Does anyone watch this programe?  I enjoy watching it and seeing the difference between the rooms when they're clean, but I can't help thinking that the people on the show are just simply a set of lazy ba***rds, and it winds me up that they sit on their bum all day, doing nothing, and then have a bunch of people come and turn their house back into a palace.

Oh if only life was so easy.....

Makes you wonder why we bother hoovering and polishing all the flipping time!!

I agree about the lazy slob bit! My house is not spotless - life is too short, but I am well aware that once it gets past a certain point of dirtyness it will be 10 x harder to clean. Most of the people on the show just dont seem to care and as for the state of some of the kitchens and bathrooms - EWW

I know, it's unbelievable.  I don't understand how they can live in such dirt!  Like you say, my house isn't spotless all the time, but I could never leave dishes for more than 3 days or so!!

That programme makes me feel like my house is spotless( its far from it) , i wonder how many people keep it clean afterwards ?

I have always wondered that too! I think that most of them would let it slip back to the way it was, eventually! :-(

I watch the programme to get tips but I must admit it makes me heave most of the time, the state some people live in is just horrific - I too do not have a mega clean house but if I leave washing up on the side it winds me up so god knows how people can live day to day in those pits!  Did you see the one where the woman had loads of birds in her house and they messed EVERYWHERE - I don't 'do' birds anyway so it freaked me out but yuk yuk yuk!  My fav tonight is 'you are what you eat' :D

Yes I like that one too!  Could never eat what they have to eat on that new diet though - looks gross, too green for me!

Well me and Scott did it for a bit and try to stick to it most of the time, we eat loads of fish now and hardly any meat, whole grain bread not white, have salad and veg on a daily basis and fruit, cut down loads on tea's and coffee, have sweet potatoes not normal (most of the time) have brown rice not white etc etc, just little things make a difference - I have the books though which is where I got a lot of the info ;)

< I could never leave dishes for more than 3 days or so!! > Well maybe if they were in the dishwasher :D

I think that the problem is that they ahve never been taught how to clean and dont have a clue. It amaizes me how many people dont know how to wash up, but then I dont suppose that they teach useful things like that at school any more. 

I don't have the luxury of a dishwasher - how I wish I did!!

I just happen to think these people are down right lazy - I was never taught how to 'clean my house' in school but I still manage to do it!!

I just don't understand how people can live in such mess and not feel disgusted with themselves?!  Did anyone watch the one the other week where the bloke who worked at the tip brought basically half the tip home with him - his house was filled with junk, and boxes - you couldn't put a foot down - that was unbelievable!  He certainly didn't deserve the beautiful house he ended up with after it was cleaned.

But my guess Keely is that you are somewhat brighter and more motivated than anyone on that program. Sorry to say that they IMHO fall in to 2 catagories 1. those that have given up on life 2. those that are just palin lazy slobs who dont give a dam.

Yep, sounds about right - probably number 1 & 2 for most of them!!

My house may not be a palace (think that would be an impossibility sharing it with a rather lively boxer)!!  However, I do still have a sense of pride in my house.

I've always (since moving out of home) worked on the basis that the house should always be tidy enough that I won't be embarassed if someone came round unannounced. 

A little bit of clutter and a bit of washing up is fine but some of the states the houses on that programme are in is just disgusting!!

I feel that many aren't lazy but unfortunately have other problems.  Then their depression or whatever moves on into the house and they get more depressed because of their surroundings.  They are then in a never ending circle.  It does appear that many do keep them clean afterwards and that actually their whole lifestyle changes.

I think it depends, I remember seeing a fater and son in a flat, and they just didn't really care what the flat looked like, then there was a family of about 7/8 children who lived in an old B and B, that was just too big for one person (of course the mum!) to keep clean and tidy, then the woman with the birds, she was obviously a bit disturbed to not see there was anything wrong with having bird poo everywhere. The other thing I have noticed is that most of the people featured are single women, that, to put it nicely, are on the VERY large size, and probably physically couldn't keep up with the house hold chores.

It is quite sad when you think about it. :(

I am some what obsessed with how clean/tidy my house is, it annoyes me if there are even a few crumbs on the floor, or if a picture isn't quite straight, or if the bed covers aren't exactly symetrical, and if you can see the actual pillow at the open end of the pillow case I am like a bear with a sore head until I give in and sort it out!! Things like that really bother me!

I know I can hear you all saying "what are you getting a long coated dog for" but it doesn't bother me tidying it away, so I am not bothered about hoovering 3-4 times a day, or anything like that!

When I was still living at my mums house, she did absolutely everything from making our beds to cooking tea every night, to basically everything in the whole house, so I was never 'taught' to keep a clean and tidy house, it is just something that because mum's house was always a palace, mine has to be as well. Whereas one of my sister's houses is a complete dump - I will add not bad enough to get her on "how clean is your house?" but everytime we go round there I end up cleaning it!!!

I think the other reason why I do it, is because I am really proud of the fact that I am 22 years old, I have a mortgage, I have (in my mind) absolutely lovely furniture and sofas and so on, and so I am very proud of what we have achieved together in our 5 short years, and so I enjoy cleaning it! I get very excited on fridays because that is when I polish, and I get to look at my furniture close up!!! So sad!!!! The only thing I can't stand doing is the washing and ironing, so I normally leave hubbie to that!! :D

Did anyone watch the other one kim and aggie did, - Too posh to wash that was disgusting

No I didn't see that, didn't even know they had done another one. :(

It was on a while ago - some of the people didnt wash their hair because they said it became self cleaning, one of them went fishing all the time and they found all sorts in his hair and under his nails as he didnt wash when he got back from holding the maggots and gutting the fish

Urgh yuk!!! I know a few people who don't wash their hair, I used to have the job of washing it after three months of them not even managing to put a comb through it It smells... well b*oody awful believe me!!!

The worst guy I used to do was this old fella whose ear hair was the same length as his own hair and he used to get me to cut them together always full of waxy stuff when he came in... cringe time!!! YUK!!!!!

I know exactly what you mean. When I lived with my mum she had a cleaner so I never did a thing. My clothes were dropped on the floor and appeared ironed on my bed. I left dishes on the side, never picked up a hoover and didnt know how to use the washing machine or iron. Everyone was teasing my OH saying he would have to do everything. Moved in with him December 24th (hectic yes!) and I am like a reformed woman. Everyday before I leave for work the house is how I would like it to be when I come home. No need for a cleaner if you look after everything! Also my mum used to blame me for all of the mess and although I was a big factor she was just as messy. Since Ive moved out, the house still gets in the same state as when I was there. Its nice to know that I cant help it and its passed through my genes!!

>>I am some what obsessed with how clean/tidy my house is, it annoyes me if there are even a few crumbs on the floor, or if a picture isn't quite straight, or if the bed covers aren't exactly symetrical, and if you can see the actual pillow at the open end of the pillow case I am like a bear with a sore head until I give in and sort it out!! Things like that really bother me!

Sounds like early warning signs of OCD, I'd watch that, seriously.

I am beginning to think that myself!!!!

I am terrible, the other night I got in the bath, so I laid my PJ's out on the bed ready for when I got out, but instead of folding them neatly I just put them down, I got in the bath and lasted about 5 mins before I HAD to get out of the bath and go and fold them, then get back in the bath!!! I am a certified wierdo!!! :D

I love watching it because it makes me feel like I am the cleanest person alive.  I have got to admit we used live next door to someone who kept chickens as pets in the house and it was disgusting.  I do my best but the kids are animals and beagle and molly constantly chew things up so it is impossible.  Has anyone ever noticed though how  most of them have immaculate walls and nice flooring etc so it makes you wonder if they just mess it up to get someone to come and do the cleaning :)

I think it may only look like that because the cleaners wash all the walls and floors down as they are cleaning. ;)

>>I am some what obsessed with how clean/tidy my house is, it annoyes me if there are even a few crumbs on the floor, or if a picture isn't quite straight, or if the bed covers aren't exactly symetrical, and if you can see the actual pillow at the open end of the pillow case I am like a bear with a sore head until I give in and sort it out!! Things like that really bother me! <<                                                                 

Thats what i was thinking, i have ocd's and though i havent got that one like i used too have, i now have others.

I agree Bluebell

My mother wasn't the tidiest person in the world and I am hopeless at housework. I do what I can but thankfully my OH is very good. I think that if my Mum had been tidier and showed us  (3 sisters)how to look after a house we would all be better at it. Hmm weird comparison but I think it works, I was taught very early how to keep a yard spotlessly clean and tidy. When I am at work I am very "anal" about the state of my yard. It has to be perfect or I'm not happy. So I do think that cleaning is something that has to be taught. I do try with my kids, but to be honest I'm next to useless. My house never gets into the state of some of the houses you see on How Clean is Your House, but a bit of clutter and untidyness doesn't really bother me too much.

I think it must come down to just individuals, like I said my mums house was/is always a palace, but she did it all, and now I am always cleaning/tidying something, but my sisters house is a down right disgrace!

Hi Keeley,
Some people have no shame, There has never been any excuss for dirt. I am very
house proud. The winter is the worsed when the Sams coming running through the
lounge before there feet are wiped all over the cream carpet. So I have a carpet cleaner now
and shampoo the lounge carpet regular the lounge is 34foot long and 15foot wide, it was
a b....... to do it by hand. I am also a bleach fanatic everything has to be bleached.
So you must never  stand still to long in our house Ha!!!
I would die if someone came into my house and said the things they say on the program.
How do they hold there heads up!!!
Regards
Denese 

The saddest and most disgusting part of the programe is when they show you the childrens rooms, tell the parents what disgusting bacteria and bugs are lying there, that their childs lives might be at risk and then the parents act shocked as if it never occured to them that they were damaging their children.  I wouldnt let my dogs live in those conditions.  I would probably be prosecuted and banned from keeping animals for many years but these couples, who look quite clean in themselves and can aford to go down the pub, cant even look after there childrens health.  There is something very wrong here.

Hi echo,
I agree there is NO way I would let my dogs in there!!
But!! everyone see's it egh!!!
I would be the kind of person that cleans before the cleaner arrives.
Regards
Denese

Me to Denese i dont even know how these people let cameras in to view they're house the state they're in.  I couldn't believe these two girls whoes house was digusting i can imagine fellas being like that but not girls ooow.

Warm regards susan

Yuck....I watched it for the first time ever tonight, and i was glued to it!  Can't believe people can live like that, and like some of you have said, it made me feel like the cleanest person alive.  Yet I'm actually pretty scruffy and quite often run out of knives and forks before I do the washing up.
It's strange, because my parents are unbearably clean and tidy, never a thing out of place in their house.

The cleanest part of this place is the kennels.....:-D

Lisa

Yeah I watched it tonight, disgusting! Made me want to go and have a hot shower afterwards just for looking at that dirt!

And I can't bear it when the two women pick up things off the floor with their bare hands. I'd have to scrub them with bleach after that YUK!

For a moment I thought the thread title was "How Clean is Your Horse?" and I was just coming on to explain that mine are all nice and muddy and dusty and happy and chilled out in the field :D Have no idea about the house - I loathe cleaning so I pay my mum to do it all for me :D :D :D (field is tidy though)

When she goes up close and sniffs things too, YUCK :d :d

My wife does all the cleaning , i do all the poo and pee mopping. My kids and dogs create the mess.

I hadn't realised, until I woke up in the middle of the night, that I had been affected by this thread (watched the first series and that was enough for me ;) ).    My house is more Miss Havishams (from Great Expectations) than How Clean, but there is a very good explanation for this.

Over 30 years ago, until I had baby no 3, I was bumbling along, quite happily, 2 little ones, working part time, keeping the house clean, polished, etc etc etcetc etc.  Then No 1 son started school - and daughter started playgroup - school being 2 miles away, playgroup a little further down the road - as I was expecting no 3 - so I gave up work.   This was in the days when we all walked everywhere, remember ;)    When baby 3 was about 3 weeks old, by which time I had got into quite a good routine, breastfeeding, walking to school & playgroup, stopping at a friend's house to breastfeed again, picking up daughter from playgroup, home, lunch, clean up, breastfeed again, walk to school to pick up No 1 son, home, tea for children, play with them, etc etc etc..... until I opened a cupboard one afternoon and found - a mouse! !

This really freaked me out, and overnight, I became absolutely fanatical about cleaning - I was up a 4.30 in the morning, scrubbing every kitchen cupboard out, bleaching shelves, wiping every tin with a bleach solution, spent a fortune on Tupperware, so that everything in packages was in plastic, which again, I wiped with a bleach solution every day.    I washed bedlinen every day (and although I had an automatic washing machine (very modern in those days) I still had to hang it all out to dry - so as well as baby & small children washing (remember, cloth nappies as well) I really added to my load!    Plus I hoovered everytime we were going into a room, and every time we were going out.   I SCRUBBED the pram - again bleach solution - every time I put baby in it - and took him out - including scrubbing wheels & spokes - this was a big Silver Cross coach-built pram - and as for poor old Simba - lab of the day - he wasn't allowed in the house until I'd dipped his paws in a bucket of warm water with disinfectant in (no, not bleach this time ;) ).

Have you seen The Last of the Summer Wine, when Thora Hird would put paper down for her husband to walk on?    Well, I was doing that as well

I had no time to play with the children - I was too busy bleaching all their toys - the whole house smelled like a Swimming Pool.   

This meant I was up in the morning at 4.30, not getting to bed until about 12 midnight, when I'd do the last feed - and I would be vacuuming then, before going to bed.

OH became aware of all of this, eventually (you know how long it can take, before the penny drops with some men ;) ) when our neighbour asked him, very casually, if I was finding it heavy going having the 3rd baby, because they could hear me hoovering so late at night.   His remedy (bless) - was to take the hoover to work !!!! and promise that he would hoover, every day, when he got home - he said, quite rightly, it only needs doing once a day.    He also took me to the doctors, because my hands were becoming quite sore and inflamed, through the use of so much bleach!   We had a lovely doctor, who talked to me for ages, and managed, somehow, to convince me that 1 little mouse wasn't going to be the death of us all, and that I was putting the family at more risk with my use of bleach etc etc etc.

Friends, who'd been worried about me, but who hadn't known what to do about it, suddenly started coming round and taking me - and kids - out - to messy homes!!! What I didn't know then, and didn't know for several years, was that they DELIBERATELY left the kitchen/lounge messy when we were coming round, so that I could see that it was "OK" to do so.    So, gradually, I overcame this compulsion, which was obviously a type of post-natal depression, and decided that if there was a choice between HouseProud Shrew and Happy Slut, then Happy Slut it was to be!

When I returned to college, some years later, and worked with families at risk, I realised that there was a problem in perception - very rarely on television, in any programme, would you see a kitcehn in the normal disarray of breakfast etc - you wouldn't see a pile of laundry, waiting to be ironed, et etc.   This can become a problem for "perfectionists", who then see themselves as total failure, if there is as much as a cornflake packet left out - so defeatism takes over, all too easily.

Phew - now that's out - and maybe I'll sleep properly again tonight - fancy a post like this, bringing it all back to the surface, all these years later!

Margot

Oh Margot, poor you!  I'm so glad you got it sorted quickly.  I saw a mouse in my house a few months ago, and all I did was put some poison down!!! :D :D :D  But then that's what happens when you've not got a little baby and perhaps post natal depression!  Good on you for coming through it, and thank goodness you have a lovely husband!!

It was a really interesting story - thanks for sharing :)

Margot, that's an amazing story! I think you're absolutely right about the subliminal message given by always seeing spotless, tidy houses on TV etc and being made to feel inadequate. It's exactly the same as only seeing young, slim, firm attractive girls in magazines, and developing an eating disorder. Thank heavens for your understanding family and friends, helping you back to reality.

Thank you for being brave and sharing that - it's given me a bit of an insight into a problem I have at the moment.

Now do you think I could get Aggie & whatshername round to help me declutter before putting Madness Mansion on the market??? :D :D :D

I've given myself until the end of August to have it all spotless, sparkling, all twinkling with tealights - even coordinating dogs beds to match ;)

Margot

LOL Margot Half the fun of mooving is the tidying and finding things that have been lost for years :)

Good on you for coming through such a tough time and being able to talk about it.

I am going to run and hide before Margot gets me hooked on bleach!!! :P

Seriously, good on you for getting through it Margot, what a lovely hubbie you have! I think mine would have a heart attack if I asked him to hoover!!! I doubt he would even know how to switch it on! :D :D :D

i don't know if it is heraditary, but my grandmother was a clean freak, and her sister also, to the point of if you where having a biscuit you know those little vacs dirt busters or something like that well she would be hoovering around you as you ate, then if you got up off the couch she would be there pulling the covers straight plumping cushions, she would then use the dirt buster where you had been sitting, both of them would be cleaning from about 5am till midnight not just normall cleaning they would be on hands and knees scrubbing kitchen floors, cleaning out cupboards and washing every bit of paint work, door frames,using the stiff brush on carpets and hanging carpets on the line and beating them to death on the line, this was everyday,they never missed a day,aunt got a new suite and kept the plastic on it , now i never new any of this until my mam took me to one side one day and said enough is enough my OH had been to see my mam and told her that i did not have time for him or the girls as i was constantly cleaning, to the point where i could not sleep if i had not done something small like clean the loo before i went to bed, or had not had enough time to wipe the paintwork on the door frames upstairs, i could not bear to not have the nets and curtains down every week to be washed and ironed correctly and put back, and the crunch came when i was in a library and their window sills where dirty and i went into the loo got some toilet roll and cleaned down the window sills OH saw me do it and realised there was a problem, i could not bear things to be out of place in the house everything must be kept tidy, it has taken me years to realise a bit of muck never hurt anyone, but now and again it will creep up on me and i start to be over zealous witht he house work, and my friends and relative have been great support, but it is so hard not to when you see muck take care of it,but i don't suffer from bleeding hands anymore or nails comming off with products i used, i am not cured but i am trying to beat it and some months i have good and some months i can feel myself slipping back into the old ways. i know xmas time is not a good time for me especially if i have friends comming over i can start getting over clean with the house and i have to be made aware by my OH and try to stop.
carol

The one last night was totally gross....yuk with the maggots falling off the kids bedroom walls onto their beds, because their excuse for a mother didn't clean.........then she had the audacity to insist that all cleaning stuff was Eco friendly

But..........I use this programme as a yardstick to beat my daughter with. She has rather, umm, dodgy tendencies to leave her bedroom in an unacceptable (well to me) state, so I pin her down to watch it. And then give her the old "that's what'll happen if you don't learn to clean up" lecture :D :D Good habits start when young :P

In saying that, my mum had many good points but cleaning wasn't one of them and yet I'm the total opposite. Nobody taught me to clean, it came naturally, until I got dogs that is..............:P

TV has a lot to answer for, like Margot said we only ever see nice homes, and they are all clean, and nice and colour coordinated with new furniture, no one ever really shows us a happy lived in house with kids and pets and people with lives! You end up thinking you have to be like that to be happy, but there is nothing wrong with a little mess as long as your happy and not at risk from the latest superbug growing in the fridge from lack of cleaning!!

Our house is clean and tidy but in no way is it a show home... the brushing boots and Numnahs drying on the radiator in the hall way look very nice I think!! They are at least clean (ish)!!

Though saying that I'm hoping no bugs are living as have just been round spraying door handles and such like with dettol spray to avoid the spread of my Cold!

My daughter watched it the other day and has insisted on cleaning the house from top to bottom.  She already has to organise my diary but now is organising the house as well.  She did the boys room yesterday which I only attempt when I feel like I can tackle anything.  :)  She is now doing my room!

Does anyone remember the house doctor when she did that woman with a million poodles.  Now that was funny.

Please can I "borrow" her? :D   My "kitchen/ironing/tidying up" fairy has suddenly discovered.....the opposite sex

Margot

You can keep if you like Margot.  She comes full equipped with tons of hormones and a big attitude. :)

ahha - just like my kitchen fairy :D - her mum is glad to "lose"her for a few hours, too!!

Margot