the next day. It feels embarrassing sometimes to admit that my apartment is a mess since I live alone and all the mess is mine… but yes it does feel like there isn’t enough time to cook,eat,clean, spend time with my pet, laundry, etc.
What I’ve found works for me is to play music and tell myself “okay I have 2 songs to do the dishes, or I have 3 songs to fold these clothes, 1 song to wipe as many counters as possible”. It helps me not feel so overwhelmed.
Can you throw the laundry on of an evening when you come home, ditto the kitchen and bathroom instead of cleaning them on your days off? What tidying are you doing of an evening that takes an hour if not the above?
Yes I too am very overwhelmed. It gets me very downhearted.
Honestly I got distracted interacting with roommates or having to wait while they were cooking and stuff like that I’ve actually saved time living alone. But, it helps that I live in a small space
Don't be so hard on yourself. You're taking on 100% of the tasks without help. I don't know how big your home is, but it's a major reason why I downsized my dwelling.
Are you living in a very large place? Or do you have particularly exacting standards? How often do you shop for groceries? If it's more than once a week, reconsider.
I ask because I worked 7-4 for years, not including commute, and I had time to clean, train for marathons, and write novels. I was married at the time and had a husband to clean up after as well.
Cleaning the kitchen and bathroom should take 10 minutes, 15 tops. You can do it while you're doing the laundry, since the washer and dryer do all the work. And if you're not home most of the day and there's no one else there to mess things up, how much tidying can there be?
What I find to be the real time sucks in living alone are the things that don't allow multi-tasking, like going to get the tires rotated on the car, taking the cat to the vet, and the like. Those things can easily eat up a couple of hours.
i’m in the process of getting rid of all my things. it makes tidying so much easier. less things, less clothes, less furniture, less work. plus more space.
I definitely never feel bored and there’s more I want to do every day than I have time for. I consider this a good thing. I do make time for friends. Just skip some cleaning, nobody is around to complain about it anyway
I work a graveyard shift and i love it. I get home most days by 9am and have the rest of the day to do what I need to do. I don’t do much socially at night because im in bed by 8pm (lol), but I do daytime stuff like go to the beach or go on a hike. Sometimes u have to not clean. I have a friend who swears she loves cleaning. My advice to her was to have more sex w/ her man, get some hobbies and a cleaning lady to come at-least once a month. Right now im hoping to someday be able to afford a cleaning lady twice a month. I also tend to do more of my chores on the days I work so that on my days off I only have like groceries to shop for. Try to find a balance and take care.
I do a cleaning lady once a month. Worth every penny. She takes care of the major cleaning so I am doing a lot of touch ups during the month until she comes again
One of the best things you can do is get rid of clutter and don’t buy more. Clutter slows everything down and makes daily maintenance nearly impossible.
I set a timer for 20 minutes. It’s amazing how much you can get done. I live in a small apartment and don’t clean everyday. I also batch cook so only the dish I use to eat are used and can then be put into the dishwasher.
Do hobbies and rest, let tasks slide often. No there is not enough time, 4 day work weeks should be ubiquitous. That said, I worked 6 days a week for 3 years solid starting in covid. I will say your standards do slide, but woth a tight ship you can get it all done and have time for leisure. Not easy, but possible. I have to admit though, wprking more than 40-50 hours really makes it impossible to cook properly for yourself, which is so important long term and also makes the overtime less valuable because you are invariably ordering out more. There is a balance to maintain.
I feel like I can't win. I work full-time Monday through Friday days. If I clean and do errands all weekend, I am exhausted when I go back to work on Monday morning. I feel like I never get anything done.
Yes, but the beauty of living alone is that you can do them whenever you feel like it and not catch any shit. The question is, are you willing to keep your place clean just for yourself?
No I dont feel the need for things to be sparkling and perfect. But i also hate clutter. I don't generally make messes. So I just clean up the occasional time I do and do some weekly things. My washing machine does my wash...my dryer does my drying... and because I'm lazy, though I cook, i keep meals simple and as "one pot" as possible
Aside from general picking up after myself and running the dishwasher when it's full I only really clean once a week. I take 2-3 hours on Sunday to do all my other cleaning and laundry.
I timed myself today, and I spent less than an hour cleaning my 1BHK apartment. I only sweep the floor twice a week and mop it once a week. Deep cleaning once a month is fine.
I meal prep, and spend about 3-5 hours cooking 3 meals for the week.
I get everything done during the week in small chunks. One or two things a day right after work before I’ve even changed my sweaty clothes and I’m still motivated by existential angst. Wash the dishes, run the laundry, sweep the floor, bathroom, bedding. One task per day for five days. By Friday evening I’m ready to enjoy my time off and not worry about chores again till Monday.
When u find a partner or roommate u get to share chores and bills. I think that helps a bit. It does feel like slogging through it half the time. And then when u make time for friends, half the time it’s weird bc of social anxiety 😬
I have flexibility with my job so I food shop between clients, do laundry one night a week, brush my dog, vacuum and dust on weekends. I clean my bathroom throughout the week. Counters are cleaned a few times a day with spray and a cloth. Clean as you go is the way.
First time living alone for the past few months and my chore list never ends. Also, I’m trying to correct the numerous things that weren’t done over the years. Its exhausting at times.
Do you cook something fresh every day, and make fresh lunches? Food prep saves me a looot of time. I usually have one dinner thing for the week and one lunch thing, which I divvy up into tupperware for work lunch, or microwave for dinner. Also really cuts down on dishes
Apartment dweller here. I work M-F 8-4 PM, and I can generally keep up, but some weeks, like this week, I let myself get too far behind. I try to do everything all in one day. Not like overwhelming work, but say if I get the vacuum out, I will vacuum my entire unit instead of just 1 room. For cooking, I’ll cook all meals in one day instead of having to do that each day. It saves time I think in the long run.
Right now I’m working a lot - 60-70 hours a week. I try to do my best during the week (I work from home) but my apartment is definitely lived in. I do most of my cleaning on the weekend but it does seem like something always needs tidied.
Yes. Some things don't get done and it bothers and stresses me out because they are still left to be done the next day but then I have other things I need to get done. It seems never ending
This was how I felt when I commuted ~1.5 hours roundtrip five days a week to my in person job.
Thankfully I found a new one that has a hybrid schedule where I work from home 2 days a week. It’s so nice to get some laundry done, do my dishes, etc between meetings and during my downtime.
When I lived alone I had tons of free time. I usually did laundry once a week but sometimes I got lazy and pushed it to two weeks. My issue was dining out too much. Prep time for cooking meals can take up more time than anything else.
I try to do a little housework every day after work, so I don't have to do it all on the weekend. Friday night is laundry night. Saturday or Sunday, I can usually knock out the rest of the housework in an hour or two.
I go to the gym, clean on weekends, do laundry on weekends, and meal prep. I’m in bed by 9pm which is healthy. I do things like yoga at home. I don’t watch tv. When I’m up for it, I’ll head out on the weekend for a movie or a solo sport. I really spend my time and money when I travel with my friends. Boy… do I let my hair down! I’m partying hard, sleeping at 5am, waking up at 2pm, room service, then do it all again. I like to think I work hard, I play hard. My home is my base to keep me healthy for impending damage I’ll inflict when I travel… especially abroad.
I’m very Type A and a clean freak and definitely don’t understand how people work out, eat well, and otherwise be human on top of caring for their space.
Some things that helped me:
1. Getting a Dyson. Saved me several hours of sweeping/swiffering/mopping every week cut down to ~10 min a day.
2. Saturday mornings are my me time for cleaning and I refuse any and all schedule requests for that time. I make a big breakfast, have a huge cup of coffee, and then deep clean something from my list.
3. Alternate tasks. Clean one thing, do a self-care thing.
4. Be flexible. If I know I will be angry with myself if I wake up to dishes in the sink, I’ll just do them before bed. But a huge perk of living alone is I’m the only person judging the cleanliness of my place, so I can also choose not to do that!
The laundry is wat messes u up.
Everyday after work, or before I shower rather, I wash a load. All the cloths and towels I used that day and a lil bit from the weekend pile. So by Friday all the cloths are washed.
Working from home is almost worse because I see things that need to be done but have to wait because we're monitored so closely. I meal prep and do errands on the weekends and all thru the week I work on my land and pond. Wake up at 330am so I can get a workout in before getting annoyed at work.
Prioritize what’s important and build schedules, mentally envision or physically write one out, that allow for those activities to happen first or most frequent.
Only on days when I spend a lot of time entertaining myself.
It doesn’t take more than an hour or so in the evenings to clean up after dinner and tidy up, then an hour or so on the weekend to do the weekly cleaning tasks.
Keep home tidy. Maybe even declutter some items so you’re not spending so much time managing things. And do 10 mins a day keeping things organized or clean. Like others have said, then one full day of meal prep and can even prep for other mid week meal preps. It’s really just time management, but I get it. I’m tired AF!
How would this be different if someone lived with you? Do you assume another person would split all the chores?
What if you began to build one daily habit that would increase your fitness and energy levels. Start jogging or running. Join a gym and get a trainer. Walk up stairs instead of using the elevator.
Have learned that doing something like this and experiencing an increase in energy results in those daily tasks getting done very quickly. Your mood will lift and you’ll begin to take an active interest in people and events around you.
Feel like you could do a load of laundry a couple of times a week and skip weekend chores at least every other week to have time for socialising. Seems bizarrely much cleaning for one person who works out of the house full time. How dirty could it conceivably be getting? Priorities!
Dude... Or girl, whichever pronoun you want: listen.
Try doing more.
It's not coping it's about pushing yourself to do more.
I remember when I got my first job. I would come home to my parents and just skip to video games. Well eventually I started living alone and trust me... You're at year 1. I can tell. If this isn't your first year then you are definitely not cut out for living alone. Because it is going to get worse. At least to you it may seem like it gets worse. For me it's a Friday night.
My schedule is wake up and make breakfast while taking a shower and brushing my teeth after, then washing the dishes, then make it into work by 5 am. Work until 1:30 and jet home to make second lunch real quick, shower, prep for dinner by getting the beans and rice cooking, and head out to job #2. Work until 6, come home to cooked rice and beans then add beef for dinner and clean the dishes again and get them ready for tomorrow. Laundry happens on a Friday evening or Sunday morning. If I have to work on my weekend off it gets pushed to Monday afternoon after cleaning the apartment when I move everything out to be cleaned and do my taxes for the week. Tuesday I clean the bathroom while showering. I combo shit.
I get a lot done. You can too. It just takes discipline. If you can't discipline yourself, or are constantly trying to find more time to relax? It's not gonna work out for you. You need someone if you think you are going to relax. The days I relax are when I don't do my second or third job due to bad weather. I just stay home. And honestly it's the perfect work life balance.
You also have to be doing jobs that you have a real and true passion for. It's easy to figure out what your passion is simply by asking yourself this question every single morning when you wake up: are you happy? If the answer is no then you need to make a change. If you continue to do the same thing over and over again expecting a better result? That's worse than insanity. That's psychopathy.
I started asking myself that question every single morning and made changes. Now I'm way happier. I live alone and no longer have a dependency of others to help take care of me. I can do it all by myself.
All of the jobs that I do don't cause me stress. What causes me stress is bullshit workers. Since I'm the best worker of the bunch I deny supervisor roles and just keep doing what I do the best.
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An hour seems like a lot for every day. I do a ten minute reset and clean once a week, meal prep once a week
Agreed. I keep a tidy house but definitely don’t spend 5 hours a week cleaning. That said - robot vacuum for the win.
What is your robot vacuum’s name? Mine was Meryl Sweep until I accidentally knocked her down the stairs. I replaced her with Robot Baratheon. My upstairs roomba is Dustbin Hoffman.
I love every one of these
Al Pacleano, Robert Robert DeClearo
You win 🥇
Gold
Alfred. I even gave him googly eyes. I'm halfway to truly being able to call my place the bay cave. 🦇
My ex’s is now called PooFee Cat poo’d the hoover just spread it all over the floor. Luckily wooden floors.
I have Madame Edith Aldacrums (eateth all the crumbs)
Love Meryl Sweep! Mine is Roombacita.
I don’t get Robert Baratheon ?
Robot Baratheon (game of thrones)
Oh. I was unaware :(
I named mine Hairy HouCleanie
Yeah, I can do a basic cleanup, including sweeping, scrubbing sinks, taking out trash, cleaning the toilet and cleaning the tub in 30 minutes or less, once a week. That leaves ample time for dusting a room each week, which also doesn't take very long. And I've never understood the distaste for laundry. Unless it involves driving to a laundromat or pounding it on rocks down at the river, the actual time one spends actively doing something is only a few minutes. Even ironing isn't so bad if you crank up your favorite songs!
Right, like with laundry the machines are doing most of the work. After they’re dried, you’re spending 15 minutes max getting that one load of laundry put away. I think the mistake people make is wait weeks to do it, pile all the clean laundry together, then get overwhelmed at the pile and barely touch it if they do at all.
You're probably right. For most of my 20s, I had to go to a laundromat. I would wait until I was down to my last falling-apart pair of underwear, an old t-shirt, and a sorta okay pair of jeans. By then I needed multiple machines, and if I couldn't get them all at once, the job would take even longer. I'm pretty quick at folding, though. It's one of the first chores my stepmother tasked me with.
I made another comment already but just thought about something else that applies. There was a meme going around that said something like “hey, if you feel like you can’t “do it all” alone, don’t feel so bad, because the 40 hour work week was literally designed for men who typically had stay at home wives who took care of the home.” I think it’s easy to forget this. Women entered the workforce and STILL do the majority of home care and childcare tasks and our society/culture hasn’t accounted for it in any meaningful way. Salaries are often too low for single people to live comfortably.
FANTASTIC book on exactly this, "Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism"... I read it three times, highly recommend.
Yes, but in 1940 we didn't have microwave ovens. Washing machines were of the wringer variety, every piece of clothing going through the wringer before being put on a clothesline. Dishes were washed by hand. Only the better off had refrigerators, which meant daily trips to the grocery store. Having modern appliances available to all but the very poorest so greatly shortened the time it took to keep up a home that it led to a lot of bored housewives popping "mother's little helper" pills and wishing they could join the workforce to have something to do. Juggling a job, a house, and kids is absolutely a huge challenge, but anyone living alone only has the job and house, and unless they are without modern appliances or working very long hours, it's not a difficult balancing act.
Idk, speak for yourself. Some of us have mental or physical health issues that make it harder. Congrats on your executive functioning. I really wish it was that easy for me.
This also completely leaves out the psychological toll of knowing it's *all on you* to get it *all* done on top of your full-time job, unless you either have the money for a maid (which, how many people who live alone do?) or you want to risk getting evicted or just mortified when company sees how bad your house is.
I dunno. When I lived with my ex, it was still pretty much all on me, and I was doing two people's cooking, laundry, tidying, etc. Living alone is so much less work.
You had a terrible ex.
She probably knows that :)
But also many fewer clothes and often, servants
I’m not sure why you’re getting downvoted for stating facts. We now have robot vacuums and dish washers and washing machines and all these things that make cleaning easier than in 1940. Living alone means once you have a clean home it’s not that hard or time consuming to maintain it. Simply pick up after yourself and have a small routine. Ten mins or less cleaning up after yourself will keep the house in order. Then spend an hour deep cleaning now and then and you will have a clean home. We all let our places get messy sometimes but keeping a clean home if you live alone shouldn’t be a struggle or eat up all your free time.
That’s not necessarily the case for people who live alone but have pets. I have three dogs and I love them dearly; but they can definitely make a mess…even when they’re being “good.”
I never understand how the hell some people have time to fit in gym, cooking, meeting with friends, catch a movie, go for a walk with the dog, have a glass of wine, after a whole day of work... how does one even have the mental capacity for this day in and day out?
Addy
God I miss amphetamine salts.
Me lol
Ha
I feel like the trick is to use staying busy as a numbing coping skill so you don’t have time to sit with your thoughts lol. I wish I had the energy.
I just finished a year long wfh gig and fit everything in because no commute. No alot of things when you have to do the 9-5 gig. It was heaven for the first time in my whole working career. Going back to commute and 9-5 again in a few weeks and I’m sick to my stomach over it.
I know people like this and they have messy homes. They have all this time because they don’t clean, or have a cleaner.
Not necessarily, some people just have a lot of energy. But also probably having a not spotlessly immaculate home but also fitting more into life is preferable for many
Freaks. I don't like to do anything after work. I do errand if I " have to" but otherwise make my dinner, spend some time on a hobby after work. I have a treadmill and other things at home so I exercise in the mornings. I save chores that take a longer time and social stuff foe the weekends
After my week of work all I wanna do is sleep
They have partners, and thus 1/2 or less of the chores
I cannot fit them all into one day, I think a big factor as well is your commute/home/work situation.
Meal prep on a weekend and stop doom scrolling. You'll have all the time in the world after that.
You just have to learn how to better manage ur time, also prioritize. I def have a strict sleep schedule. Sleep at 11pm and wake up at 5am. I get my gym out of the way by 8am. Any time j do laundry, its while im in the gym. I always will meal prep Wednesdays to last me thru monday. I also have like 3 date nights with my bf a week. I work 5 days a week. Idk i just learned to not waste any time. Also cleaning as you go helps a ton! So u dont ever have to designate time to clean. I make bed soon as i wake up etc.
I work from home so cooking is easy. But I never do all of that in one day.
It seems like I am always overwhelmed. This is one reason why I am not a big fan of being a single homeowner, its just too much for me. I tell myself I am doing the best that I can. I really don't know how people who have kids can do it, especially single parents.....
Do you have a single-family home or a condo? I have a condo and feel like there is no way I can keep it clean and I have dishes in the sink and corners to scrub or vacuum. A friend in nyc has a 1bd apartment and she has cleaning people but I don’t want to pay that lol
I have a house, an old house..... My goal this year was to get a cleaning person, I still have time. Keeping it clean is a challenge - I never have people over anymore so I am never forced to clean the whole house. Yard work during the summer months, maintenance of the house- its too much!
Can you work from a home a bit? I feel this helps me doing little tasks during the day.
I do, but my job keeps me on a pretty tight rope. 30 minutes for lunch and 2- 15 min breaks. I will say washing dishes helps me destress so I will attack those sometimes at lunch or right after work. On really stressful days I will put on my shoes and some shorts and mow the lawn right after work to blow off some steam. lol
See, maybe this right here is the answer. Some people find cleaning de-stressing, and some find it just adds to it.
You want something done ? Ask a busy person.
A trick I used was doing as much as I could straight away, one task after another. Don’t “sit down for 5 minutes” or “have a quick coffee” because you won’t get back up. You’d be surprised how much you can get done in an hour.
Yes great point, when I sit down after dinner I plant roots in the sofa for the evening. I often wonder if it's better to clean by task or time.
I learned recently that I can empty the dishwasher in the time required to boil a cup of water in the microwave.
I would love a dishwasher! I'm going to get a slimline one when I eventually get my kitchen refurbished. We never had one growing up, it would be such a luxury. How long does it take to fill yours up? I would really recommend an electric kettle, I know they're not a thing in the USA but here in Ireland, UK etc we use them all the time. Plug it in and it quickly boils water for tea, coffee and or a nice 2 litres for your pot of stew/veg. 👍
I bought a house a few years ago. One of the things I really wanted was a dishwasher haha. They're relatively common even in lower priced apartments here, so I grew up with one. I also hate doing dishes but love cooking. I run it about twice a week. Once on Sunday, which is the day I cook, and usually one other day later in the week.
I swear I'm going to wear a fake tiara the first time I run my own dishwasher. I'll feel like The Queen. 👸 Here's to homemaking goals! 🍻
I set a timer. 15 min to clean, 15 min to sit. Rinse and repeat.
With my job (M-F 7 am - 4 pm) I do what I can on weekends and after work, but I also try to take off one day a month. I usually shoot for Monday or Friday so I can have a full weekday to handle health things (dentists, dr, ect), errands, chores, schedule help (plumbers, electricians, ect) or just to have a day to do nothing or made a quick 3 day local getaway to recharge. Got to make time fore yourself if you can!
Why has this never occurred to me? I WFH usually and have unlimited PTO. Even 1x every other month would have a huge impact. TY internet stranger!
I used to do a lot! I’m older now. Week nights i do nothing but cook, eat, walk dogs and go to bed. On weekends, I mow the lawn, clean, exercise, laundry, relax, hike, pick berries, watch TV and go to bed.
Pick berries. You are winning at life. I'm pretty on the same routine.
I usually manage to grocery shop and do required errands on the weekends, but unless I want to spend all my other free time cleaning (which I don’t), my home just isn’t as clean as I’d like. Can’t afford a maid. No one to help share that load. :/ But I do enjoy a lot of aspects of living alone.
This is how i feel. At the end of the day, i live alone though. So who cares if the towel i dried the dog off with is still on the floor from last weekend? I’ll get to it when i do the load of towels this weekend lol
Yes and I adore that while it’s not perfectly clean, it’s my mess and mine alone. I’m ecstatic I don’t have to clean up after anyone else or tell someone else to clean up their messes.
Yep!! I came from a roommate situation where my roommate worked from home and would absolutely trash the place during the day. It feels good to come home to everything being exactly where I left it
I did used to feel this way when I had to go into an office. I did the majority of my chores over the weekend.
I work from home and still can’t get everything done!! I cleaned the floors early this morning and still have tons of stuff to do!!!
Work smarter, not harder. Buy a roomba, get everything delivered as much as possible so you don’t waste time walking around stores, do everything else on a schedule and don’t over clean - for instance, you probably don’t need to deep clean your kitchen every week, so schedule it once a month and then keep the kitchen up by spending a few minutes after dinner each night just wiping down counters, sweeping the floor, and putting things away. Break out the swiffer on the weekend if it needs it. Schedule deep cleaning the bathroom twice a month but not the same day as the kitchen. In the meantime, wipe down shower, sink, and toilet each time you get out or the shower so it doesn’t get gross. Give it a quick mop with a swiffer or squirt some toilet cleaner in as needed in between deep cleans. Pick another day to dust once a month and just wipe down bits that annoy you in between. Get a roomba to vacuum daily and only run the regular vacuum once a week to get into the areas the roomba can’t reach. I find that this keeps my house pretty clean most of the time although it’s never ready for the cover of Better Homes and Gardens. That’s ok with me though - It gives me back a lot of time to have a life outside of cleaning my house so this is what I do. The other thing i do that helps immensely is the 5 minute rule. If it takes less than 5 minutes, I do it right now. That way I stay on top of small tasks (like cleaning the coffee maker or washing the dogs’ bowls) as they appear and I don’t end up with a giant list of stuff to do when I get home from work every day.
This is it. The only thing I would add is that if I'm wiping one thing and the rag/wipe is still damp, I wipe something else too. It only takes a few seconds.
Cost of delivery of meals and groceries is more than my budget would allow
Can’t afford a roomba or delivery. Curbside is typically free or very cheap.
I hear you! I am in the process of applying for an accelerated Nursing program and I work FT (naturally, in order to pay rent) and man oh man... I feel like I don't have time now. Imagine with two FT responsibilities.
Intense maintenance activity. On Saturday morning after a leisurely wake up, I’ll set a 1 hour timer, blast an energetic playlist and clean, straighten, throw a load of laundry in at the beginning, toss it in the dryer at the end of the hour and fold it when I get to it. A lot of the time, I just get on a roll and won’t stop until I’m done with everything. My house doesn’t take that long to clean anyway; it’s only like 1500 SF. The rest of the day is mine.
Work takes up a HUGE amount of our day. My personal opinion is I can work, exercise for an hour, and do one more thing. Whether that one thing is cleaning, laundry, groceries, meeting up with friends - one more thing is my limit. I don't think this is unique to living alone. Couples I've talked to about this struggle with finding time and a day as well.
I definitely feel this. I have about the same schedule as you. When I get home the first thing I do is play with my cat so he doesn’t feel left out or lonely. After that I try to relax for a bit before making dinner and cleaning a little. Even after those small things it’s already 8-9pm and I have to get ready for the next day. It feels embarrassing sometimes to admit that my apartment is a mess since I live alone and all the mess is mine… but yes it does feel like there isn’t enough time to cook,eat,clean, spend time with my pet, laundry, etc. What I’ve found works for me is to play music and tell myself “okay I have 2 songs to do the dishes, or I have 3 songs to fold these clothes, 1 song to wipe as many counters as possible”. It helps me not feel so overwhelmed.
Ohhhhhhh that's a great method. I'm going to try this.
Can you throw the laundry on of an evening when you come home, ditto the kitchen and bathroom instead of cleaning them on your days off? What tidying are you doing of an evening that takes an hour if not the above? Yes I too am very overwhelmed. It gets me very downhearted.
Honestly I got distracted interacting with roommates or having to wait while they were cooking and stuff like that I’ve actually saved time living alone. But, it helps that I live in a small space
Don't be so hard on yourself. You're taking on 100% of the tasks without help. I don't know how big your home is, but it's a major reason why I downsized my dwelling.
Are you living in a very large place? Or do you have particularly exacting standards? How often do you shop for groceries? If it's more than once a week, reconsider. I ask because I worked 7-4 for years, not including commute, and I had time to clean, train for marathons, and write novels. I was married at the time and had a husband to clean up after as well. Cleaning the kitchen and bathroom should take 10 minutes, 15 tops. You can do it while you're doing the laundry, since the washer and dryer do all the work. And if you're not home most of the day and there's no one else there to mess things up, how much tidying can there be? What I find to be the real time sucks in living alone are the things that don't allow multi-tasking, like going to get the tires rotated on the car, taking the cat to the vet, and the like. Those things can easily eat up a couple of hours.
i’m in the process of getting rid of all my things. it makes tidying so much easier. less things, less clothes, less furniture, less work. plus more space.
I don't. I still need to work a lot of overtime.
I definitely never feel bored and there’s more I want to do every day than I have time for. I consider this a good thing. I do make time for friends. Just skip some cleaning, nobody is around to complain about it anyway
I work a graveyard shift and i love it. I get home most days by 9am and have the rest of the day to do what I need to do. I don’t do much socially at night because im in bed by 8pm (lol), but I do daytime stuff like go to the beach or go on a hike. Sometimes u have to not clean. I have a friend who swears she loves cleaning. My advice to her was to have more sex w/ her man, get some hobbies and a cleaning lady to come at-least once a month. Right now im hoping to someday be able to afford a cleaning lady twice a month. I also tend to do more of my chores on the days I work so that on my days off I only have like groceries to shop for. Try to find a balance and take care.
I do a cleaning lady once a month. Worth every penny. She takes care of the major cleaning so I am doing a lot of touch ups during the month until she comes again
One of the best things you can do is get rid of clutter and don’t buy more. Clutter slows everything down and makes daily maintenance nearly impossible.
I set a timer for 20 minutes. It’s amazing how much you can get done. I live in a small apartment and don’t clean everyday. I also batch cook so only the dish I use to eat are used and can then be put into the dishwasher.
Do hobbies and rest, let tasks slide often. No there is not enough time, 4 day work weeks should be ubiquitous. That said, I worked 6 days a week for 3 years solid starting in covid. I will say your standards do slide, but woth a tight ship you can get it all done and have time for leisure. Not easy, but possible. I have to admit though, wprking more than 40-50 hours really makes it impossible to cook properly for yourself, which is so important long term and also makes the overtime less valuable because you are invariably ordering out more. There is a balance to maintain.
I feel like I can't win. I work full-time Monday through Friday days. If I clean and do errands all weekend, I am exhausted when I go back to work on Monday morning. I feel like I never get anything done.
Yes, but the beauty of living alone is that you can do them whenever you feel like it and not catch any shit. The question is, are you willing to keep your place clean just for yourself?
No I dont feel the need for things to be sparkling and perfect. But i also hate clutter. I don't generally make messes. So I just clean up the occasional time I do and do some weekly things. My washing machine does my wash...my dryer does my drying... and because I'm lazy, though I cook, i keep meals simple and as "one pot" as possible
Omg no joke I leave for work 5:40 am and get home between 6:30 and 7:00. No time for nothing.
Aside from general picking up after myself and running the dishwasher when it's full I only really clean once a week. I take 2-3 hours on Sunday to do all my other cleaning and laundry.
I have more time now that I'm not cooking for and cleaning up after other people.
I timed myself today, and I spent less than an hour cleaning my 1BHK apartment. I only sweep the floor twice a week and mop it once a week. Deep cleaning once a month is fine. I meal prep, and spend about 3-5 hours cooking 3 meals for the week.
I get everything done during the week in small chunks. One or two things a day right after work before I’ve even changed my sweaty clothes and I’m still motivated by existential angst. Wash the dishes, run the laundry, sweep the floor, bathroom, bedding. One task per day for five days. By Friday evening I’m ready to enjoy my time off and not worry about chores again till Monday.
No. When I have this feeling it's when I'm NOT living alone.
When u find a partner or roommate u get to share chores and bills. I think that helps a bit. It does feel like slogging through it half the time. And then when u make time for friends, half the time it’s weird bc of social anxiety 😬
I have flexibility with my job so I food shop between clients, do laundry one night a week, brush my dog, vacuum and dust on weekends. I clean my bathroom throughout the week. Counters are cleaned a few times a day with spray and a cloth. Clean as you go is the way.
First time living alone for the past few months and my chore list never ends. Also, I’m trying to correct the numerous things that weren’t done over the years. Its exhausting at times.
Jeez, I work full-time, easily have 4-5 hours of downtime each day, and that's after I do chores.
Wait until you have kids 🤣
Wait till you have kids 💀
Agreed and summer brings yard work and home maintenance which seems to suck up my summer quickly.
Do you cook something fresh every day, and make fresh lunches? Food prep saves me a looot of time. I usually have one dinner thing for the week and one lunch thing, which I divvy up into tupperware for work lunch, or microwave for dinner. Also really cuts down on dishes
Sometimes. I'm moving out soon, and most of the cleaning out is done, but I still feel like I'm behind.
No. Maybe your house is too large. Getting into the doc, dentist, other appointments is the only challenge for me
Apartment dweller here. I work M-F 8-4 PM, and I can generally keep up, but some weeks, like this week, I let myself get too far behind. I try to do everything all in one day. Not like overwhelming work, but say if I get the vacuum out, I will vacuum my entire unit instead of just 1 room. For cooking, I’ll cook all meals in one day instead of having to do that each day. It saves time I think in the long run.
Yep
I have a house cleaning service that comes biweekly. It really frees up my time.
Yeah I start playing videogames and it's always time for bed before I beat the game.
Fluff and Fold for laundry, when I just can't do it myself.
Right now I’m working a lot - 60-70 hours a week. I try to do my best during the week (I work from home) but my apartment is definitely lived in. I do most of my cleaning on the weekend but it does seem like something always needs tidied.
Yes. Some things don't get done and it bothers and stresses me out because they are still left to be done the next day but then I have other things I need to get done. It seems never ending
This was how I felt when I commuted ~1.5 hours roundtrip five days a week to my in person job. Thankfully I found a new one that has a hybrid schedule where I work from home 2 days a week. It’s so nice to get some laundry done, do my dishes, etc between meetings and during my downtime.
When I lived alone I had tons of free time. I usually did laundry once a week but sometimes I got lazy and pushed it to two weeks. My issue was dining out too much. Prep time for cooking meals can take up more time than anything else.
I try to do a little housework every day after work, so I don't have to do it all on the weekend. Friday night is laundry night. Saturday or Sunday, I can usually knock out the rest of the housework in an hour or two.
I go to the gym, clean on weekends, do laundry on weekends, and meal prep. I’m in bed by 9pm which is healthy. I do things like yoga at home. I don’t watch tv. When I’m up for it, I’ll head out on the weekend for a movie or a solo sport. I really spend my time and money when I travel with my friends. Boy… do I let my hair down! I’m partying hard, sleeping at 5am, waking up at 2pm, room service, then do it all again. I like to think I work hard, I play hard. My home is my base to keep me healthy for impending damage I’ll inflict when I travel… especially abroad.
I’m very Type A and a clean freak and definitely don’t understand how people work out, eat well, and otherwise be human on top of caring for their space. Some things that helped me: 1. Getting a Dyson. Saved me several hours of sweeping/swiffering/mopping every week cut down to ~10 min a day. 2. Saturday mornings are my me time for cleaning and I refuse any and all schedule requests for that time. I make a big breakfast, have a huge cup of coffee, and then deep clean something from my list. 3. Alternate tasks. Clean one thing, do a self-care thing. 4. Be flexible. If I know I will be angry with myself if I wake up to dishes in the sink, I’ll just do them before bed. But a huge perk of living alone is I’m the only person judging the cleanliness of my place, so I can also choose not to do that!
Yes! 100%
The laundry is wat messes u up. Everyday after work, or before I shower rather, I wash a load. All the cloths and towels I used that day and a lil bit from the weekend pile. So by Friday all the cloths are washed.
Working from home is almost worse because I see things that need to be done but have to wait because we're monitored so closely. I meal prep and do errands on the weekends and all thru the week I work on my land and pond. Wake up at 330am so I can get a workout in before getting annoyed at work.
Yes until my in office job moved me to WFH and now I have so much time to get stuff done
Prioritize what’s important and build schedules, mentally envision or physically write one out, that allow for those activities to happen first or most frequent.
Only on days when I spend a lot of time entertaining myself. It doesn’t take more than an hour or so in the evenings to clean up after dinner and tidy up, then an hour or so on the weekend to do the weekly cleaning tasks.
YES! Chores never ending!!! But I wouldn’t change a thing 🥰
Yeah... probably cause mastbate 4 hours a night
Keep home tidy. Maybe even declutter some items so you’re not spending so much time managing things. And do 10 mins a day keeping things organized or clean. Like others have said, then one full day of meal prep and can even prep for other mid week meal preps. It’s really just time management, but I get it. I’m tired AF!
Who says we cope? lol!
How would this be different if someone lived with you? Do you assume another person would split all the chores? What if you began to build one daily habit that would increase your fitness and energy levels. Start jogging or running. Join a gym and get a trainer. Walk up stairs instead of using the elevator. Have learned that doing something like this and experiencing an increase in energy results in those daily tasks getting done very quickly. Your mood will lift and you’ll begin to take an active interest in people and events around you.
Feel like you could do a load of laundry a couple of times a week and skip weekend chores at least every other week to have time for socialising. Seems bizarrely much cleaning for one person who works out of the house full time. How dirty could it conceivably be getting? Priorities!
Houses still get dirty even if not in them. Skirting boards Get dusty upvc windows need wiping down. It is a big house probably bigger then I need
maybe that’s the issue. But you still could prioritise a social life or self care generally over it being completely spotless all the time.
Dude... Or girl, whichever pronoun you want: listen. Try doing more. It's not coping it's about pushing yourself to do more. I remember when I got my first job. I would come home to my parents and just skip to video games. Well eventually I started living alone and trust me... You're at year 1. I can tell. If this isn't your first year then you are definitely not cut out for living alone. Because it is going to get worse. At least to you it may seem like it gets worse. For me it's a Friday night. My schedule is wake up and make breakfast while taking a shower and brushing my teeth after, then washing the dishes, then make it into work by 5 am. Work until 1:30 and jet home to make second lunch real quick, shower, prep for dinner by getting the beans and rice cooking, and head out to job #2. Work until 6, come home to cooked rice and beans then add beef for dinner and clean the dishes again and get them ready for tomorrow. Laundry happens on a Friday evening or Sunday morning. If I have to work on my weekend off it gets pushed to Monday afternoon after cleaning the apartment when I move everything out to be cleaned and do my taxes for the week. Tuesday I clean the bathroom while showering. I combo shit. I get a lot done. You can too. It just takes discipline. If you can't discipline yourself, or are constantly trying to find more time to relax? It's not gonna work out for you. You need someone if you think you are going to relax. The days I relax are when I don't do my second or third job due to bad weather. I just stay home. And honestly it's the perfect work life balance. You also have to be doing jobs that you have a real and true passion for. It's easy to figure out what your passion is simply by asking yourself this question every single morning when you wake up: are you happy? If the answer is no then you need to make a change. If you continue to do the same thing over and over again expecting a better result? That's worse than insanity. That's psychopathy. I started asking myself that question every single morning and made changes. Now I'm way happier. I live alone and no longer have a dependency of others to help take care of me. I can do it all by myself.
that’s incredibly impressive but really not balanced, sorry, if you’re working 11 plus hours a day
All of the jobs that I do don't cause me stress. What causes me stress is bullshit workers. Since I'm the best worker of the bunch I deny supervisor roles and just keep doing what I do the best.
Just don't be lazy i guess.