Dirty, tidy, homes are the answer .....it's official!

[Mo2]

The BBC.co.uk site is running two stories in their 'Health' section today, which perfectly demonstrate why you just can't win as a parent today, if you let yourself be influenced by every media release...

In the first, here
we learn that "Clean houses 'may trigger asthma'" and that we should be careful not to do too much cleaning, especially using chemicals.

In the second, here we are warned however that "Messy homes 'cause messy minds"

Aaaaaargh.........

[enid]

Good. We have a grubby (cobwebs in all corners, old, fingermarks everywhere) but tidy (everything tucked away, little boxes for everything and we tidy every night) home!

Do I win now?

[wild]

we are clean and messy
I will risk the asthma.

[sponge]

We are clean once a week when the cleaner has been. The rest of the time we're quite dirty and messy, so we risk asthma one day a week and our minds are a complete jumble almost all the time. Oh well.

[Chandra]

Good to hear that, we have a tidy house (with exception of my desk (at the moment I have my laptop on top of the scanner and many papers on it I no longer recognise...), and we try to have people to visit at night when we can dim the lights and they can't see I have not used the vacuum cleaner in a week or dusted in a month. The environment is ecologically friendly, at least that's what our cobweb colony seems to suggest.

[motherinferior]

How did they gauge 'intelligence'? By academic qualifications? How can they 'take genes out of the equation' when they've already said that the kids from 'wealthier and more academic parents' were more intelligent, ie doing better in an academic system which is skewed towards kids from that sort of home?

[Bibiboo]

Well you're damned if you do and damned if you don't, eh?

I can say we're clean but untidy too.

I read an article some time ago saying that we were wrecking our kids immune systems by making our houses so clean and germless that kids had v little exposure to germs to build up a tolerance too, so were getting ill easily.

[lavender1]

ours is tidy but there is dust about...clutter free mostly (apart from kids bedrooms) but not always clean.

[Chandra]

Ds spent a few minutes boosting his immune system yesterday by licking the patio doors side to side. He is 18m so still normal, or so I want to believe

[TurnAgainCat]

When I bought my first flat, Mum wrote in her card to me her motto as a working mother, "Keep your home clean enough to be healthy and dirty enough to be happy." Surely this is right and your main focus should be on what makes you feel happy (assuming that you understand how to prevent vermin, fleas, scabies, food poisoning, etc!)? It is actually quite hard to come across "good" dirt in the city as there are so few farm animals or wild creatures around, but so much toxic pollution; on the other hand, going to nursery and travelling by city bus and Tube puts you in contact with vast numbers of immunity-boosting germs from all over the world!

[fruitful]

Did they really find 8000 twins born between 94 and 96, who were separated and grew up in different homes? One twin in a messy home and one in a neat one? Have no clue if this is likely or not but it seems a lot to me. Or am I missing something?

Anyway, I have decided that dd is far too clever for her own good and needs a messier home .

[charlize]

Its interesting about the germs isn't it. Its quite true that a few germs are good for the developing immune system and I think you can be too clean.
However my sister in law has never put her 8mth old dd down on the floor. She thinks its dirty to do that. But how is the child going to learn to use her muscles? To roll over ? to crawl and pull up? Is it just me or is this v strange.

[Piffleoffagus]

I have a messy mind but quite tidy and clean home.
ASthma bah humbug I got it after mum and dad split up
psycho symatic

[Heathcliffscathy]

we are dirty and messy unless someone is coming round when one or the other might get done :(