How To Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis

After reading How To Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis, I decided it was an excellent topic to discuss in our Life Hacks section of the Women Who Fast website.

Why is KC Davis someone who can help us?

In this Mel Robbins podcast with KC Davis, Mel says, “KC is a therapist who sounds more like a wise friend.” I agree.

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How To Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis has a lot of great hacks when it comes to keeping up with tasks to be done around the house. And she has a therapist-styled approach to tackling it all.

Throughout the book, KC explains why we might struggle: If keeping up with housework is a constant challenge, it’s likely to do with all or any of these four variables.

Emotional – Feeling like we are failing or not being good enough.

Physical – Disability or physical limitations.

Mental – When we’re under stress and life is feeling hard, tasks can go from autopilot to every step that feels like we have to force ourselves through.

Societal messages – Women are sometimes labeled as the ones who should do the care tasks, making us feel like our worth is directly tied to how well we do these tasks.

KC not only helps us identify why we might be struggling, but she also uses her life experiences and professional expertise to help us find ways to combat our challenges.

Along with KC’s therapeutic approach, she has many excellent how-to house chore tips to make our lives easier.

Housework Hacks in How To Keep House While Drowning

Doesn’t it seem we’re always seeing suggestions for hacks to clean, cook, do laundry, and all the other “chores” we must do? Or maybe you’re on the lookout for better ways to get stuff done? I usually am. And I picked up a few new tips and tricks in this book.

KC initially states, “In this book, I’m going to help you find your way of keeping a functional home—whatever “functional” means for you.” 

This is the first hack that I highlighted. Because it shouldn’t be what functional means to our neighbors, Facebook friends, mom, or sister. It should be what works for you.

To gather this list, I read How To Keep House While Drowning on my Kindle Scribe, where I can highlight and take notes. With the Kindle Scribe, you can send a PDF of all your highlights and notes to your email. It’s so interesting to see the summary of your thoughts and what you found compelling or important as you read.

KC loves baskets. “Big baskets, little baskets, clear baskets, wicker baskets, baskets from the Dollar Tree, baskets that I got for free. Baskets of shoes, baskets of books, baskets in all my crannies and nooks. And here’s the key, here’s the trick: the baskets go where the stuff already went.”

Alongside her tip to use more baskets, she says, “If you’re feeling fancy you could purchase a basket’s cousin such as a tray or a lazy Susan. My organizational system is, on its face, just putting a basket in the right place.”

I especially love the idea of a decorative lazy Susan in my kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom dressers. I didn’t know there were so many cool lazy Susan options!

The next tip, I think, is a fun one: “If you dance every day to the same happy song with your baby, or your pet, or a friend on FaceTime and after a week play that song while folding laundry or doing dishes, your brain will associate happiness with that song and will provide a little pleasure reward.”

Another suggestion KC makes is to use a visual timer. She suggests setting a timer for 5-15 minute increments to get yourself going on a task. It is incredible how much can get done in 5-15 minutes. And setting a visual timer can be the trigger that gets the ball rolling.

The visual countdown timers with no ticking noise are a great way to go.

One way KC found (for herself) to reduce the stress of housework was to take dusting completely off her list. She would when she felt like dusting, but she took the pressure of regularly maintaining the dust off her plate. 

I don’t care for dusting either, so I enjoyed her approach. One tip of my own for dusting is to get an ostrich feather duster. I love this guy. Love is a strong word for a feather duster, but it helps make dusting feel more tolerable because it makes quick and easy work of it.

KC has more hacks and advice to consider than I’ll list here. In How To Keep House While Drowning, you’ll find what resonates and works for you.

How To Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis quotes you may appreciate

The beauty of having a Kindle Scribe is being able to highlight anything that interests you or that you want to remember or share. Here are some quotes from How to Keep House While Drowning that you might ponder.

Note: KC uses the term “care tasks” throughout her book because she also discusses taking care of ourselves as well as where we live. She defines it like this: “Care tasks are the “chores” of life: cooking, cleaning, laundry, feeding, dishes, and hygiene.”

“How you relate to care tasks—whether you are clean or dirty, messy or tidy, organized or unorganized—has absolutely no bearing on whether you are a good enough person.”

“Care tasks are not binary states of done or not done. They are a cycle.”

“Care tasks are a never-ending list, and if you wait until everything is done to rest, you will never rest.” 

“I find that the balance between rest and work seems to work itself out pretty naturally when you practice self-kindness.”

“There are seasons of life when we just can’t get all of our needs met, but the mental shift of seeing rest not as luxury but as a valid need helps you get creative, or at least validates it’s okay to mourn how difficult life is right now.”

“We are not obligated to line up every care task in the done state at the same time.”

“Good enough is perfect.”

Last but not least, because this one is my favorite.

“I am allowed to be human.”

Summing it up

The main message in How To Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis is to help people recognize why they might be struggling, find ways to be kind to themselves, and give themselves a break when needed.

The book is subtitled “A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing.” That sums it up nicely. There’s stuff in life that needs to get done, and KC might be the one who helps you find a way to make it easier.

All the best to you!

Dawn