‘Sad beige’ lover or slummy mummy? You’re damned either way when it comes to cleanliness and parenting
Our flat is a mess. I write this looking at a pile of laundry taller than I am, besides which are two semi-unpacked suitcases and a Fisher-Price Little Snoopy that are conspiring to break my neck. Next to me is a used Calpol syringe, an ear thermometer, three mugs, lots of loose pages from the novel I’m writing, and a multipack of Pom-Bear crisps. I have always been messy and, having grown up in a house with a brother whose autism manifested itself in disorder, have a fairly high tolerance for chaos. But nothing prepared me for the mess having a child would create.
The problem is less acute with a baby. A baby comes with a lot of stuff, granted, and you are too sleep- deprived to think straight, let alone approach the housework, but a small child is at least somewhat contained. The mess a toddler creates is unholy in comparison. When my son doesn’t want something, he simply throws it over his shoulder, the way a pissed person might a kebab. A lot of the stuff he throws is sticky. In Nell Frizzell’s book Holding the Baby, she makes reference to something she calls “toddler cement”, a mix of porridge, snot, regurgitated milk, hair and something colourful, probably jam. A nightmare to clean, but still not as bad as some of the other substances you will encounter, and we haven’t even started potty training yet.
Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett is a Guardian columnist
