Confessions

stickywicket

What has your arthritis resulted in you doing, or not doing, which you are a bit ashamed of?

I rarely iron. I'm not ashamed of that because I think it's the only sensible approach to arthritic life but I do feel a pang of guilt when I'm preparing to visit my son in California each year and I fish out from my linen basket blouses that have been in there, awaiting the iron (and sunshine), since our last visit.

The Health and Safety Police would probably condemn my fridge.

Ditto oven.

Ditto microwave.

My windows are not always transparent.

But my priorities clearly are

jojo03

I can totally relate to all of the above! I do actually iron, but I'm pretty useless at cleaning.

My mum and mother-in-law are very house proud, which is why I try to keep them away from my house as much as possible!!

I never hoover under the telly, under the bed, or anywhere else you can't see. My curtains don't get taken down to be washed (I find a bit of Febreze helps with that!), and there are cobwebs in the corners that are practically antique.

On the surface, I think my house looks clean and tidy, but I could definitely do much better if I was fit and able!

So glad to hear it's not just me!

Slosh

Snap!
Plus my garden is full of weeds. My husband does basics but it's not the same. So glad it's not just me.

theresak

Ditto from me. While I was never a fiend for housework, at least I have an excuse now. Some things don't get ironed & Windows have to wait until hubby has time to clean them. Sometimes I cheat and buy readymade pastry.

I'm another member of the 'glad it's not just me' brigade.

barbara12

I feel proper proud when I get some ironing done sat on my stool, the top of my oven is clean but the inside... :oops: oh well nobody's died yet...hoovering around things... :oops:life is to short has they say..I cleaned my laptop screen the other day..

Slosh

I managed to iron two blouses and a pair of trousers this afternoon, lightweight dry iron and an ironing spray. The ironic thing is that I now have more ironing than pre-arthur days as I can no longer easily manage to put on and take off tee-shirts, jumpers etc. so have to wear more shirts and blouses. I keep an ironing board up in what used to be my sewing room (had to give that up) so I can just iron one or two things at a time which is manageable.

Starburst

I have ironed since I was forced to do so in order to get a badge at Brownies.

dreamdaisy

I refuse to be ashamed. If the state of my house offends guests then they are more than welcome to seize a duster or switch on the vacuum. Thoroughness went out of the window a few years ago, I am looking forward to having the heating on again so I can spray the radiators with polish When the mood strikes I do the inside of the windows and am always surprised at how easy it is - I think the fear of the work is worse than the reality and that applies to the majority of housework.


My main problem is this: I am chronically untidy. :oops: DD

stickywicket

barbara12 wrote:

.I cleaned my laptop screen the other day..

That's a bit extreme, isn't it Barbara

dreamdaisy wrote:

I think the fear of the work is worse than the reality and that applies to the majority of housework.

Nope. I don't fear it. I just can't reach most of it I admit I can reach ironing but it's all a matter of the best use of limited energy levels. In my head I have tons of the stuff but it all kind of dissipates on its way down to the various joints.

bubbadog

Bending incorrectly to play with the cats! OH is always telling me off for doing it!!

Kitty

I don't do much at all. A little cleaning, hang the washing out, but no cooking and not much gardening. OH does it all - well, he says he's better at it than me anyway.

Boomer13

Letting guilt of not being able to do work of various kinds get to me. Feeling guilty keeps sneaking in.

dreamdaisy

I felt guilty for a while but then realised it was an extra burden on top of all the others - and one I could banish. I do what I can, when I can, and if I can't? No matter. Short-cuts can be taken, tasks can be delayed and - because I live with a bloke - no-one notices. DD

tkachev

Arthritis prevented me from visiting my Mum in hospital and then I got a call to say she had unexpectedly died. I'm heartbroken that I never got down to see her in her final days. It was even worse for my siblings as they lived close by and got to the hsospital minutes too late. I hate to think of her all alone.

I had previously driven down with my 2nd Son, the only time that she ever saw him, when she had previously been admitted to hospital.Arthritis made driving a nightmare and I lived about 2 hours drive away. but her face lit up when she saw us and I'd wished I'd done the same again.

Elizabeth

stickywicket

Elizabeth, that's sad but you have nothing to be ashamed of. Some things we can do and some we can't. How lovely that she saw your second son, though. I bet that made her day.

Boomer13

And that's another for me: not being there visiting my mum. I fear I have missed her last good years as she now has Alzheimer's. It's made worse by the fact that I look reasonably well, so no one really believes me when I say I have been ill. It all makes me very sad as I was very close to my mum. I know she would understand, but still, I feel terrible about it.

stickywicket

Is she well enough to talk on the phone, Anna? Or maybe a regular letter or postcard of somewhere she loved. We think arthritis is a cruel disease but I'd take it any day over Alzheimers, or any other form of dementia. My mother-in-law had Multi Infarct Dementia.

It doesn't matter what others think if they don't know, or don't understand, the truth. You and your Mum were close. That's something to treasure.

Vickio

How glad am I to have found this forum and this thread?!

I am nodding along with all of your housework posts. My mother, MIL and sisters in law are all also big on immaculate cleaning and I feel very guilty in comparison, but I really struggle with a lot of stuff, especially when it involves bending down or kneeling (skirting boards....need I say more?)

Between me and hubby we try to vacuum every day as we have a very hairy dog (golden retriever) and two cats so need to keep the hair away, and happily our 13 yr old son is now a dab hand at hoovering

Dusting gets done when you can grow potatoes in it and the bathroom gets a squirt of bleach or a wip ran over it now and again if I'm having a good day or my husband does it (he makes all the bloomin mess and spills anyway...)

I feel quite depressed about it at times but other days I say to myself 'no one ever died wishing they'd done more cleaning'. Today is one of the latter days....

Vickio

PS: Anna I really feel for you. I live 300 miles away from my family, and wish I could go more but it's just not possible. My Nanna passed away 2 years ago but I adored her and felt awful about not being able to see her more.

You can only do what you can do. xx

pot80

Open and honest. What a virtue.

stickywicket

Vickio wrote:

'no one ever died wishing they'd done more cleaning'.

Thank you, vickio. That will be my mantra from now on

Slosh

And as Shirley Conran once wrote
Life's too short to stuff a mushroom

JamesFoote

Well i am a bloke
and my mother -in law lives with us so to be honest i dont do much anyway

I love detailing my car, i have done it for years and it really relaxes me. it use to take me 3 days to do a full clean but now a day is more than enough and sometime i just can not do my wife car at all and that really bugs me.

i would clean the cars every week but now i do it when i can and suffer for the next few days.

they do look good though

James

dreamdaisy

It's also too short for arthritic regrets: we do what we can, when we can, using the available (but usually limited) physical resources we possess at the time. If others feel the need to judge then that is their trouble, not ours. DD

Boomer13

I am sorry, I missed replying to this somehow...... :oops:

Sticky, very occasionally when I talk to my Mum on the phone we have a terrific 5 or 10 minutes and she's completely there with older memories. I love those minutes! Then, it all goes sideways and she forgets all again:( I even become a friend of myself. She asks "how is Anna doing" I think Alzheimer's is an extremely tragic disease.

Vickio, the housework is hard isn't it? We have dogs too and limited strength to vacuum etc; it's just an ongoing battle but priority areas get done and I love my spray bottle of bleach solution. Things get a shot with that if nothing else.

It is hard not spending more time, especially with aging family members. I miss my aunt horribly, she died a few years ago now and I wasn't there to help her much in her last couple of years.

stickywicket

I'm afraid that is dementia. Mr SW's Mum was the same. She regarded him as 'the nice gentleman who comes to visit every day'. The only good thing is that yours is probably unaware of your being unable to visit much so don't beat yourself up about it.