Aspergers and being tidy

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Sometimes, but not at the moment.

I am meticulously organized, but my method of organization would never be confused with tidy! I wonder of the physical chaos of my individual environment isn't really a passive-aggressive way of enforcing my personal sanctum sanctorum.

hah me tidy? thats a laugh

Hang on, hang on, hang on...... I thought Aspies like organisation and everything in place? I know I'm on the spcetrum myself, but that has always confused me and I'll like to know the answer.

I can be very slapdash - I'm not too bothered about things being neat and tidy, but I still like to keep my room tidy. There is nothing on my floor - the only things what are cluttered are the shelves. Nothing is in order on my shelves, but at least they're not laying about on the floor.

I must say, though, I make a mess at work, and I either forget I've made the mess and go off and do something else, or I trip over my own mess. But my NT manager is just the same as me - she starts something then forgets to finish it and goes off leaving a mighty mess.

As a child I was very OCD about keeping everything neat, organized and tidy. My room was like a museum, with everything arranged into collections, lined up, labeled and in alphabetical order. That was me as a 'happy Aspie'. However, as I grew older and began to become more depressed, hopeless and exhausted due to my difficulties, I found it harder and harder to keep things tidy, until I became exactly the opposite. My house is often in total devastation, while I block everything out with my relentless focus on my interest.

I think what happens now is that I don't know how to clean and tidy without it being some mammoth, meticulously organized and carefully executed master-plan that takes days to formulate and days more to carry out. It has to be exacting and so takes a ridiculously long time. I basically have a standard for tidiness that is so high and obsessive that even I can't meet it anymore - and yet I don't know how to do half measures, so it often doesn't get done at all. I also have real trouble knowing what to do first and how to be methodical. I end up feeling compelled to do things like categorizing all my books in a new way, and taking two days to do it, while all my dishes are dirty in the sink, and I have no clean clothes, that kind of thing. I just don't know how people manage to deal with all the different aspects of life at the same time - a job, keeping a home clean and tidy, doing their paperwork, budgeting, shopping...it's endless. I don't get it. It seems impossible to me, like an insoluble calculation.

So, I can totally understand how an Aspie, especially as they get older, can be incredibly tidy 'at heart' and yet their home be in complete chaos.

This is why psychs have to have a lot of experience and insight when assessing people, because the Aspie cliches can often be fully present, but get turned around. In fact, I suspect that, often, the more heavily present and intense they are the more likely they are to get turned around and end up in a strange apparent paradox. One just has to fully understand the dynamics at work to recognize them.

im not really clean, but im no hoarder either. i cant be to dirty because then my ocd from hell will make a appearance

I'm not tidy at all. I like things to be in the right place and in the right order, but that doesn't mean they have to be tidy - if the "right place" is on top a pile of crap then so be it.

I function so much better when I am tidy, but when my life is going through a big change like right now, that I'm back in school, things go haywire. The mess in my room is driving me insane but there is so much to do and my school work always ends up being more of a priority. But I study better in here when it's tidy, so really I should just bite the bullet. Here I am wasting my time on WP after all..

I am not that tidy at all -- not good at housekeeper, not a neat writer at all. I guess my life is cluttered like my mind, but being tidy is by no means a prerequisite for having Asperger's.

Others would probably not call my room tidy, but I know where things are and that is the important part for me. I know exactly into which stack of papers I have to dive when I want that letter my insurance sent me last year.

On the other hand I am unbelievable immune to dust. I see that my room is dusty, but it doesn't bother me. And I think that I do not see the dust quiet as clearly as the rest of my family. My mother is always complaining about the state our house is in when everything still looks fine to me.

I used to share a flat with another (NT) girl for a couple of years. She was the total opposite of me when it came to keeping the flat in a presentable state. We got along really well: she dusted and vacuum-cleaned, I organized the tons of thing she just left lying around. Sad that she had to move to another city...

really tidy aspie here correct my game collection and i kill you not literally of course

i'm a proper slob. but I have the same problem about things being straight. sometimes i will clean my house so perfectly that i notice anything out of place, but if the house is a mess, i don't notice it anymore, it stops bothering me.. one object out of place=chaos, everything out of place=order. i'm weird.

I am not at all tidy, however I know where everything is. Well, sort of since I moved I still look for things in the wrong places. The only time I am clean and tidy is when I am working on a project.