Have you ever lived with someone who was messier or neater than you?

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

And it caused a LOT of friction?

Please give me suggestions. I am considered the slobbier one, though I am far from a slob. He is a neatfreak. To his credit, he HAS improved over the years (chilled out a bit) and no longer tries to get the place to look like a freaking museum AND I have improved over the years and am WAY better than I used to be.

The problem is what bothers him, doesn't bother me. It WILL bother me, eventually (and it doesn't have to get to the health department condemning it for that!) but AFTER it bothers him. So HE ends up doing it and bitching and feeling resentful.

Yes, we already divided up chores. I even I have one extra chore than him (Little Moonbeam has them, too) and he STILL bitches.

I know I am all about griping about him tonight but no one ever said living with someone forever would be easy.

I am hoping there is some great idea out there that will help. He gets upset if there are two little dishes in the sink. He sweeps ALL the time.

URG.

[Gothic Sponge]

1. Relationships can turn ugly

if one person is anal-retentive and the other anal-expulsive.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

2. HEY!

Am I supposed to be the anal-expulsive one in this scenario? LOL.

But seriously. I hate it when I start thinking we'd both be happier apart. I don't even need or want to divorce him. I just want to live about two blocks away.

Is that weird?

[Gothic Sponge]

3. I've been there!

It's odd...I lived with someone that made Felix Unger look like a slob. It drove me crazy. Yet, when my wife and i were together, i was the neat freak, and she was the slob. Go figure!

[Kenneth ken]

4. yes and yes

I had a room mate who was much messier than me; I had a different room mate who was much neater than me.

Now I live alone. Works great! :P
Probably not the solution you were looking for though.

[samplegirl]

5. Its Hell to live with messy people

I know i've been doing it for years................cant wait to
live alone!!!!!!

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

6. Is this messy person a partner in life

or a roommate? Or family members?

[Habibi]

7. Do you have enough space in your home

for you each to have a separate space to trash/neaten as you wish? Sometimes that helps--just having a little corner of the universe that you alone control. Negotiating the rest becomes easier. At least in my experience.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

8. Sigh

We've tried that. It didn't work. I JUST don't see the frigging point in getting all bent out of shape about every little speck of anything on the floor (we went to all hard floors because wall to wall carpeting drove him BANANAS!!! He was constantly checking the carpet for stains, etc.).

I wonder if that boy doesn't have OCD.

[Habibi]

12. Oh, dear.

It sounds difficult. My best wishes for you; I have nothing to offer, advise-wise, otherwise, apart from the separate living spaces already mentioned.

One partner and I used to joke about owning a home in which we each had a wing, for which we were each responsible.

Specks are, well, just specks. If I had a life partner who got bent out of shape about such things, I too would be asking advice. Or packing my bags. But I've been fortunate in my lifetime to hook up with people who, if they didn't completely share my idea of the best comfort of home, at least tolerated my idea of it.

I'm sorry this is hard for you.

[Tom_Foolery]

9. My wife and daughter are absolute pigs...

My wife has her clothes spread all over the bedroom. My daughter doesn't know what a trash can is. She throws paper, candy wrappers, etc. right on the floor. Our house is such a mess that I'm embarrassed to have anyone come over. I try to keep it clean, but why should I spend my very few days off cleaning the house when the wrecking crew take just minutes to mess it up again?

If try to discipline our daughter, I get the prune face from my wife. It isn't worth it any longer.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

10. Aw, damn

that is much worse than this situation. The house is generally picked up. I rinse off our dishes and doing the dishes is his job (he just has to load and run the dishwasher, Little Moonbeam puts them away).

I cook every meal we eat. I do the laundry, I clean our bathroom and I dust. Little Moonbeam vaccuums and has to keep her room, playroom and bathroom picked up. She doesn't keep them PERFECT, but they are far from trashed out.

I think his expectations are unreasonable. He literally cannot relax if the bed is not made and if there is a single fork in the sink.

I feel for you. I would give up, too. Sheesh.

[Tom_Foolery]

11. I'm not a neat freak either. I know people can be messy...

but this is crazy. My mother likes to remind me that my sister was a pig when we were kids. I tell her that my sister's room was nothing compared to my daughter's. My parents don't come to our house because we live way out in the boonies, but I wouldn't want them to come anyway. I have two days off this week, and I'm cleaning this house up. I swear that it's going to stay looking good. I'm laying the law down to these two, and they better listen. I get so tired of coming home from a long day at work to find a big mess in the house. I feel better getting this off my chest. Thanks!!!

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

13. You're welcome

I hope it works. Inertia is hard to overcome.

You are making me feel guilty. I really need to go put up that load of clean clothes.

One thing that drives me crazy is I DO plenty of things, but Mr. Moonbeam either doesn't notice them, doesn't care that I do them or both.

I often bag up the trash (supposed to be his job) and just today I washed our bed linens and put them back on when they were dry. But he totally doesn't notice that I do things like THAT!

I guess what it boils down to is, I don't care if I pick up after him a bit, because I know it all evens out. But if he ever picks up after me, it burns him up no end!

I don't get it! :shrug:

[Tom_Foolery]

16. I don't get it either. Have a good night. n/t

[miss_kitty]

20. that is too bad

i am slobby, but only because i live alone. when i live with others, i consider it poor manners to make them look at my mislayed crap.

[bif]

14. My wife andI were total pigs.

Now she's more of a clean freak than I am. I have one daughter who's pretty clean and one who's the biggest pig on the planet. We actually imposed a rule regarding her bedroom: you at least have to have a path to yourr bed in case of a fire. Plenty of tension here, believe me.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

15. I feel ya.

My daughter and I are pretty much on the same wavelength. We don't get freaky about every little thing, maybe the house gets a tad messy, but we know we'll pick it up. He's just a tad insane about it.

[bif]

17. Here's the thing

If we're entertaining(which we do almost every weekend) the downstairs looks great. Who give a shit about the upstairs? So that's our compromise.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

18. That sounds like a good deal.

And he's honestly not stressed about her bedroom (he just doesn't go in there). She keeps her playroom pretty neat and we all use the office so we straighten it up as we go.

The master bedroom just doesn't GET that messy. I think his main deals are the laundry, the floors and the dishes. That's it. It's like it pisses him off if he does any of it at all, but I'm not doing all of it! I do all the cooking!

Thanks for listening to me vent, LOL!

[miss_kitty]

19. have you considered a disinterested 3rd party

IE counseling? i ask, because it sounds to me the way you tell it-you've made strides and it is an effort for you, and Mr M isn't meeting you halfway or praising your accomplishments.

If he has the neaty-neato-neatnik thing, it sounds like it is something he needs to deal with. I mean, there are reasonable expectations, then there are the over-the-top bizarro demands made by people w/ Mr Moonbeam's affliction.

Let me tell you where I am coming from. If I were to miraculously partner up w/ Mr Youlldo tomorrow, I would have to pack up everything in my place, then unpack it, just to get a handle on the tidying. I would consider that a reasonable expectation on the part of a new roommate/partner. I am a move-it-around and vacuum or scrub gal, but i can't seem to get a handle on putting it away. My sister has panic attacks in my apartment. I have panic attacks at her place, because she is always 'tidying up' behind me.

Our mom was tidy and clean w/o be weird about it.

If something bugs Mr Moonbeam, he has to take responsibility for that feeling, and take care of what it is that is bothering him, either through physical action, or through self-control. If you are picking up and cleaning, he needs to lay off.

That's just MHO, though.

[Habibi]

26. Yeah, what she said

Sounds like you're not getting credit for the contributions you make. Housework is a daily chore for *all* parties in the house. If you're doing your bit, he needs to recognize that, and do his.

[NashVegas]

21. If He Ends Up Doing Your Chores

praise him :)

[Nightowl_2004]

22. Yeah....

My Mom :scared:

[tibbir]

23. My ex-husband is way neater than I am, especially back in the day

He was actually quite nice about it, though. I'd take clothes off and leave them on the bed (or the floor sometimes) and he'd come along and hang them up for me. It made me feel so bad that after a while I started at least throwing them on the hanger so he wouldn't do that.

We tried to divide chores more or less equally. The thing is, after our son was born and he couldn't be the child any more (uh oh, bitterness alert), he started a passive aggressive move. The deal was that I'd cook and he'd wash the dishes - and he would wash the dishes after they'd sat in gross dirty water soaking for days.

I've been living on my own since 1994. I clean up after myself now much better and do all the work and I couldn't be happier.

[St. Jarvitude]

24. Well, not really - but I figured I have to post in this thread

This thread wouldn't be complete without a post from messiertom. :D

Actually, my dad is a neat freak and occasionally he'll freak out if I leave a few things on the floor in my room. Oh well.

[VOX]

25. Very litle friction. But I do despair of finding my wife's shoes in the..

den, the dining room, the office, the living room, etc. etc. On the other hand, my corner of the office looks like a bomb hit it.

I used to be a clean-freak, but over time, it was just too much to keep up.

Just last night, my wife and I spent 4 hours together cleaning up the house, from stem to stern, and we actaully had fun while doing it!
:kick: