Name: Sandra Felton
Background: In “Neat Mom, Messie Kids: A Survival Guide” (Revell, $11.99), Sandra Felton advises parents on how to instill habits of neatness in their children. She is the founder and president of Messies Anonymous (www.messies.com).
Q. Do you think messiness is genetic?
A. I don’t know if it’s genetic, but it definitely seems to run in families. It’s true with neatness as well. Some people apparently just come into the world neat. They may be raised in a very messy family, but they maintain an orderly way of life. There’s something involved other than just learning.
Q. What about the element of rebellion? If you grow up in a house that strikes you as overneat, you rebel by being messy. If you live in a chaotic household, you might try to carve out order for yourself.
A. That’s absolutely true. I come across that all the time. I remember one woman who had a mirror she wouldn’t hang up, just to annoy her mother.
Q. How do you decide what’s neat enough for your household?
A. It depends on what is good for you. I often say disorganization is a form of self-abuse. Getting organized is a gift you give to yourself. How organized you want to be depends on a couple of things. One is, how does the house work? Are you constantly frustrated because you can’t find things? The second is, how does the house look? If the house looks good to you, then you’re on the mark. But if you’re ashamed to bring people in, and you don’t want to go home yourself, you’re missing the mark.
Q. Sometimes I need to make a mess, though I don’t like it as a permanent condition.
A. There are also people who make isolated messes. They have neat houses but their drawers might not be organized. People don’t want to live in model homes. But they do want to live in a way that makes life easy for them. There’s enough stress in the world without bringing it into our houses. Home should be comforting, a respite.
Q. Say a person’s home is a big mess right now. Is it best to approach cleaning it up as one big project–a purge–or more gradually?
A. The best approach is slow. I suggest you go around the inside periphery of your house with three boxes: one that says “Throw Away,” one that says “Give Away” and one that says “Store Elsewhere.” And if you must have a fourth box that says “Ambivalent” because you can’t decide, take that one along too. Label them with big letters, then start at the front door and begin going through things. Go all the way around the house until you’re back to the front door again. It took me 3 1/2 months to do that, and I have a small house.
It’s important to do it slowly and think about it because as you make these decisions, you are challenging your old way of life. Clutter is the result of unmade decisions, and now you’re making those decisions. That begins to change a person internally. It’s an upward spiral.
Q. What if it’s an emergency and time is of the essence?
A. If you have a landlord threatening to evict you, or something’s broken and you can’t have the man come in to fix it because of the mess, you need another method. Start by grouping things together: “Billy’s clothes,” “Mary’s toys,” “Photo stuff,” “Tools.”
Get white boxes with big labels on them, and put stuff in these boxes. Then you can stack them against the wall; they’re white, so they disappear.
You still have the problem of eventually dealing with what’s in the boxes, but your immediate problem is solved.
Q. It would make a huge difference.
A. And it gives you hope, because now you see what you have, and you can go on.
Q. With getting children to be neat, you emphasize changing habits rather than keeping charts. Can you teach a toddler to be neat?
A. You can teach it before then. If you have a little child on the floor who can’t even crawl, and he’s sitting on the floor playing with toys, and it’s time for a nap, say, “It’s time for a nap. Time to put our toys in the basket.” You put one in, and you put one in the child’s hand and the child puts one in. It’s a mindset you’re trying to create.
I have mothers who tell me, “I am so tired of doing nothing all day but pick up.” That’s so unnecessary. Children should not only not be leaving stuff around for Mom; they should be helping Mom. If a mother has a vision for her children in this area, she’ll start teaching them early. Even though it’s extra work to teach them, it’s beneficial in the long run. If they learn self-control and to be a team player and to be responsible and not procrastinate, they’re going to be better for it and so is the house and so is Mom.
Q. What if you didn’t start when the children were small, and now your house is out of control. How can you get on track?
A. Having a family meeting is always a good idea. Setting up consequences, both good and bad, is important, and so is being consistent. Make it beneficial for the child to do whatever it is you want them to do.
If they keep their room clean they can have friends in overnight. They can decorate it with things that wouldn’t have been appropriate before.
Q. Some parents decide they’ll just keep the door closed on kids’ rooms, and whatever goes on in there is fine. Where do you stand on that?
A. There are people who say, “Look. We have to pick our battles, and we’re going to let that one go.” That’s probably pretty appropriate. And with teenagers, they are trying on all sorts of different lifestyles, and you have to let them. But you have to be smart about it. To say, “Honey, I don’t expect you to keep your room nice” is missing the boat. To give up on it altogether is not wise.
In my case, with my mother, I lived inside her organization, and it was a gift. I wouldn’t have liked to live in a messy room, but I would not have known how to keep it neat myself. With her parameters, I was able to live what was for me a life of dignity, even as a child.
