DGFL 

Disclaimer: I’m not a “dirty” person and my house isn’t gross! It is cleaned and disinfected regularly and it is safe to enter!

I know there are a lot of stereotypes about men and women in regards to cleaning a house. A lot of women bitch about their husband’s lack of attention when it comes to this matter; dishes left in the sink, toilet seats left up, laundry left on the floor. Well, not in my household. My closet is typically an explosion of laundry everywhere! Half of it is clean because the boys think it’s fun to pull it off the hangers, so it stays there until I have time to get to it. The living room is typically a cluster-fuck of toys, but it is what it is because if I waste my time cleaning it up, it will be destroyed again in t-minus 2 minutes. And don’t get me started on the bathroom! Scrunchies, clothes, towels, products that claim they’ll help with my prematurely wrinkling forehead are scattered about! But why put them away when I will no doubt be using them in less than 24hrs! (Remind me I can NEVER justify yelling at my kids about picking up!) My, or should I say my husband’s, issue is that clutter typically doesn’t bother me. It’s not that I like clutter, but I feel that my time is more valuable elsewhere. Well like I said, my husband HATES clutter. I mean he is self-diagnosed with OCD when it comes to clutter (and reminds me ALL the time)! A couple days ago he brought another laundry bin into the bathroom and said, “I’m gonna go ahead and set this in here so when you take a shower or give the boys a bath just MAYBE the clothes will make it into the bin if it is 2ft away.” That poor man.

Now let me go back in time. When I first met my husband I was a young, super hot ;), 21yr old. But I was STUPID. He had a cleaning lady for his place in the city and I made the mistake of asking WHY he would pay someone to clean his place when I could do it MUCH better. (Save your money for something like an engagement ring is probably what was really going through my head!) I told him to let her go because I could OBVIOUSLY do it. Yeahhhhhh let me say it for you…WHAT THE FUCK WAS I THINKING?! I mentioned stupid right? I started our relationship with false advertising by acting like I could, but more importantly wanted to handle this task!

Now let’s fast forward 8.5yrs with 2 kids & 1 dog (not to mention a teaching job and a growing company) …I HATE CLEANING MY HOUSE! It takes up time I don’t have for something I hate doing. Now my mom is someone who loves to clean her house. She would blast her music (always U2 … she’s obsessed with Bono) and make her house sparkle all while owning a business & raising kids/dogs; making my list of excuses nothing but excuses! Unfortunately for my husband, this personality trait did not pass down to me. I am many things, but obsessive about clutter is not one of them.

So now that you have my backstory, know that I spent what felt like the ENTIRE day cleaning my house, because when I do it, I do it damn well (no matter how much I hate it). And now I’m exhausted, tired and “wasted” all of my time today. Now WHY did I spend the day cleaning? To make my husband happy? Umm…no, but we’ll pretend that’s why (unless of course he reads this blog post tonight! Hi babe!) No, no it’s because we have a cleaning lady coming. Who would want a CLEANING lady to come to a dirty house. I don’t want her to think I’m a slob or anything.

xoxo

Colleen – DGFL (dirty girl for life) … I bet my husband wishes that had a different meaning.