Laundry Is the Bane of My Existence (And I Think We’ve Entered a Black Hole)

I love my family. I love making our house a home. I love the idea of fresh sheets, fluffy towels, and opening a drawer to find exactly what I need.

But laundry? Laundry is the bane of my existence. There. I said it. (and God bless my husband, because he DOES actually do laundry AND typically is the better of us two at catching it up when we get behind)

Somewhere between being a mom, a nurse, and a person who occasionally wants to do something besides manage everyone’s clothing, we have gotten stuck in a laundry black hole…And I’m starting to think there is no bottom.

Adding to the conundrum, we’ve found that doing too many loads of laundry in day or weekend tends to cause our septic tank to get a little overworked. (and nobody likes septic problems!)

How Is There Always More?

There are five people in this house. Logically, I understand that five people create laundry. Emotionally, I feel like we are providing wardrobe services for a small traveling circus. Clothes. Towels. Sheets. More towels. Something someone wore for approximately eleven minutes and somehow determined was dirty. I can be actively doing laundry and still feel like we’re falling behind. A load goes in. A load comes out. Another basket appears. At this point, I would like to speak to whoever is in charge of the inventory. Because the math is not mathing!

(but for real….the inventory keeping might actually be a root cause to this issue in our house…. we’ll talk more about that later)

The Laundry Black Hole

The thing about getting behind on laundry is that the rest of the family does not stop needing clothes while you catch up. Nobody says, “You know what? Mom’s working through the backlog. Let’s all stop generating laundry for a few days.” We keep getting dressed. We keep taking showers. We keep sleeping in beds. It’s honestly very inconsiderate of us!!

So now there’s the laundry that already needed to be done, plus the laundry we created today, plus whatever is coming tomorrow. Suddenly, “catching up” starts to feel like a mythical achievement, or at the very least a constantly moving target. It’s something other people do… probably people who also know where all their matching socks are, but it’s definitely not us.

We’re just trying to make sure everyone has underwear.

There’s a difference between keeping laundry moving and actually getting ahead of it. Lately, it feels like we’ve been doing a whole lot of moving without ever arriving anywhere.

Washing Is Only the Beginning…

If laundry were just putting clothes into a machine and pressing a button, I think I could make peace with it. Truly, I don’t mind this part of laundry. The problem is that this starts the chain a chain of events.

You have to remember to move it to the dryer. Then get it out. Then sort it. Then fold it—or at least get it into some recognizable order. Then get it to the correct person. Then somehow convince the clothing to take up residence in a drawer. This last part apparently requires a separate appointment.

And when life interrupts somewhere along the way (and of course it does), the baskets become part of the scenery…Dirty laundry waiting to be washed. Clean laundry waiting to be put away. A basket that requires further investigation before anyone can confidently assign it a category.

It’s exhausting to have a chore taking up both physical space and mental space, especially when you never get the satisfaction of feeling finished.

When a Pile Starts Feeling Personal

I know laundry is laundry. It should not have the power to make me question my ability to run a household. And yet, when you walk past the same pile enough times, it can start to feel like a running commentary on everything you haven’t gotten to.

You see it when you’re leaving for work. You see it when you’re trying to relax. You remember it when someone asks whether their favorite shirt is clean. Even when you’re doing something else, a little part of your brain is still keeping track of that pile.

I want our home to feel welcoming and functional. I want our everyday systems to help us enjoy living here. But there are seasons when keeping up with the basics takes more energy than I have available. Laundry has a way of making those seasons very visible. And I don’t think I’m the only one who has looked at a mountain of clothes and thought, “How are we working this hard and still this behind?”

I Needed a Way to Catch Up

At some point, the thought of doing another load stopped feeling encouraging. Of course, it would help, every load helps. However, when you’re staring at a MASSIVE backlog, one load can feel very small compared with everything still waiting. Especially when you know that, by bedtime, there will be more.

I wanted some breathing room. I wanted to be able to look at the laundry and see a manageable chore again. I also wanted to stop spending quite so much of my life feeling annoyed by fabric. I wanted to stop asking myself the “how are we working this hard and still this behind?” question. So I did what I like to do…. got creative.

A change of scenery…or maybe chasing Dopamine?

Call it what you will. A strategy, tricking the mind, efficiency….. pure brilliance? I decided to try out our local laundromat, it had recently been completely renovated and upgraded. Unexpectedly, it has given me a renewed outlook on this whole laundry situation.

I’m not ready to declare laundry my new favorite hobby. Let’s keep our expectations reasonable.

But I am starting to see a way out of the black hole.

This “laundromat strategy” or “secret trick play” works well for many reasons, many of which cater to the ADHD factors of my brain’s processes. I don’t think by any means that this is ONLY useful for those with ADHD, I’d be remiss if I didn’t highlight how this strategy supports my ADHD brain.

Going to the laundromat can support an ADHD brain in several practical ways:

• A clear beginning and end. “Go to the laundromat and finish these baskets” feels more concrete than “keep up with laundry forever.”
• Fewer things competing for attention. At home, dishes, kids, craft projects, and a dozen other tasks can pull me away. A dedicated laundry trip narrows the focus.
• Less remembering in the background. I don’t have to keep reminding myself about the washer while doing everything else. The machines and laundry are right there.
• External cues for the next step. Timers, machine displays, and finished cycles help signal when it’s time to switch, unload, or fold.
• Multiple loads moving at once. Working through several baskets together shortens the catch-up process and reduces the repeated starting and stopping.
• Visible progress. Seeing the pile shrink gives me a sense of accomplishment that’s harder to find when I’m doing one load at a time.
• A change of environment. Leaving the house can help interrupt the avoidance loop that builds around an overwhelming pile.
• A specific purpose for the time. Laundry gets its own appointment instead of relying on me to squeeze it into every spare moment.
• A natural opportunity to fold immediately. Folding while waiting for the remaining loads can keep clean laundry from becoming another unfinished task.
• Possible body doubling. Being around other people doing laundry may help me stay engaged, even if we aren’t interacting.
• Less overwhelm afterward. Clearing the backlog can make the next load feel manageable instead of like one more contribution to Mount Laundry.

The laundromat doesn’t magically make me love laundry, but it gives me structure, cues, and visible progress—and fewer steps that depend on me remembering something later.

THe Laundromat Method, treated a root cause.

Some of This Laundry Needed to Leave the House

Another major contributor to our laundry overwhelm was the sheer amount of clothing still in circulation that didn’t need to be there.

Clothes the kids had outgrown. Things that were too worn out to keep. Items we kept passing over while looking for something that actually fit.

They were taking up space in drawers, baskets, and the laundry pile—and making it harder to manage the clothes we actually use.

Somehow, a shirt that no longer fits can still end up in the wash. It gets tried on, tossed aside, mixed into a pile, and suddenly I’m washing it again. Apparently, we were offering complimentary laundry services to clothes that no longer worked here.

The laundromat gives me a slightly easier opportunity to interrupt that cycle. As I’m folding, I already have each item in my hands. That makes it a natural point to ask: Does this fit? Is it in good enough shape to keep? Does anyone actually wear it? I’m already sorting the laundry, so separating out the unwanted clothes feels like a smaller extra step than starting an entirely separate closet cleanout at home.

But there’s a second part to this that matters just as much: the unwanted clothes have to actually leave the house. Let’s be real; we all know how this goes. I sort out the too-small clothes, put them in a bag, feel briefly accomplished, and then that bag becomes a permanent resident. It moves from one room to another, waiting for me to decide what to do with it. (or actually do what I have already decided I’m going to do with it)

Now I have laundry clutter and a bag of laundry-related clutter. Fantastic.

With the laundromat method, the clothes are already outside the house, and I’m already out with the car. Separating usable clothes for donation from worn-out items makes it easier to give each bag a destination and work a drop-off into the trip. It still takes follow-through, but it removes a few of the steps between “I should get rid of these” and actually doing it.

That’s part of what makes this feel like a reset. I can bring home clean clothes we want to keep—and reduce the amount we’ll have to manage next time.

Laundry & I will continue working on our relationship.

While the “Laundromat Method” in my laundry system has given me a renewed outlook on this whole laundry situation.
I’m not ready to declare laundry my new favorite hobby. Let’s keep our expectations reasonable.

But I am starting to see a way out of the black hole.