My home hasn’t really felt like my own in such a long time. Not since my ex-husband moved in, and certainly not after he moved his “friends” in after they lost their house. (See this post for more on that). When my ex-husband moved in with me, he arrived with so much stuff…tools, dart boards, furniture, clothes, the list goes on. And while I was prepared to compromise and make space for his stuff, I wasn’t expecting all the clutter and mess that came with it. To say he was untidy is an understatement. My things got reduced and moved, and before I knew it, there was hardly any of me left in my house. And to make matters worse, I could hardly move for his crap taking over every available space.

When his “friends” moved in, they brought their own baggage, and it seemed that, day by day, while I was at work, they were adding more and more of their things to my home. They bought a MASSIVE pouffe/storage thing into my home, packed it with a load of their crap (which never got looked at), and it was sooo heavy that I couldn’t move it. That thing was plonked, unceremoniously, in the middle of my living area and was in the way every damn day. That was frustrating enough. Then I found that they had bought up most of their kitchen stuff too, plates, cutlery, saucepans, all the fucking kitchen gadgets known to man, glasses, mugs, all sorts of crap. It wouldn’t have been so bad if I didn’t own plates or anything. They shoved all my things to the back of cupboards and drawers and dumped their stuff in front of and on top of all the worktops, even using the oven as extra storage space. The most absurd thing was the collection of packets of herbs and spices and sauces, the ones you get from Hello Fresh when you order meals through them…soooo many unopened, out-of-date packets that were kept in a huge basket and shoved on top of the wall cupboards and never used. Space was so tight in the kitchen that I couldn’t even prepare myself cheese on toast for breakfast due to a lack of countertop space and the oven being used as an extra cupboard. On top of that, opening the cutlery draw proved difficult as it was RAMMED full of 174 different knives, forks and spoons, (not counting mine) and when you opened the drawer they would catch, well, my ones would and i discovered that they were getting bent up and misshapen too as no one seemed to be able to open the drawers carefully.

If that wasn’t bad enough, my Dysons (I had 2 that my parents had given me) disappeared. I couldn’t clean or tidy properly (too much clutter and no space, hardly any of it belonging to me), I couldn’t get to my shelving units to dust, and if I could, there was no space to take my things off and put them safely whilst I dusted. I couldn’t mop because there was no visible floor to manoeuvre the mop around effectively.

I’m ashamed to say that after they (his “friends”) left after 7 months, things didn’t get much better in terms of cleanliness. By that point, my mental health was spiralling pretty badly, I didn’t have the energy to do much other than exist, and most things just didn’t get done. My “husband” didn’t care enough to help out, not that he ever had. He always saw cleaning and household tasks as “Pink Jobs” so just left it to me to get on with everything, and if I didn’t do it, then he wouldn’t either. To make matters worse, he wouldn’t ever tidy up his own belongings, and the house was littered with tools and other heavy/bulky items of his that were hard to move, so that made cleaning just as difficult as when his “friends” were staying. I had nowhere to put his stuff in the house, though there were sheds and an outhouse, not to mention a summerhouse where they could live. If I dared to move things, then I’d have an earful about how he couldn’t find anything and how it was my fault. Asking him to put his things away was just as bad and I’d have excuse after excuse ranging from “I’ll do it later”, “I need them out because I’m going to use them later” (which NEVER happened), or “I can’t put them in the shed/summerhouse/outside because they might get stolen”. I gave up and just lived with it.

Once he was out of the house and I got the keys back, I started moving and packing up all his things. My house started to feel brighter and fresher. The air quality changed, and the atmosphere just felt so different, more positive, freer, lighter. I was able to see the floors again. My friend bought me a Hetty Hoover. I was able to hoover the carpets and floors, the skirting boards, under the sofa, and all those little places dust and dirt like to hide. I mopped the floors using washing-up liquid, then bleach, then more washing-up liquid, then disinfectant. It took nearly 30 buckets of soap and water to get the grime up and the water to rinse away run clear.

I got down on my hands and knees and scrubbed the kitchen and hallway linoleum with a brush, which was stained, grimy, and grey-looking. It now looks bright and fresh, and the white within the pattern is now visible again! I then went to town on the bathroom, bleaching and scrubbing everything to within an inch of its life. There is textured, anti-slip flooring in the bathroom, and I again scrubbed that clean. I took the seat off the toilet and soaked and scrubbed that in the bath.

I dismantled shitty, broken furniture that had taken up so much space in the bedroom. Gone now are a massive wardrobe, 2 sets of drawers, the massive, stupidly oversized super king bed he had insisted on that was waaayyyyy too big for the room and was stained with his sick. Every single inch of the carpet was hoovered, the windows cleaned, the window sills dusted and wiped. I replaced the broken furniture with a new Kallax Unit, which I made from a flat pack myself. I reinstated my dressing table and mirror back into the room, removed the old (broken) TV from the wall, and removed shelves from the built-in wardrobes, turning that space into another hanging space for clothing.

I started to redecorate. I had been wanting to redecorate downstairs for years and had chosen the wallpaper and the paint colours that I wanted. He had promised me that he would help decorate, but it never came to fruition; the paper and paint remained in the shop, and no decorating was ever done. As much as I liked the wallpaper and colours I had chosen, I decided not to go with that – too many bad memories of asking and asking and wanting and never getting it done, it felt weird and tainted. I came up with new ideas and colour schemes. I decided on a new wallpaper (this one from B&Q/I Love Wallpaper) and a white, lime green and black colour scheme. I spent weeks and weeks slowly decorating, and the room is nearly finished!(I can’t wait to share some photos in another blog post!).

My next plan is to re-decorate the dining area, again, going with a white, lime green and black scheme with the same wallpaper. The rooms are knocked through and separated by an archway, so it makes sense to decorate with the same theme. After that, I will be removing the carpets. I only have carpet going up the stairs, along the landing and in the bedrooms. Though they are clean, there are soo many stains on them, and they are looking worn and tired. The bedroom and landing carpets have been installed over the laminate, which, I think, is making the carpets smell funny as the airflow is blocked. I’ll be removing the laminate too, seeing what the original floors are like and hopefully, be able to sand and varnish that. Then I’ll be starting to redecorate the bedrooms! I have some ideas and will be sharing these in a blog post coming soon!