Messy Bedrooms, Messy Behavior: Get Kids to Be Responsible For Their Rooms & Relationships #638

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1:58Visit ixl.com slash Kirk to get the most effective learning program at the best price. So when Casey was young, we had a phrase in our home, which was, hey, where was Casey? And what that meant was wherever there was a mess in the house, that's where Casey had been. And I know this concerns you and it frustrates you about physical messes in the home. And we're going to talk about that today. But what I really also want is for your kids to learn how to clean up their own messes in life with siblings, with a future spouse, with classmates, within themselves, to know how to deal with internal disappointment and frustration.

2:40So that is what we're going to discuss on today's episode of the Calm Parenting Podcast. Welcome. This is Kirk Martin, also host of the PDA Parent Podcast. And if you like this podcast, please hit subscribe so you don't miss any episodes. It actually helps more parents find us. And a five-star review actually means a lot to me personally. So I know this is going to focus a little more on physical messes in the home. and I have scripted this out but what I'm feeling inside is that I'm going to go off script and when I go off script, those will be the gems. Those will be the things to pay attention to.

3:17So it's going to be a mix of some very practical things to help you with messes in the home but also some philosophical things, some shifts in attitude that are actually really important. So look, if you have kids that create messes all the time, that's normal. It would be weird if your kids cared about keeping their rooms as neat and orderly as you do. Just like it would be weird for my son as a tweener teen to be as meticulous about lawn care as I was. Look, when you're a kid, you have a hundred other priorities and things you'd rather be doing than cleaning up. It just isn't a priority. So you're not alone if you're worried about this.

3:59And look, personally, I don't want kids to be a neurotic mess like many of us are. Secondly, control your own anxiety about your child's future. If you are a good conscientious parent who loves their child, which you are because you're listening to a parenting podcast, then you have this reasonable fear. You're anxious that if your child is disorganized and can't clean up as a child, and if you don't correct them and teach them properly, they'll grow up to be a disorganized adult and they won't be successful in life. And that will mean you will fail to raise them properly. And it may mean that no one will marry them or hire them.

4:40I get all of those concerns about that. And while that may seem like a reasonable fear, it simply isn't true that a messy child grows up into a messy adult. You know, it's kind of like we talk about with the kids who do the bare minimum to get by in school, or they just don't care. They're really bright kids, but they may get B's. And we'll say, oh, they're being lazy. Well, there's a difference between being lazy and not being motivated. I guarantee you, I could spend a day in your home and find areas in your life in which you do not do your best. And it's not because you're lazy it's because you're just not motivated you have other priorities so i can assure you look you have a dna in your home and it's like we've always said like you model these things if you if you are organized and you have a place for things and if you don't leave uh dishes piled up for days on end then your kids eventually will follow your lead and if you are generous toward other people and giving and patient, your kids will grow up and internalize that.

5:50And you've heard me say Casey's bathroom and bedroom were horrid when he was a kid. Actually, I just got back from his house a few minutes ago where he fixed us dinner. And so his home is very organized and neat and you have to take off your shoes. In fact, we joked right before I left, I had taken off my shoes by their garage door and usually they have us go out the front door. And I said, he is like, where are you going? And I was like, well, I left my shoes over by the garage and I know I'm not allowed to track dirt in your spotless home, right? And it's a running joke, but just remember the idea of ownership.

6:29He owns his own home now. It's where he lives. So guess what? He followed our lead and he's responsible. And so just chill a little bit, right? And so that kid who seemed to attract dirt as a kid now has a clean, orderly home. So chill with the parental anxiety. Don't project into the future. Or you will endlessly lecture your child, and it won't work anyway. You'll spend like 18 years wasting all that time. So, by the way, your kids have a door on their bedroom, so you don't have to walk by and see the mess. So just close the door. Live your life in peace. And you can always say, hey, I'll come in and read to you at night or talk with you if you have a clear path for me.

7:16So you can take the tough approach and there's no guarantees this will work, but it's worth a shot. And so I like that. I'm not always a huge fan of leading with tough discipline with strong will kids because one day don't care. And it usually just doesn't address the root of it, which I will get to. And so you can reset expectations and then use other approaches. So you can say, hey, your room can be a mess, but the living room, kitchen, and stairs must be free of Legos and clothes and toys. If you leave your things lying on the floor in these areas, it will cost you$1 per item or it will be donated to Goodwill or I'll collect them and hold them as ransom.

7:57Now, some kids may respond well to that, but most of our strong-willed kids simply don't and won't care. So, if you need to reset, you can say, hey, I apologize for leading you to believe that I would clean up all your messes every day. And I've done that by not asking you to do anything. And that was my mistake from now on. Here are my expectations. By Saturday morning, if these two things are not picked up, if this is not completed, hey, the router is going to be turned off. All screens will be turned in until all your chores are completed. So no friends, no screens, no playdates, no fun until your jobs are completed.

8:37Let me know if you need some help or clarification. And then when Saturday morning comes and they predictably haven't completed what you asked, then you just do what you said you were going to do. It's my favorite discipline tool. I keep my promises to you and I just do what I say I was going to do. So it's a matter of personal integrity and you can count on me. And you just stick with it, even through their protests and their tears, no lectures. Matter of fact, no drama until they learn. This is the new way that I roll. This is how it works. I think that's a perfectly reasonable way to handle this.

9:16Just make sure your expectations are realistic for their age. And also realistic knowing some of you, like me, you're very, very orderly. you need things to be done a certain way, just manage that. Don't project that onto your kids. And remember, we're always going for progress, not perfection. So I like other approaches more, but the tough approach, always an option. And I like this one. Look, give your kids some independence and space with this. They'd love those two things. So find an area where they can actually excel. Some of your kids may actually do their own laundry. So let them pick out a laundry detergent they'd like.

10:01Put a hamper in their closet. Give them ownership like they're in college. And this could even be when they're really young. Some of your kids may like the control this gives them, and they tend to like more adult jobs. Just don't be surprised if your kids start a load of laundry at 11 p.m. because they forgot they needed to wash their favorite hoodie sweatshirt that they wear 18 days in a row, or have something special the next day to impress someone. Don't be surprised if some of your kids do a load every two weeks. Who cares? Spray them down with Febreze. I know you can't do that, but just relax with that.

10:41Or some kids may do a very small load every single day, wasting water and detergent, right? And the reason they'll do that is because if they wait too long, and then it gets overwhelming. I will tell you, I prefer small loads because I do it, then it's there, and I'll have like 1 ,800 things to fold and sort when I'm in charge of it. So I do smaller loads, boom, boom. Relinquish your need to lecture about wasting water or being smelly. Just be thankful they're doing their own laundry, even if you don't like the way they do it because that's pretty much guaranteed. Because many of you and I, we're control freaks, so chill.

11:27Notice when they make progress. Hey, you know what? Being responsible for your own laundry really helps me a lot. Hey, that shows me you're growing up. Your father still doesn't know how to do his. Kidding. But you could pay your child a small allowance for doing chores you no longer have to do. If it motivates them and alleviates work for you, determine then what's worth to you. Maybe they can do laundry for their siblings in return for siblings doing the chore of theirs. That's how life works anyway. It's a division of labor. You may even determine, hey, you're really good at this. If you take care of all the laundry in the house, I'll clean your bathroom for you.

12:10You may have one child who absolutely loves cleaning and organizing. So maybe you pay that child or that child charges the other sibling for doing their homework. Kind of kidding. But you could do a version of this. Just take advantage of it. It's how the adult world works with people specializing in different areas and trading services for money. So many of you have kids who are not naturally organized. Like me, they have these very busy brains where they have all these thoughts and feelings. Like just, it's like all like socks in a dryer in their brain. And I've been through this before, but that's why they like to control other things.

12:51They sometimes keep an acorn or stones in their pockets. They're not good at losing a game, so they cheat to control the outcome of the game. Well, this ends up being something that's very hard for them. If you have a child with ADD or ADHD, then they're not going to be naturally organized. So here's a real life example. This is a girl who's not really good at cleaning her room. It's a definite weakness of hers, and she struggles with this daily. So her room, how many of your kids are like this? Their room quickly becomes a mess. And by the time that you kind of address it, it's too far gone. She's overwhelmed.

13:30She doesn't know where to start. So she gives up, and it kind of devolves into chaos. Look, some of us have been there before. I remember there was a time in our life when we were heavily, heavily in debt. Not heavenly. It was hell. We were heavily, heavily in debt. And it's like, well, why even bother? Like, how am I going to get out of this debt? It's so overwhelming. So her dad would say, hey, honey, if you just took three minutes every day, your room would stay clean. And look, dad in this situation is absolutely correct. But it doesn't always mean that works with these kids. because her history says she's not going to take that three minutes every day.

14:12That's a very logical, reasonable, rational approach. But most behavior is not rational and reasonable. And I know that feeling of being overwhelmed and I try to deal with reality. So let's change our attitude toward this. Look, this is not a moral issue. It's not a disobedience issue. It's a tools issue. So let's reset expectations and we go for tidy, not immaculate or perfect And I want a reasonable goal for a kid like this And we can provide baskets so she can throw things in the big baskets Maybe a basket for dark clothes and one for light clothes A basket for anything with paper, books or papers Or bark from a tree because that's what a lot of our kids collect And so personal items Look, you could put masking tape on the floor with four quadrants and each quadrant holds a different kind of item.

15:04Make it easy, make it visual, and you could try this. Someday, one night, go in and happily do a good, but not perfect job. Organize her room and clean with her. And what that really means is you're actually doing most of the work this time, so we get a good baseline. And then you take a picture of her room, a before and after picture. so you hang those pictures on her wall. See, sometimes that visual can be extremely helpful because she can look at it as a guide and she knows, okay, here's what an organized room looks like. You could actually make a video of how to tidy up. It could be a fun way to show her exactly how to tidy up with five steps in five minutes because a lot of our kids like video.

15:54Again, it's a neat little idea to use their strengths And I want you to turn this into something you bond over instead of expecting her to do this on her own for three minutes every day. But there's another even more important reason for doing this. It's back to school time, and that means you're going to be running around nonstop with your kids. Keep cure hydrating electrolyte packets in your car, purse, backpacks. It makes drinking water more fun and healthy, and it gives you that added energy boost without the crash and without expensive sports drinks loaded with sugar and food dyes. Cure is pure, clean hydration with fantastic flavors for everyone in the family, like pink lemonade, fruit punch, grape, strawberry, kiwi, raspberry, and my favorite, berry pomegranate.

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18:02That's HungryRoot.com to get 40 % off your first box and a free item of your choice for life. Our kids do homework much better when they're comfy and cozy. Check out Wayfair.com for a huge selection of comfortable chairs, desks, lamps, and organizers. Create a little homework nook for your kids, even in a weird place. And while you're browsing online, treat yourself with some new bedding, throw blankets, something fun to celebrate autumn, or just something practical for the kitchen. We like Wayfair because they have everything we need in one place. Furniture, cookware, appliances, bedding, decor.

18:43No need to shop at multiple stores. And they have 20 million verified five-star reviews so we can quickly find what we need, discover new ideas, and get things shipped to us fast and free, all for a really good price. Transform your space with pieces that hold up to real life. Join Wayfair Rewards today and get 5 % back on every purchase. Head to Wayfair.com or shop the Wayfair app for all things home. That's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R dot com. Wayfair, every style, every home. So I was coaching this dad and here's what he ended up doing. He began playing some music that his daughter loved when he walked into the room.

19:25Most songs are about three to four minutes long. So he was like, hey, are we going to do a one song cleanup or a two song cleanup today? He made it fun. He came alongside his daughter, helped her, gave her a hug, and then left the room. Even though sometimes he did most of it, look, I can tell you one day this will be a distant memory. And you will regret it if you hurt your relationship over things like this. But here's the beautiful part of it. This is an area of his daughter's weakness and vulnerability. so instead of the dad shaming her over with endless lectures in which she started to feel like a failure he came in and bonded with her and he showed her hey i'm actually really good at this i'm teaching you some new skills and and tools and he built trust with her in an area of her weakness instead of shaming her.

20:25That is the big win. In the long run, the room being clean or dirty doesn't matter much, but you know what does? The relationship with you. Now, more practical stuff. Reduce the friction. There are a lot of studies about reducing the friction to complete simple tasks. It's why if you leave apples, oranges, and bananas in an office break room, the bananas get eaten right away. Why? There's no friction. You just peel it quickly, eat it, you're done. And so this is a really important insight with kids and adults who are impulsive, who have symptoms associated with, even with PDA. It's super, super helpful to have everything needed right there.

21:09So I'm going to share my experience. I tend to be responsible for the bathrooms in the house. And here's how I work. Sometimes I'll look at it and be like, you know what? I'm in the mood right now to clean the bathroom and the sink and the toilet. And if I go to clean, and this is what used to happen. Well, if the paper towels aren't there and if the spray is not there and the cleaning items aren't there, well, now I've got to go down the hallway, grab everything. Sometimes that moment is now gone. And I noticed some of you, well, that's stupid. I know. And I'm not saying it's right. It's how I am.

21:44So guess what? I reduced the resistance. So now there is a cleaning caddy under each of the bathrooms with everything I need. So when that mood hits to do it, boom, it's done. And so I would encourage you to do that. Now here's a cool one related to that. And this is with, I do a lot of work with PDA, Kids with Pathological Demand Avoidance. We have a whole separate podcast on that, PDA Parent Podcast. And I made this suggestion, which is very small, but it's the small things that end up being a big deal with our kids. And I said, put a dust buster in your child's bedroom. It's a small thing that you can use very quickly.

22:27It's right there, quick, boom. Because there is no way a kid is going to drag a big vacuum up and down the stairs, plug it in, unwind the whole cord, wrap it back up. No, it's right there. Your child is more likely to use it. And they like the ownership and the control it gives them. And this mom who went through our PDA parent program said, I loved your program. There were so many good ideas, but it was this still spuster thing that is working. And now I'm applying that to all the different things in our home. I'm reducing the friction. It's really cool. Now, I hope one day if you do this, that your child actually invites you to look at their bedroom or their bathroom after they've cleaned or organized.

23:10and I hope they're beaming with a little bit of pride. I don't expect that, but if they are, please bite your tongue. Don't point out what they missed, how they could do it better. Oh, honey, let me show you how to do this. No, praise for progress. And even if you're cringing inside, you can say you can help your kids and give them tools, but there's nothing more deflating than being excited about doing something new and then have someone rain on your parade. So you know what? Nice job. And then you walk away. I know that'll kill you in the moment. Now, here's a cool story. And this is kind of why I'm doing this podcast is shout out to Trevor, an 11-year-old from Michigan, because I think he has inspired what might be the most important idea or the second most important idea of this podcast.

24:02So Trevor had actually listened to our programs, especially the ADHD University one. He told his parents, Oh, now I understand why I struggle with organization, with memorizing facts, and I forget things. My brain is so focused on coming up with ideas and seeing patterns and being creative, and my brain feels like it's constantly swirling with thoughts, so I struggle with feeling disorganized in my brain. And what I want you to teach your kids is how their brains work and normalizing their strengths and weaknesses. is. And you can ask your kids if this is how it feels for them and be curious about that.

24:41Right. So Trevor started using his ability to see patterns and problem solve to help with this. So he leaves post-it notes where he will see them as a reminder to do little things. He liked Casey. Our son has ideas in the programs. And one of Casey's is he puts the little boxes next to his to-do checklist because he feels a sense of accomplishment when he puts that check there on the list. And he asked his parents if he could create organized messes or piles in his room so he knows where everything is, but the piles are organized. It's not perfect. And so the best part was Trevor said this, I don't beat myself up for being this way anymore.

25:26I create workarounds that worked for me. And that's perfect for our kids. They just need some new skills. See, you're not excusing the messes or saying your kids can't doing it. You're placing a natural weakness in proper context with their natural strengths. You're coming alongside them to create practical solutions and make progress. I want them to know there's nothing wrong. There's nothing wrong with your brain. And that's what Trevor knows, right? It's like, no, my brain is really good at being creative and problem solving and building with checkers or with legos and playing checkers it's just that i'm not really good in this other area but now i can use my strengths to mitigate some of my weaknesses because that's what you do for the rest of your life and so definitely let your kids listen to the programs because they will start to see oh i have a good brain now that's the physical messes in the home, but there are other messes.

26:26So I love this example. Mom wrote, when my kids are going at each other, I normally break things up and send them to their respective rooms. But one day I walked into the living room and I sat and I used your script. We've got a Stop Sibling Fights program. And I handed responsibilities to them saying they could continue to be irritated and miserable or they can solve it themselves. And the mom said, I grabbed a snack, I went into the kitchen, and I actually sat. And I heard them begin working it out themselves, and then they asked for help. It was probably the first time we have ever really problem solved.

27:07Now, it won't always work that easily, but sometimes if you step back and you give your kids some space and you begin teaching them how to clean up their own messes with siblings, it works so much better. And I would have the kids, if you have siblings that squabble, have them listen to that program and say, look, I can be the referee and the dictator in the home and just send you to your rooms and take away your stuff. Or I can teach you guys how to handle conflict, which by the way, would be great training for marriage. Another one, I have little kids who throw tantrums and whine a lot. And I've been so angry and I've alternated between blaming them for being ungrateful and blaming myself for not teaching them better.

27:53She said, I went through the 30 Days of Calm program. I realized I was making the tantrums and whining worse by giving so much emotional energy to them. I was letting little children control and determine my mood, But I've cut the whining of tantrums in half in a few days solely by changing myself and my reaction to my kids. She's teaching her kids how to handle disappointment and frustration without fixing it all the time. Well done, moms and dads. So, look, if you do get the programs, you get 17 programs for the price of a trip to a therapist. We can share it with teachers so they're on the same page.

28:33We'll share for free with your parents so your whole family is on the same page. And if you need financial help, email Casey at CelebrateCalm.com. C-A-S-E-Y at CelebrateCalm.com. He'll help you out. But I still respect you for working hard at this. So let's step back. Let's build that trust. Give kids tools so they know there's nothing wrong with them, but they know how to solve and clean up the messes in their lives. Okay. Love you all. Talk to you soon. Bye-bye.