Putting things away-again

[BuntyB]

Does anyone have any ideas how to gain some co-operation in putting things away?

 

If I stand with one child encouraging all the way, I can get them to put one item away at a time. Unfortuately with 3 of them who need this level of help, I can't be everywhere!

 

I have tried doing one child's room at a time, but they undo stuff faster than I can sort it, and they are the ones who go into meltdown when they can't find things because they haven't put them away!!

 

I have just tried to get C to pick up some of her clothes and she just bursts into tears and says she wishes she was little again and didn't have 'all that resposnibility'. It's so frustrating that they seem to get overwhelmed by the tiniest of tasks.

 

My house is a total cluttered dump which makes me feel very claustrophic and stressed- not that anyone else seems to care and it is really driving me mad. We have guests coming tomorrow...

[brooke]

my grandma used to say "the house will be there when your not!!!!" not that it helps.

I do sympathise though i find xmas quite hard as we have guests staying and i have to say they are the messiest people in the world . It drives me mad i cant stand it and spend all my time cleaning. I would just recomend leaving their rooms till they are back at school and do downstairs when they are in bed!!!!!

[BuntyB]

Thanks for sympathising.

 

If only I was at home and not at work when they were at school....!!

And as for them being in bed- does anyone on here have asd teens who get tired and go to bed before their parents?

Aren't they just exhausting?!!!

I do worry about how they will ever cope when they are old enough to leave home.

Edited December 29, 2007 by Shona

[brooke]

oh dear i guess im lucky that mine eventually go to bed im dreading the day they start staying up late. O my eldest 7, sometimes gets up at 3am for the day!!!! I cant imagine the state my house would be in if i worked, i spend most mornings tidying only for them to come home and trash everything!!!

[Clare63]

Thanks for sympathising.

 

If only I was at home and not at work when they were at school....!!

And as for them being in bed- does anyone on here have asd teens who get tired and go to bed before their parents?

Aren't they just exhausting?!!!

I do worry about how they will ever cope when they are old enough to leave home.

 

 

Yeap Shona I can empathise and I have only got one !!!!! sleeps half the day awake half the night...soooo exhausting, as for untidy bedroom well don't even go there, yet today he suggested I descaled the kettle coz he said it was disgusting, wanna look at his own room. Cheeky devil, I hasten to add I did descale the kettle , very embarrassing LOL

 

Clare x x x x

 

PS still got a lounge full of Christmas presents to put away yet, goodness know where we'll find homes for them !!!

[rainbow queen]

Does anyone have any ideas how to gain some co-operation in putting things away?

 

If I stand with one child encouraging all the way, I can get them to put one item away at a time. Unfortuately with 3 of them who need this level of help, I can't be everywhere!

 

I have tried doing one child's room at a time, but they undo stuff faster than I can sort it, and they are the ones who go into meltdown when they can't find things because they haven't put them away!!

 

I have just tried to get C to pick up some of her clothes and she just bursts into tears and says she wishes she was little again and didn't have 'all that resposnibility'. It's so frustrating that they seem to get overwhelmed by the tiniest of tasks.

 

My house is a total cluttered dump which makes me feel very claustrophic and stressed- not that anyone else seems to care and it is really driving me mad. We have guests coming tomorrow...

 

 

can fully understand this and ive only got 2 children-one is dx asd [my other son isnt dx but he does same behaviour)

same happens with me it has to be 1 on 1 instructions ect

my son does the same if i ask him to do a basic task-crys/screams huffs and puffs and says hes tired of doing all the work -he wont even put his own shoes on or coat and hes 6 and a half.

i dont know what to do about it-i just keep on at him but this causes meltdowns but then if they never learn to do nothing -they will carry on expecting u to do it-so every day i try and squeeze some tasks out of him like put plate in the sink/put underwear in washing basket-just do one or 2 a day to start it off and try and increase it......lol

[KateBall]

If I ask my ds to put his things away - he says "no way - I'm not your slave" I got him a perfectly decent laundry bin for his room. That's been discarded and he puts his dirty clothes in a large brown paper carrier bag he got from the zoo when he bought some souvenirs! To me his room looks a complete muddle and mess. But if I go in there and dare to knock something out of place - he knows it as soon as he comes in the room again and throws a fit. On the whole his mess is confined to his room because I have threatened to chuck things out if I find them elsewhere at the end of the day.

 

Shona other than this - I haven't a clue what the answer is - if you find one let me in on it!

[KarenT]

I have threatened to chuck things out if I find them elsewhere at the end of the day.

I do this too. J knows that he'll get a certain number of chances then if he still doesn't cooperate items will be confiscated and he has to earn them back. Some things have gone permanently on occasion.

 

As for putting away Christmas pressies, I always make sure J and I have a big clearout of old and unused stuff in Oct/Nov to make way for Christmas. He's told that if there isn't room for new things he won't get so many (he still believes in Santa so that helps). He's quite thoughtful too and likes the idea of giving things to charity or school fairs, so it's not too difficult for him to part with unwanted possessions.

 

We've started having a regular Saturday morning tidy - everything that's accumulated downstairs goes back to his room and we have a checklist of tasks to do to make the room tidy, ie sorting books and comics, putting everything back in designated places (loads of stacky boxes and drawers etc, lots of labels). We've also got a rule now of having a limited amount of Bionicles out at one time as they're too distracting, the rest have to go in a box after they're played with. Mind you, he can't do any of this without my supervision as his distractibility is incrediby high, but he's getting used to being redirected to the task in hand.

 

Really sympathise with those of you with more than one child - I've only got J and it's extremely hard to keep him organised and tidy. He's another one who can undo tidying in seconds.

 

Have you tried incorporating jobs/tasks into a reward system? This works well for J, although he still needs a lot of prompting and encouragement. It makes more sense to him if he's actually earning something for what would otherwise be pointless tasks. Every job he does earns him a token, then they get totted up at the end of the week and converted into pocket money at 10p a token. We use a visual chart and job tickets to remind him of what has to be done and he likes taking them off and getting his token once they're done. You'd need to adapt it according to age though.

 

Karen

x

[Rhianydd]

we have lockable toy cupboards here and all toys in certain boxes

so one box has to go away to get something different out

which normaly means ds puts one thing in and I do the rest

but we got to the stage that we had toys from one end of the house to the other

this seems to work with ds