Every woman can relate to a messy house. But we may not agree on why or how it becomes a dilemma.
The truth is and you may not like me for this. Your lives are reflected in your Housekeeping. What you and your husband are trying to accomplish is impossible. 50 hour work week, you have a job, a newborn, just bought a home? S-T-R-E-S-S! You're looking at a serious set-up for serious marital problems.
You have no time to take care of his needs. He needs more than a meal eaten late at night. Health wise that is not good anyway.
Friends share the truth.
You and hubby are going to have to make a decision as to what is important - your marriage and family or the outside stuff that have torn up more marriages than adultery.
The sign that it is too much is you and hubby are arguing about the nothings.
Being a wife and mother is a full time job. You have four jobs not one.
Wife
Mother
Home manager
Employee
I know the debts are burying you or hubby would not have to work 50 hours a week. You did not mention vehicles or other debts.
You have a hand full and there is no way to get tips to manage it all. It is a pipe dream that will eventually land you and your precious husband in divorce court. You are really still newly married and have no time to get to know each other or attend to each other's needs. I'm sure sex has been laid aside and become a chore.
Men are men. If you are not there to meet his needs in the bedroom, that's if you can even get in the bedroom, he will eventually find it elsewhere.
One of the greatest primary needs you both have is your sex life. Your hubby needs you in ways that as a woman you will never grasp completely.
You both will have to sit down and do some serious assessment of where you have to cut back, not if.
Tips?
1. Evenings are for you and hubby to wind down and relax together.
2. Find some tasty simple recipes online that can be prepared easily and put in the freezer. Get a crock pot to cook tasty meals that can cook slowly all day.
3. Don't try to clean the whole house. Its defeating and you end up feeling worse. Clean one room first and keep it clean. Start with the bedroom. Your husband needs a place to rest and so do you. Make it a goal to get it clean, inviting and peaceful. Baby sleeps in his own room.
4. Use pretty paper plates and cups "for awhile" to cut down on washing dishes. Let your husband know what you're doing. You need time savers right now.
5. Don't buy anything else you don't absolutely need for the next several months. Cuts down on clutter.
6. The time you do have, take a tablet and pencil and go through each room including garage and basement. You have a lot of stuff you don't need. Write down what is in each room.
Go to the store or somewhere and get boxes, lots of them.
Put boxes in each room or outside the door. Label them: THROW OUT OR KEEP. Each day sort through at least a few things.
Do one room at a time until it looks like what it is supposed to be. Take your time. It didn't get that way overnight. It won't be resolved over night.
8. Laundry and dry cleaning go in separate baskets or boxes.
If you can afford it buy several stand up laundry bags on wheels, one for each member of the family. ALL laundry goes in them. Sit them outside the bedrooms.
Dry cleaning goes in a box at the front door for easy access and to dropped off at the cleaners.
9. Together choose one thing a week you and hubby can cut back on financially even if it hurts. Open a penny jar savings account and put in there even if its 3 dollars.
10. You're not tired. You are stressed to the limit and it feels like tired.
If you have to eat late at night because of jobs, You will have to eat lighter meals that digest easily. Vegetables, fruit, fish, chicken, soups.
Your body is supposed to rest and repair at night not fight to digest late dinners. When you eat late at night, you wake up tired the next morning because instead of resting and doing repair jobs, your body was trying to digest a full dinner.
Water curbs appetite. Drink a glass before a meal and you will not eat as much. Drink water before going to bed.
It sounds like a lot but print it out and see if it doesn't begin to make sense. Like most young new couples you fell into the trap of the American dream. No one told you that you couldn't have it all at once. Marriage, family,jobs, house, cars--They didn't mention drowning in debt is part of the dream?
SUMMARY
1. Put your marriage first not your house
2. Where must you cut back to get your life back-not if?
3. Inch by inch to clean the house
4. Identify you are both in over your head and find solutions together.
5. Make a pact together: The outside stuff will not destroy your marriage. I don't know how you feel about God but prayer is powerful and you need Him.
Money can buy a divorce or destroy a marriage but it can't save one.