Bedrooms....... | ADHD Information

I love the coin idea!!

Being an overly neat and tidy, clean-freak perfectionist myself, it was difficult for me to sit back enough to allow my son to have his space and grow in it.  I was constantly nagging him and cleaning his room around him. 

I have relaxed somewhat as he has gotten older.  When he does clean his room, he does a great job but it takes a lot of hoohaa to get him to actually do it.   And it takes an age as he ends up playing with everything he should be packing away!

My son has a small room with way too much stuff in it.  I know this doesn't help him, so every few months we have a combined big clean and box things for an orphanage nearby.  DS pleasantly surprised me with his willingness to let things go.

I cannot wait for the day my son gets a much deserved bigger room.  I think he will display a lot of pride and will take more care in putting everything in its place rather than shoving it in a corner under the bed.

I really probably don't have any good advice, but I do tell both my children that saturday is the day to clean their rooms.  My 6 yr old has not problems but my 10 yr old dd does. He isn't on meds on the weekends so it is close impossible, but If i can see that he has made and effort he gets 2 dollars.  Somerimes he will go through a deep clean and organize his things.  But I usually end up with the real cleaning.  I don't know the answer but, your not alone.Let's see.....have a checklist of what he is to do in cleaning his room, in order. Have a picture posted of his room all clean and neat so he can reference that. Label his drawers as to what goes where. We have bins for toys. Unfortunately, she throws clothes in them sometimes. Go through his room and thin out the junky stuff. Have him pick up his room every day before bed so it doesn't get out of hand too quickly.Any thoughts on how to get a  7 year old boy with ADHD to clean his bedroom and keep it that way?  This seems to be our biggest fight.  I swear, its like a tornado went off in there, and any suggestions about cleaning it always come to a duel, which I NEVER win.  I figure its minor compared to some others so I just let it go, but its starting to become a big problem.  We are planning on starting the marble system, but have not implemented it yet.   Thanks in advance for the support and ideas!

We have a checklist too, and mostly it helps, but if the mess is too big he still just gets overwhelmed. 

Something else I resort to is sitting there and telling him "pick up that toy and put it in the green box" and so on, until it's done.  It makes me want to bang my head against the wall, but sometimes it just doesn't get done otherwise.

However, I have to say that my very favorite technique is to simply shut the door so I don't have to see it.  I do make him keep the space between the ladder to his loft bed and the door clear so that if there's an emergency he can get out with out getting tripped up.  Also helpful if he wakes in the middle of the night.   

For Chase, and he is almost 11, I have to break it down into more manageable pieces.  First, I send him up to pick up all the dirty clothes, then once that is done, I have him pick up the trash, then the toys.....and I usually have to be close by and hands on or it never gets done...

With my adult daughter, who was undx and therefore unmedicated, it was a losing battle until even after she moved out...it took me and her sister many hours of cleaning, and sorting to clear it out after she moved out....

I like cr12345mr's suggestions, I think I will use some of them for Chase...

My son and I clean at the same time.  When I clean a specific room he does too.  We have a contest to see who can finish first in their space.  Sometimes we clean the same room together. It makes for a good time for us to talk and chat about whatever.  I don't expect perfection but I do expect him to try.  He actually is pretty good.  He is 5 and makes his bed daily.  I can't say that I do this to my own bed.  Thanks so much for all the great ideas!  I, too usually just shut the door.  There are much bigger fish to fry than having a clean room.  But, like most of you, I fear him gettign hurt in there in the middle of the night, or in an emergency.  WE moved the toy box to the closet, he just broke the closet door, so we hung curtains over it until we can get it fixed.  He has bins for toys, but those don't work either.  Everything goes into the closet!  And his cd's and dvds wind up all over the floor, heaven forbid he put one back in its case!  I think I have solved that one though, its easier for him to put them in a binder with those plastic sleeves.  Hopefully this will work!  You know, its nice to know I am not alone in this.  I am so glad I found this board!  I have labeled plastic stacking boxes, dd knows if it is on the floor after she is in bed it is gone. I have cleaned her room recently and gotten rid of alot of stuff, she is 9 so her "toys" are mostly barbies and brats. If they are not in their boxes she doesn't get them back. Makes her think more about keeping it clean.I close the door a lot too. My dd will cry the entire time she cleans her room. She does a great job, but I have to be able to handle the crying. So when I am not as stressed and can handle the crying that's when she cleans her room. Needless to say it is not as often as I would like. There are not a lot of days that I am not overstressed. Actually, I am on vacation this week and I decided to sleep a little late. Huge mistake. My dd was up early un-medicated and my house looked like a tornado spun through it. All the cabinets were open in the kitchen. Bowls and plates on the floor. My acrylic paint was out (was stored on a really high shelf in the cabinet). She had painted on some paper and my kitchen floor.  And the items from the cabinet in the bathroom were out. I found a maxi pad on one of her dolls. (She needed a diaper) Oh well I cleaned up a little...did not do the dishes, but the house looked presentable. She did help. If I had to do it over again I think I still would have slept late. A single mom trying to do too much needs a couple extra hours of sleep now and then. I agree with what everyone is saying you have to break it down for them or else they get over whelmed. If all chorces are done by bed time she gets to but a happy sticker on the calander and then the end of the month she gets to add it up and gets a dollar for each one. even 50 cents would add up to enough they could get something nice from walmart. I like the dollar because it is enough for some clothes or a video game. So far it is working very well, I was worried that the waiting a full month for the reward would be to long but it seems to be working ok.

Yeah, I gave up on the beds getting made years ago....I don't even get mine done...Jon gets up after me, and it is upstairs...I sometimes don't get up there all day.  Jon does throw the covers up over the whole thing though....that way the cats only get to sleep on the comforter, not the sheets we are going to sleep on...

I, too, shut the door on Chase's room a lot.  I only ask that there is room for me to get to his bed to wake him without risking my neck.  If it gets too cluttered, I supervise a tidy up....it hasn't been totally cleaned and organized in a long while.  Maybe this summer.

I've got the same problem, only its double.  My 8yr old ADHD son and my almost 4yr old son share a room.  They have separate beds (decided against bunking) which never get made.  We finally moved the toy box into the closet, but that doesn't help either.  My oldest's idea of cleaning up is to up EVERYTHING (toys, clothes, shoes, whatever) into the toy box. 

I try to keep small bins so he can separate his toys.  No luck.  My youngest loves Thomas the Train, so I try to keep those separate so he can find them.  The oldest cleaned their room over the weekend, I had to go behind him and straighten the toy box and finish picking up.  It's a never ending battle around here too.

 

What I have done before... I hid coins in my childrens messy rooms.  The object of the game was to find the coins (remember how many you hid) and they must clean the room to find them.

I hid them in pockets of dirty pants.. that needed to be put in the laundry bag, in shoes that needed to put away, in the bed that needed to be made... under toys...etc... then they could turn the coins in for something... but only if they cleaned and not just search for the coins.

The coins are wooden ones that I got at Michael's craft store and painted them with the kids... gold, silver, bronze and sparkly purple... each color had a different number of coins... purple were the hardest to find and the were only a few of them. 

Just a thought. 

My favourite stratergy....when all else fails bring out the bin bag...its amazing how quickly the room gets tidy!!!