(Attention deficient/Poor memory/Obsessive-compulsive/Autistic) Cleaning and decluttering tip/lifehack

osberend:

It’s always a struggle to keep my apartment clean and free of excessive clutter that makes it impossible to find things that I actually need. One recurring problem that contributes to this is that I’ll frequently see objects — mostly but not exclusively some sort paper with writing on it — that I don’t actually have any need for as physical objects, but that

• Contain information that I think I may need or want in the future, and/or
• Remind me of people I don’t want to forget, and/or events that make me happy or proud to remember

and that I fear forgetting otherwise. This is exacerbated by my OCD, and the autistic traits that it overlaps with, which greatly increases the number of things that I feel like I might need to know, that I worry about forgetting, or that I feel a sense of guilt about the prospect of literally or figuratively discarding. It’s also exacerbated, on the other end, by my ADHD, which makes it genuinely more likely that I will in fact forget things if not prompted by physical reminders.

And a solution I’ve found, just within the last year (I’m 31) that doesn’t “fix” the problem to the extent of making cleaning and decluttering as easy for me as it is for the median neurotypical, but that helps a lot is this:

Ask yourself if a digital image would be just as good.

And if it would, snap a picture with your (or someone else’s) digital camera or smartphone. If you don’t have either, and can’t borrow either from someone who does, scan anything that’s flat and not physically gross with a scanner — often, libraries will have one or more available for public use. And then save copies of those photos in two or more physically separate locations (which may just mean “on your hard drive and also on Google Drive, Dropbox, or some other cloud storage solution”). Now the physical object can be junked, recycled, or given away, and the information it contained is actually less likely to be destroyed than if you simply kept the object without taking photos.

A digital image will not always be just as good. I emphatically do not want to make the blanket assertion that any and all physical objects that you have no need for other than to look at them should be junked in this fashion, especially when addressing an audience that contains a bunch of fellow autists. This is not something you should do in every possible case where you could. I’m just saying, ask the question. Doing so has helped me a lot.

Also, stimulant ADHD meds help with cleaning a lot. Both in overcoming compulsive difficulty throwing things out (at least for me) and in getting up the oomph to do it in general. And treating any depression you might have, whether that’s with a light box, dietary changes, exercise, talk therapy, anti-depressants, behavioral changes that improve situations that exacerbate your depression, or (as for me) all of them together. But that’s another topic.

P.S.: This should go without saying, but in some tumblr communities it doesn’t: If this is helpful to you, or you think it might be helpful to someone who follows you, go ahead and reblog it. You don’t need to be attention-deficient, obsessive-compulsive, depressed, or autistic. Sharing information and ideas is good. If you worry that being helpful will cause people to criticize you for not “staying in your lane,” ask yourself who died and made them the Department of Transportation. And if people do that, ask them. I can tell you the answer right now: Nobody. Just because someone claims moral authority doesn’t mean they actually have it.