Order versus Chaos?

[Lesley]

I was just curious-

 

I'm quite well read up on AS, I'm NT living with 2 aspies (son, hubby) and working with it too (teaching AS)

One thing has always puzzled me; many times I reead about the need for order in the AS life - often this is presented by the Aspie needing to keep all their belongings in the strictest, neatest, tidiest, catalogued order. Perhaps you'd notice this in a perfectly tidy bedroom, CD collections catalogued with precision etc.

 

In my 2 aspies (son & hubby) it seems to be the opposite - when they finish with something they just put it down where they are & forget about it - I'm constantly tidying up after them.

 

Their need for 'order' seems to be in their head - I'm sure if you disected their brains you'd find head size filing cabinets in there.

They both have to plan their future with fine detail but can't seem to get the present day items organised.

Maybe its the difference between actual objects and visionary ones? Maybe a newspaper or toy doesn't fit in their head size filing cabinet so they don't know what to do with it & just dump it?

 

Does anyone else experience this?

 

Are Aspies supposed to be tidy?

Anyone got any tips on how to get my aspies to be tidy?

 

L

xxx

[stinger]

i never keep anything tiday but then again i am lazy

[Viper]

I live with three aspies, my husband un DX'ed. my 14yr old DD and my 4 yr old DS.

 

My husband is infuriating with his constant need to tidy up and clean, but saying that he has his own version of tidy. Everthing has to be put away but he never puts it where it should go. He will tidy up a game and then stack it in a corner of the room, I constantly have to clear away piles of his tidying, he thinks if it is in a neat pile in the corner it is tidy.

 

My DD shares a room with her sister and is always moaning about the mess she makes and my son just leaves it to my husband to pile it all up for him

 

My husband and son are always cleaning too, they love nothing beter than bonding over a good hoovering session or window cleaning, in fact if it sits still too long it gets cleaned.

 

Viper.

[smallworld]

Send em round to ours please !! We're in urgent need of someone who likes cleaning/tidying (apart from putting CD's, games, herbs(!) into alphabetical order)

I need 24 hours notice of any visits, not enough cupboards to cram things in at short notice.

When I was a teenager, my Mum used to ask me to hoover before she came in from work. I just used to shake the ######-pile rug. She always thought I done what she asked. It gave me a life-long conviction that I could get away with this method of house work.WRONG !!

 

wac

[kerrybobs]

Hiya,

 

My daughter who is 10, AS, ADHD, is the scruffiest person I know. She will just leave anything where she stands. Her bedroom is the worst she has the box room in our house so space is limited but the majority of the time , I cant even get in the room due to the mountains of clothes, toys plus numerous carrier bags full to the brim all over the room.

 

I have tried putting stickers of knickers, socks etc. on her chest of draws and wardrobe yet they are always empty. Robyn gets overwhelmed when it comes to tidying up, she lacks concentration and has no organisational skills what so ever.so she will end up sitting on the mountain of clothes playing.and we have the tantrums and her favourite saying is ' my brain does not know how to tidy up'.

 

She will get very distressed and will be crying and talking to herself last week it was ' I dont know why my room is like this, I dont know how to do it, I am going to get a knife and kill everyone in this house'.

 

I thought I will just do it myself in future. The thing is when it is tidy she loves it and likes sniffing the furniture where I have polished , but come the next day it is like a bomb has hit it. She also likes to rub anything may it be a drink, nail varnish, paints etc on her bedroom window even when she has stood there watching me scrub it off and I tell/ask her not to touch the windows, give her 10 minutes and she is at it again.

 

I must be the talk of the street me with the dirty minty windows.

 

Kerry

[KarenT]

James' room is a tip. There's storage space for everything and it could be really neat and tidy, but he gets engrossed in games and 'needs' all the kit to go with them, so they're left lying around the room till he wants them again for the next part of his game. Half-read books are everywhere, clothes get discarded wherever they were taken off... I could go on. We've tried to encourage tidiness in him since he was very small but I still have to go in there every couple of weeks and give it a once-over.

 

Karen

x

[Amanda32]

My son keeps his room tidy, sorts his boxes of toys out and dont let anyone mess it all up as he gets annoyed. If I go in there to clean he says, mam dont do this and that you shouldn't do that. He likes things in order and cant move anything really but im not going to stop him better than throwing it around.... My daughter hasn't got problems and is quite lazy at 12 and I haven't been in her room for 2 weeks now left it to her to sort out as she should be doing it herself anyway so she has to sleep in it. I like to keep things in order if I can and dont like anyone else doing my work as I do it the way I like and am quite independant. I clean the house and always look over things all the time to check if its spotless and no crumbs anywhere. I ALWAYS tell my hubby what ive done and what im going to do in what order and for him to look over my work.... Lately I havent had the chance to get things square with work going on in the house and its doing my head in.... He has lots of tools etc and I dont like clutter but im trying to bare it until the work as finished.... Im the same at work like to clean with perfection (if that's the word).... making sure that its done properly. I am finding it difficult with the mess at the moment but if I want the work finished I should let him carry on.

Take care

Amanda

Edited August 13, 2005 by Amanda32

[Suze]

My son,s room is a tip but it,s organised mess.Put that way on purpose.His room is laid out as a farm complete with soil sand false grass and a bowl of water for a pond.I try to tidy up but he immeadiately knows when something has moved

[Flora]

My AS son's room always used to be absolute chaos. Then earlier this year we completely renovated it and presented him with an orderly, newly decorated room with a home for everything and spare storage space for when he acquires new 'things'. Since then he has been totally obsessed with keeping it tidy and has even posted a list of rules on his bedroom door for visitors to his room!

 

I'm not saying redocorating or renovating is the answer to an untidy AS person, but it certainly worked for my son.

 

The messiest person in my house is my only NT child who's room is quite scary sometimes!

 

Lauren

[lil_me]

Depends what it is, all his stuff in a specific place or if not in a certain order, however the row of dinosaurs I stood on this morning in his room hurt my foot but he has to put his shoes, coat etc in the right place and if something is in the way and he can't get to the cupboard he's not a happy bunny. Can't move a thing without him noticing.

 

We've just changed the bedrooms around and allowed him to decide where everything goes which has been much easier for him to deal with.

 

He will however throw things around in meltdown then panic they have been moved or empty all sorts on the floor to find one specific thing.

 

His little brother and Dad are the untidy ones, spend all day following them round.

[nightingales]

Hi Leslie,

No, we didn't get one of the ultra-tidy types either. Sigh. If we were burgled, I doubt we'd notice for days...

When he was younger I came close to giving up tidying after him altogether, as he would constantly toss things out of his way or flick paint, food or anything sticky from his fingers (hated the texture, I'd guess in retrospect). I had a minimum standard that meant we could probably tell if there was a used nappy or a dead mouse on the floor (after the health vivistor came round to see his newborn brother, and C proudly presented her with the small furry corpse he'd just found.

 

Lins

[annie]

My hubby decided to help my 15 year old tidy up his room because he's always buying magazines and they were all over the place (even though he has lots of shelves and cupboards).

 

Hubby told son to open his chest of drawers, in the bottom drawer, it was full of empty Smartie tubes.

 

A while later, hubby comes and tells me that the room is neat and tidy now.

 

Our son had thrown out all of the magazines and most of the other rubbish that was all over the place..........but put all of the Smartie tubes neatly back in the drawer again

 

Annie

Edited August 13, 2005 by annie

[karin]

hi all read all your e-mails and laughed at a few ive decided to hire a jcb truck next time i clean the boys room 3 share the same room twins and little brother it is a tip when i cant see the carpet any longer i know it is time to tidy it we are trying to get youngest to throw some toys out as his birthday is in a month and keep saying to him you wont get any birthday presents as there will be no more room for them suceeding a bit forget the twins the minute i tidy their boxes the next its a tip waste of time keep smilin luv karin xx

[bevalee]

Hi

 

My son is 15 and his room is a tip! Every where he go's he makes a mess and i'm forever clearing up after him.

 

He likes to have all of his clothes ironed. I put them away and he puts them on the floor! I could ring his neck

[jools]

we live in chaos.......all 3 of them are messy.

but in the mess G will will always know where his football stuff and yu-gi-oh cards are!

[annie]

Hi Beverley,

 

You mentioned ironing.

 

Our 15 year old is always telling us not to go in his room, so I normally leave his ironing in the hall for him to put away.

 

Trouble is, he never thinks to put it in his room, let alone put it away. Even though he'll walk past it at least 20 times a day.

 

There's normally a mountain of clothes outside. The only time he bothers to sort it out is when he's virtually out of clothes. Then he'll moan that I don't put them in his room

 

Annie

[Lesley]

Thanx for the tip Lauren but we tried that one - completely re-decorated & sorted appropriate storage at Christmas - even spent ours on the web finding pictures to go on labels on drawers etc. but all to no avail. It's like J doesn't even NOTICE his surroundings! (until he steps on a toy & hurts his foot....)

 

L

xxx

[Flora]

Hi Lesley. Yes, it certainly wouldn't work for all of them. I have tried a similar thing for my NT daughter who is still incurably untidy! I wasn't sure if it work for my son and certainly didn't expect it to, also I will add that it's only a couple of months since we did his room so it could be the novely factor! Only time will tell.

 

Lauren

[lsw146]

My daughter's room is constantly awful and I have often wondered whether this is a sign that we are going along the wrong route in wanting assessment for AS but I have come to the conclusion that it is because she sees the detail and not the bigger picture.

 

I am sure that when she enters her room she doesn't see chaos just lots of individual items. It is only when I point out the mess and ask her to organise it that she has meltdown. However after a few years of showing her how to organise and giving direct instructions on what should be put away where, things have got better. Her panic was in doing the tidying the wrong way and choosing where to put things?!

[Lesley]

I can definitely relate to that - my sons idea of tidying up the mess on the floor (if he gets past meltdown) is chucking it all on the bed!

 

L

xxx

[Tally]

My mum always used to tell me my room was a mess, and that I wouldn't notice if she moved things about, but believe me, I did notice. It may look like chaos to you, but it's probably not.

[invent 10 things b4 breakfast]

My 8 year old Aspie is so untidy. Lego all over the floor, robots, cut up bits of paper and selotape everywhere in his bedroom. I am never allowed to throw anything away either - he goes into meltdown, let alone tidy it up, he knows exactly where everything is.

 

In his mind he is still playing with ALL of it, even if he's out in the garden doing something completely different.

[~Jonathan~]

I live in ordered chaos and now have 100 posts

[nightingales]

Becky -- sounds like your son and mine could swap rooms!

Lindsay

[elaine1]

my son is the untidiest person you wd ever wish to meet. his room is an absolute tip. I clear it out once a year, obviously i clean in between lol, but we end up with binbags full of old comics broken toys etc, that he is just treading on every time hewalks across the floor.

we even gave himloads of storage and marked the drawres for certain items, does he use it no....................

 

 

I give up trying to sort him out now. I just hope hes tidier if he ever decides to move out!!!!!!!!!!

[annie]

Alex's bedroom is part of a downstairs extension at the side of the house. His bedroom door is off the hall by the front door. We have to make sure that his door is shut.........not only because of the mess that you can see, but the lovely teenage hormone smell that wafts out of it............there's permanantly an air freshner on the go in there and the windows are open as much as possible, but the smell is still there

 

Annie

[DaisyProudfoot]

Martin's bedroom used to be very untidy until we moved him into a different bedroom to share with his little brother. He now has his side of the room and his brother the other and although the toddler always expands into Martin's side of the room he doesn't seem bothered anymore as long as his D & D figures are up a height.

 

I used to have terrible problems washing his sheets, duvet cover and pillow cases - he would be furious that I had messed up his bed and moved his cuddly toys around and woe betide if the same sheets and duvet weren't back in place by the time he went to bed.

 

Now we have an arrangement - I can remove the toys and wash the bedding as long as he can come up and put every toy back in its rightful place. I also have two sets of the same sheets, duvet etc and I don't think he notices!

 

His NT sister is another story entirely - now that bedroom gets so bad I've actually sat down on the bed and cried at the state of it. It's tidy at the moment - we had a blitz recently!

 

Daisy

[elaine1]

toms sister is the complete opposite, she is very tidy and is cleaning mad. she stayed t my elder daughters house yesterday and she cleaned the place from top to bottom.

lol im hiring her out for �5 an hour if anyone's interested lol

[BuntyB]

My daughter is also dreadful. If i stand over her and pass her things and tell her where to put them, she can do this for a while. Mostly if we suggests she picks anything up, she goes into total meltdown. She sleeps with mountains of things in her bed. If we discuss hygiene she will make a face and say 'yuk' but it doesn't alter her habits.

 

On the other hand, my son was obsessively tidy, until he hit 12! Now he's only interested in Playstation or computer and also lives in tip land. I live in hope that my daughter will have a simialar transformation at 12 and become the tidy one next year!

Edited August 17, 2005 by Shona

[Tez]

My son answered a personality questionaire the other day. It asked - is order, tidiness and organisation important to you, to which he answered yes.

In another place it asked whether he was organised, tidy and ordered, to which he answered no. Well, that's certainly true. There isn't a space in his bedroom that you can tread without stepping on something, mostly pieces of paper that he has written on.

 

I think that he would like to be tidy but just doesn't know how. Also his idea of order is very different to mine.

 

I went to pick some of the paper up the other day and was told to leave it. He told me that it was a representation of his brain and if I moved any piece of it I would jumble his brain up and confuse him!

[Lesley]

wow that's deep!

not looking like a simple answer to this one then guys!!

 

Lx