We’ve all seen that mom at drop-off who always has it all together. She always comes in wearing outfits (not PJs like, ahem, some parents), her kids’ hair is always brushed, and you just know her home is spotless. Although some people might call this witchcraft, others might want to take a look at a mom from the United Kingdom, who recently shared that she spends six hours a day cleaning up after her nine kids.
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Mom Louise opened up her house to camera crews while filming an episode of ‘Obsessive Compulsive Cleaners.’
The British show pairs real people who love to clean with people who are decidedly not into cleaning and documents the ensuing chaos.
In a clip shared on YouTube in 2020 that’s recently bubbled up again, the 33-year-old mom from Lincolnshire, England, immediately declared that she “hates dust.” The video shows her wiping every surface and edge of her home and then cuts back to Louise who mused, “Dust doesn’t defeat me because I’m always polishing.”
The mom spends about six hours a day cleaning her seven-bedroom home.
That’s almost the same amount of time her kids probably spend at school.
“Cleaning has to be done, all day, every day,” she explained. “Even with a big family there’s no excuse.”
Louise said all nine of her children “know how to behave in the house.”
“They know the house has to be kept clean at all times,” she shared.
The video showed all nine of her children taking off their shoes when they walked through the front door and carefully placing them on the appropriate shelf.
She even turned one of the bedrooms in her home into a walk-in closet just so she could keep all of her kids’ clothes in order.
“No one is allowed in here — only me,” she said in the clip. “I just think it's a lot nicer when things are kept tidy.”
The mom did share a hot cleaning tip, too: vinegar diluted with a bit of water to keep windows streak-free.
The mom has not officially been diagnosed with OCD.
But her need to keep things clean means that she’s created a whole bunch of rules to keep her home in order.
“I just won’t cook burgers in the house,” she said. “I hate the smell of stinky fat and it lingers all around your house for days afterwards.”
She also admitted to using her kids' things as instruments in her cleaning, if necessary, and demonstrated using a small plastic fork wrapped in a baby wipe to get into the nooks of her microwave.
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Louise said even with her large family, she always finds the time to keep things spotless.
“I easily do it. I keep it spotless. So I just don't understand why other people can't do the same. I want people to know there's always time — and there's never an excuse not to clean,” she said.
Although Louise seems to have this whole "spend-six-hours-per-day-cleaning" thing down pat, not everyone online agreed with her message.
Some people pointed out that they couldn't clean for six hours a day because they were, you know, working.
"Hmm nowhere in that story does it mention her having any kind of job other than her parenting and cleaning duties … throw her into a full time job) and see if she thinks there's no excuses," wrote one person on Facebook.
"So many reasons for things to not always be perfectly clean … work, self-care time, spending time with your kids instead of doing the dishes right away, sleep, mental health issues, disabilities, injuries, illness, spending time with friends and family etc.," another commenter pointed out.
"Please can someone hold my coffee while I email my boss quickly that I need to spend six hours a day to clean the house. I'm sure they won't mind me doing this and still pay me a full salary so I can pay rent on my sparkly clean house. Great, can I have my coffee back now, Thanks," a third commenter joked.
Other people agreed with Louise — there's always time to pick up after yourself.
"Cleanliness is a great thing to teach your kids," wrote one commenter. "It teaches responsibility, hygiene and respect. Things that are lacking these days. Well done."
"I agree with her! No excuse not to have a clean home. Six hours a day is excessive though so she clearly has OCD," another person chimed in.
Although a third commenter agreed that they'd rather spend their time doing other things than cleaning, "If that improves her life, all the power to her."
It's a sentiment that I think we can all agree on.
