The part I despise the most is putting them in the closet. I’ve tried many solutions, but I’ve not found any that made the job less tedious.
When I was a student, I just threw my clothes into various shelves based on the type and considered that good enough. I did not fold clothes ever. I just threw the boxers in one shelf, the socks in another, T-shirts in another, pants in another.
As an adult with a family, this won’t be accepted anymore.
I had a period in which I had a dryer, but I did not find that it saved me a lot of time because the fastest way to get the laundry into the shelves and the hangers is by sorting it first. And if I had to sort it anyways, I could just sort it on the drying rack and put it on the hangers on the drying rack.
I think it’s fairly hard to find solutions to fix this.
I have considered mapping out each step, and then try to identify the pain points. Then find ways to remove as much friction as possible. Kind of like how an UX designer would handle this.
If there’s a system that works for you and isn’t impacting others why not do it? My entire family basically lives out of laundry baskets and chaos drawers. We don’t fold our clothes. If something gets a little wrinkled we toss it in the dryer for a second before we wear it.
I don’t know, I just think for me at least, as someone with Audhd I grew up being told there were “rules” to keeping a clean house like only run the dishwasher full, or sort your laundry by color… but they are sort of old dumb rules.
A full dishwasher means I’m literally out of dishes for my small family, laundry can be washed on cold and be fine for most things, just find systems you can live with and follow… screw the rules.
Running a half full dishwasher is more efficient on water than washing a single pan by hand. The old rules are dumb
Even not running a full dishwasher we’re still only running it once a week, if not longer. We tend to reuse dishes if they can be i.e. made popcorn twice this week and just keep using the same bowl cause why not.
During the summer months, you can just get away with wearing a swimsuit most days. Just get used to going in the pool pretty frequently after workouts and voila, your laundry and shower is taken care of. I used to ride my bike to the pool every day then do this, but I was like 10 so nobody raised an eyebrow
If you can afford it, get a housekeeper.
Become a nudist.
I’m a nudist and this is actually legit. I only wear clothes to go outside sometimes and often only briefly so I’ll usually just hang them back up when I’m done. I only do a single small load of laundry once a month or so. My wife isn’t so she has to do like 4 loads a month of her clothes.
How do you deal with body soil on furniture?
Sheets on the couch, covers on chairs.
Maybe consider not washing things so often? Underwear, socks and t shirt I wear one day, but an outer shirt I might wear twice, pants or shorts for a week, towels last one to two weeks.
Single type of socks so you don’t need to pair them.
Dry shirts/t-shirts etc on hangers, then just hang up the hangers. You can extend this to trousers etc if you have the hanging space.
Single type of socks so you don’t need to pair them.
I didn’t even realize what a life hack this actually is despite having been doing it for like 15 years.
People keep gifting me fancy sports socks… They just go in the misc socks draw and don’t get used 😭
I find listening to audio books or watching a favourite show or chatting with a friend on the phone helps my brain while folding so I’m unaware i did it.
I find my struggle is tasks like this gets so monotonous. Repeat boredom is the part that bugs my brain. it’s all like “cant we just do something else?” So i make sure to have prepped a secondary activity for my brain to be distracted by while the body goes through the motions.
Clothes don’t have to go in the closet. If they’re your clothes and they don’t get in anyone’s way, your family doesn’t have a right to complain about you storing them on a pile on your bedroom floor, if putting clothes away is making you so miserable.
Alternatively, maybe strike up a deal with another household member for them to do your laundry in exchange for you doing some other household chore for them (e.g. you’ll take out the bins when it’s their turn to do the bins, you’ll cook all their meals, etc).
I genuinely love laundry so I’m not sure I’m the best person to comment but here are a few suggestions:
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as others have said, get a set of drawers so that you can just chuck different clothing items in different drawers. If there’s no space for that you could get some storage containers/baskets for smaller items in your closet.
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Try rolling up your clothes rather than folding them. This is often recommended for packing but I always do it. It saves space and you can roll a bunch of clothes quickly and they’re easy to move from where you’re folding to the wardrobe. This image gives a rough idea, but you can find tonnes of videos as well:
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Become a nudist.
No clothes = no laundry.
I used to dislike laundry in the past, until I figured out that the part that I disliked was the monotony and lack of mental stimulation. This could be solved by listening to podcasts or audiobooks while doing the laundry. Now I no longer dislike it, because it’s really only an opportunity to listen to podcasts for 30-40 minutes (hang-drying/folding time)
I have a dryer. All clothes go in the dryer because outside is wet and inside is tiny. If clothes don’t like the dryer, they shrink and we can’t wear them, therefore all clothes are dryer-safe. After dryer, clothes are piled on couch. When clean clothes are needed, they’re on the couch.
Live out of a laundry basket. If anyone questions it just curl yourself around the laundry basic and scream like a possum protecting its nest of young. Maintain solid eye contact throughout. Defecate if necessary.
They’ll never mention it again and probably warn others. you can then live out of that laundry basket free of judgement.
Follow me for more info about living life with the freedom of a possum .
why won’t it be accepted any more? Does your family care more about the state of your closet than you being happy?
Seriously, talk to them about it, tell them how you feel.Find a partner who doesn’t mind doing laundry.
