How to Keep House While Drowning
A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing
by KC Davis · first published 2020
100% recommend
Why HN recommends it
Practical, low-pressure guide to managing household clutter and chores when overwhelmed, depression, or ADHD make standard routines hard; suits parents and neurodivergent readers who want to make the home work for them.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
How to Keep House While Drowning will introduce you to six life-changing principles that will revolutionize the way you approach home care—without endless to-do lists. Presented in 31 daily thoughts, this compassionate guide will help you begin to get free of the shame and anxiety you feel over home care. Inside you will learn: · How to shift your perspective of care tasks from moral to functional; · How to stop negative self-talk and shame around care tasks; · How to give yourself permission to rest, even when things aren’t finished; · How to motivate yourself to care for your sp
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I found KC Davis's 2022 book How to Keep House While Drowning to be a nice update to Kondo's techniques. On a practical level Davis focuses on accumulated mess as 5 things: (1) trash, (2) dishes, (3) laundry, (4) things that have a place and are not in their place,…
on “Marie Kondo Gives Up” ↗…3. The Book You Wish Your Parents Had Read, Philippa Perry 4. Burnout by Emily Nagoski 5. Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, Lindsay C. Gibson 6. Self-Compassion, Dr. Kristin Neff 7. How to Keep House While Drowning, KC Davis 8. Deploy Empathy, Michele Hansen 9. The Body Keeps the Score, Bessel A. Van der Kolk 10. Atlas of the Heart, Brene Brown 11. What Happened to You? Conversations on Trauma, Resilience, and…
on “Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?” ↗…on "efficiency" has helped me finish a lot of projects I otherwise would have put off for far too long! The books are "How to Manage Your Home Without Losing Your Mind" by Dana White for ADHD folks, "How to Keep House While Drowning" by KC Davis for when life is f'ed. Heartily recommend both.
on “Why you’re going about recovering from perfectionism all wrong (2021)” ↗I will caveat this with something I learned from “How to Keep House While Drowning” - an incredible book for overwhelmed parents, neurodivergent people, and those going through depression: Make your home work for you, don’t work for your home. If that means the best way for you to…
on “Ask HN: Something you’ve done your whole life that you realized is wrong?” ↗1. Give yourself some understanding and grace. You are a good parent, doing your best, never forget that. "How to Keep House While Drowning" I have found to be a good read to help here. 2. Find an expert, hopefully near your region to help with management 3. Find any patient advocacy or support groups to connect and learn from.
on “Ask HN: My child was diagnosed with sensory processing disorder. What to do?” ↗