Keeping up with the Chores

 

I don't think it's any secret that some chores are significantly harder with POTS.

I am incredibly blessed to have a husband who is supportive and helps with more chores than most even though he works such long hours.

Here are some of the tips that help me keep up with the chores: 

• Do a little every day, even when you don't feel your best
• Try to make sure you get to have a day off each week where you have no chores
• Do a deep declutter and embrace minimalism (this is my secret!)
• Whenever you are leaving a room, look around and see if there is anything that needs to go to the room you're heading to. It saves on trips & conserves energy.
• Don't put it aside, put it away! 
• If the things don't have a dedicated space in your home, ask if they really belong in your home at all
• Be ruthless with gifts--if you don't like or use them, pass them along to someone who might enjoy them
• Notice which areas of your house are "problem areas" and work on problem-solving for those specific areas

Do a little bit every day

I follow Clean Mama's Tips for keeping a clean home. I don't usually do a load of laundry every day because there is only the two of us, but I can see how if you had kids this would be necessary. Once these small tasks are done regularly, it is much easier to keep up.

Understand the importance of a day of rest

When I used to work on-call I never felt like I had a complete day to rest. My days off were sporadic and this mean that if I wasn't at work, I was working around the house or meal prepping. Now I fight to make sure there is a day of the week where I have absolutely no chores aside from the light daily ones. Now that I have these days off, I look forward to it and get to enjoy my clean house. It's a dream.

Consider Minimalism

I have completely embraced minimalism. I don't mean the monochromatic, tech-driven minimalism, but the minimalism that ruthlessly declutters and where everything has a designated place to go. Once I embraced this, I was able to freely let objects go and have only things that bring me joy in my house. Ask if this is right for you and look into the subject on Youtube and Spotify; I was able to find a few videos and episodes that made it very accessible to me.

Be ruthless with decluttering

This goes along with minimalism, but one thing I struggle with is having an emotional attachment to objects. In the last couple years I have worked on letting things go if I don't absolutely love or need them. An example of an area I have worked on this is with gifts; I used to keep everything I was gifted, and now I know when to let things go. I was given a rusty, ugly teapot for Christmas one year and I knew I didn't like it. My solution was to get home, stage it and snap a picture, and send a text to the gift giver saying "thank you so much for thinking of me!" and then donating the teapot. I never, ever want to hurt feelings with this so I found this technique works great for thanking the people who love you without seeming ungrateful. On top of gifts, I constantly make an effort to go through things I own and donate, gift, pass along, or toss things that no longer serve me. Doing this regularly helps me not to feel overwhelmed and makes my home a peaceful oasis instead of a stressful mess.

Embrace little figures of speech! 

• Don't put it aside, put it away
• Before leaving a room, look to see if there's anything that needs to go where you're heading (my mom used to say this to me)
• Do I love it, use it, or need it? If the answer is no, give it away
• If it doesn't have a place to live, does it need to live in my home?

Working with problem areas

I noticed that some parts of my house were messier than the rest, and I have made it a habit to check on these areas regularly and identify why they might be getting messy. By doing this and working on solutions, those areas are much better and not nearly as messy as they were.

In short:

These habits take time to develop. It might require asking for help from your loved ones, splitting chores differently, or identifying ones that are triggering (vacuuming is very hard for me, so Kevin does it). Be patient. I used to be "messy Jessie" so if I can do it, you can too! It takes a lot of work but it is so worth it.

Blessings, 

Jessica