Let’s accept this: no one wants to live in a messy house.
However, having a packed schedule, mental stress, or physical sickness might cause someone to not clean their house for long.
Do you find yourself or someone else stuck in such circumstances? If yes, you’ve found the right guide to help them out!
Continue reading for 15 reasons behind what causes someone to not clean their house, along with practical ways to help them out!
🤔Why Are Some People Not Cleaning Their Houses?
Whenever someone tries to explain why they aren’t able to clean their house, we take it as an excuse.
Sometimes, it might be an excuse indeed. Still, we must recognize various lifestyle-related, physical, and mental health problems preventing people from keeping their houses clean actively.
To help you out, I have categorized some of the major issues and their solutions below. Take a look!
🚶♂️Lifestyle-Related Reasons
While most of us aim to hit a perfect lifestyle by making every minute count, it hardly works that way. Some standard lifestyle issues that can keep you from maintaining cleanliness in your house are:
🧦Tendency to Hoard Things
Do you have a habit of preserving items that are useless now but you think you might come into use later? As a result, you find it hard to discard them. Unfortunately, such hoarding tendencies are common for both children and adults.
You might use the saved items later, but the behavior certainly leads to cluttered and unclean living spaces.
When this habit becomes a dominating trait of someone’s personality, it’s dubbed a cognitive disorder. It’s termed Compulsive Hoarding Syndrome, which is a type of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).
Let’s discover the right way to tackle this:
Also Read: Best Way To Clean Tattoo Ink From Carpet
🐱Living With Pets
Living with pets can be a boon and a pain at the same time. The collective pressure of managing personal life, pets, and cleanliness is challenging for anyone.
Whether drooling giant puddles on your carpets or sniffing and vomiting on your furniture, pet activities affect your domestic hygiene. If you’ve pets at home, they’ll shed furs almost everywhere in the house. Hence, those who own pets must keep their surroundings squeaky clean.
Here are tips that will help you:
👨💼Busy Life
Dynamic timetables often lead to unclean houses and serious health issues like asthma and lung infections.
Cluttered and messy rooms make you feel suffocated and irritated too. It affects your focus and mental well-being. People get so invested in balancing work and personal life that they hardly get time to maintain domestic hygiene at home.
To complete physically exhausting tasks on time, one doesn’t need to live in an untidy house. So here is what they can do:
Also Read: How to Make Cleaning a Hobby
🎭Personal Preference/Personality Traits
Living in a messy space could be a personal choice too.
Some creative freaks hate following social norms. For them, tidy and well-maintained living spaces represent the conventional picture of society.
They like to do unusual things, living in a very organized mess and creating something out of the box.
Also, people with type B-type personality traits ( there are different personality types such as A, B, C, D, etc. ) are laid back when it comes to maintaining a hygienic lifestyle.
To overcome their perspective, they might try these suggestions:
🎯Specific Reasons
Along with the lifestyle causes, there could be some specific reasons that don’t let you clean your house.
Having a small or poorly constructed house, financial instability, and a lack of cleaning skills keep you from maintaining personal hygiene.
Let’s understand the issues one by one and see what we can do about them:
🤏Limited Space
A small or poorly constructed space naturally gives you an unorganized look.
Stuffing a small room with furniture, clothes, and too many possessions gives it a shabby appearance. You may even fall short of space to accommodate the required items.
In that case, following these measures would help:
Also Read: Best Way To Clean Mohawk Laminate Flooring
💰Financial Constraints
Anyone may go through financial constraints that prevent them from purchasing effective cleaning accessories and hiring cleaning professionals.
The pandemic has resulted in an even higher cost of living. But when there is a will, there is a way. Here are some ways you would want to try:
Also Read: Why My Dyson Vacuum Smells Bad
🥺Less Experience in Cleaning
Some people may lack proper cleaning skills altogether. Sweating to clean their house is a nightmare for them.
Below are discussed specific scenarios and solutions for them:
Also Read: I Accidentally Vacuumed Mice Droppings
🧠Mental-Health Related Reasons
Did you know that someone’s mental health issue can also be a reason for them to live in an unclean house?
Dealing with mental health problems such as stress, depression, and past traumas can make it even more difficult for someone to clean their house. Looking for effective solutions? Spare a read!
😁Feeling Safe in the Mess
According to surveys, certain individuals were observed functioning better in messy spaces.
This could be a weird disorder in which people feel safe when surrounded by too many possessions and clutter. Though the messy room may annoy you and me, these individuals feel comfortable in it.
Some effective solutions for them are:
😢Depression
This is one of the more common mental illnesses.
When one is depressed, one feels highly detached from worldly matters. Forget about maintaining cleanliness; these people have lost interest in everything else.
They have been traumatized; thus, a dirty and untidy house doesn’t affect them much.
Here is what you can do to help them:
😭Stress
Stress does not spare anyone! Though we don’t perceive it as a mental illness, it’s no less dangerous than it is.
Being unable to carry out responsibilities on time, having a poor personal life, exhausting work, etc., can be reasons to live a stressful life. When people fail to balance their life, they naturally feel burdened. The pressure build-up leads to mental stress.
Thus, the solutions are:
🤕Past Traumas
Your emotional baggage resulting from poor past experiences has an equally harmful effect on your mental health. Perhaps an individual had a traumatic experience in the past related to cleaning or washing.
They could’ve been accused of being unhygienic, judged, and deserted by their loved ones. In that case, they will feel comfortable living in dirty houses rather than cleaning them.
Some rescue tips are:
🦥Lethargy
Of course, some folks are just lazy and lack the urge to clean their house. As a result, they often come up with distorted lifestyles and unfinished work.
Below are some suggestions that might help:
Also Read: 7 Reasons Why Hardwood Floors Feel Sticky
🔢Other reasons
After all these, there are some other issues that compel individuals to live in untidy houses as well.
Your living environment gets affected by physical or mental illness too. Poor physical conditions, self-confidence, and more complex mental illnesses can force you to live in dirty conditions.
Let’s discuss them!
♿ Physical Disability
Some people have difficulty cleaning their houses because of health issues like arthritis.
It is a disease in which affected people cannot move their hands and legs suitably. They suffer extreme joint pain while doing so.
People having physical health problems can:
Also Read: How Does Someone With No Arms Wipe Their Bum
😖Low Self-Esteem
Of course, self-confidence can make or break your game! At times, underconfident people find themselves incapable of maintaining an organized house.
They fear failing in their attempts. They hesitate to ask for help too. It’s extremely difficult for them to face negative judgments.
In that case, they may:
🤦♂️Suffering From Diogenes Syndrome
Not all of us are aware of Diogenes Syndrome. It is a behavioral disorder in which older people live in extreme squalor and unclean house. As a result, they refuse to seek help from others and live a self-imposed isolated life.
An effective way to tackle the disorder would be:
One might live in a dirty house due to one or many of these causes.
However, knowing the causes is not enough. If one aspires to eliminate the mess, one must go through the following:
👎 9️ Ugly Effects Of Not Cleaning Your House
How about saying no to sweeping, dusting, and vacuuming? Sounds tempting, doesn’t it?
Imagine living in a house with damp, muddy corners, molds in some places, and stinking air. Won’t you love to have bug bites?
These are not nightmares; these are the effects of not cleaning your house. Severe or prolonged exposure to a dirty living space is extremely risky for anyone.
Read along to understand the 9 massive effects of not cleaning your house:
🏠Effects on the House
Living in a cluttered house is an invitation to mosquitoes, bugs, and flies. With poor air quality, there’ll be excessive mold growth in your bathroom or kitchen.
Your bed will be home to bugs; unfortunately, dealing with them is not a cakewalk. Let’s read about some of them in detail:
Bad Air Quality
No dusting will ultimately lead to bad indoor air quality. On top of that, your allergies will worsen with this contaminated air, and you may encounter severe respiratory diseases if you continue living in a messy house. Besides, it could lead to poor vision too.
Excessive Mold Growth
Mold is a fungus with sprouts and pores that thrives in moist, dark places.
You’ll find them in your bathroom, kitchen, or windows. It usually happens when you’ve kept your house closed for a long time.
Mold fungus growth is a warning sign for you to clean your home. Otherwise, you may welcome some severe infections.
Also Read: How To Clean Soap Spills
Worse Bed Sheets
You can wash bed sheets only a few days a week, but do wash them!
Otherwise, they stink, get soiled, and it’s just gross to sleep on them. Besides, not maintaining your bed sheets leads to excessive wear and tear, reducing their longevity.
Bugs, Rodents, and Mites Will Multiply
When someone doesn’t take the trash out of their messy room, they open the door for bugs, rodents, and mites.
They crawl over the garbage and feed on it. They destroy your furniture, clothes, and, above all, your peace of mind. Not just this, but a messy home affects your food and lifestyle too:
🥗Effects on Food and Living
Have you seen people constantly feeling unwell without proper explanation? One of the probable reasons is poor hygiene. Food poisoning, allergies, mood swings, and poor social life result from a dirty lifestyle.
Let’s discuss them one by one here!
Food Poisoning
When you let the mess stay as it is in your kitchen or fridge, mold grows over your food, and bacteria build-up.
💡Tip:
Consumption of such foods will get you stomach infections. To avoid this, you must maintain personal hygiene in your eating places and eatables.
Also Read: Can You Put Fridge On Carpet?
More Allergies
Avoiding debris and mess is the best way to get rid of allergies. But if you stay in a messy environment, you will be more susceptible to headaches, skin problems, respiratory difficulties, and allergies.
Bad Mood
Various health reports suggest that an orderly home fosters a healthier body and mind. How do you expect to feel good living in a messy room with a very unpleasant odor?
A poor mood is natural if you live in a home with piled-up clothes, dirty dishes, rotting food, undone bed sheets, and rats running around everywhere. And, if not taken care of, it can cause deeper mental health conditions.
Worse Social Life
No one likes to stay with messy people. If you keep your house messy, nobody will want to visit your place. Even your best friends wouldn’t come to see you. You’ll start feeling deserted, adding to the same emotional exhaustion.
🙈Last but Not Least:
Chores tend to pile up when you procrastinate the execution. The more dirt and grime accumulate, the harder it gets to clean the space.
You think you will get rid of the mess when the time is right, but the right time takes months on end to arrive! Furthermore, it leads to physical or mental illness.
💁♀️To Wrap It Up
As you see, a messy house has a poor effect on the mental health as well as physical health of a person. Little steps towards cleaning can make a huge difference in how one thinks, feels, and lives.
But to witness the effects of living in a clean house, one must initiate the process tomorrow or next week but today.
🙋♂️What Causes Someone to Not Clean Their House: FAQs
What is considered a dirty house?
You may call a house dirty when the place is unorganized, the drainage is blocked, water is clogged, the floor is covered with soil and grime, and you find molds, bugs, and pests in the house. A bad odor lingers as soon as you enter the house; that’s when a house is dirty.
Is not wanting to clean a sign of depression?
A lack of interest in cleaning your house or living space relates to depression.
It’s not that depressed people don’t wish to live in a tidy house.
However, a depressed person would keep thinking about his miseries rather than invest time cleaning or dusting. And that’s why they live in an unclean house.
How can someone start enjoying cleaning their room?
It’s tough to clean a room, but to enjoy cleaning a room, one can follow some simple yet motivational steps.
a. Turn on music while cleaning your house; it boosts your mental health.
b. Finish the cleaning task after waking up from bed when you’re fully energetic.
c. You can give yourself some rewards after you complete cleaning properly.
Does a dirty house affect physical health?
A dirty house can invite several health risks. It’s as bad for your physical fitness as for your mental health.
A messy room can trigger pimples and rashes on the face or body.
People having asthma will have breathing problems. In addition, if the dust particles penetrate their nose, it can get fatal.
Also, a dirty home environment is a breeding place for mosquitoes and flies that carry diseases like malaria or dengue.
How often should I clean my house?
You should keep your house clean regularly. It is best to clean at least one section of your house once a week.
It’s okay to skip it some day when you’re tired, attending social events, watching an interesting web series, and want a break from your household chores.
However, these days should be rare.
Adarsh is a Health Science graduate with expertise in environmental health and wellness. He is a Neat Freak who constantly looks for ways to keep his surroundings clean. At Clean Homies, Adarsh is focused on researching and sharing information on how you can maintain hygiene at home for a happy life.
