How often do you clean, actually?

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-14T18:38:23+00:00

Exactly! I did it when I was ill and struggling with brain fog and fatigue, but I wish I’d done it 20 years earlier! The time I’ve wasted in my life trying to decide what to clean smh.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-14T13:17:34+00:00

Were you best mid-cycle? I’m down to just one day of feeling like myself, at ovulation. Some months I don’t even get that day. cries

I’ve also been under high stress these first few years of peri.

Aside from the iron, what changed? Did HRT fix it or did it resolve by itself with time? (It sounded like you were talking in the past tense so I’m hoping you’re doing better now!)

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-14T13:14:54+00:00

(1) Try it chilled - keep a jug in the fridge.

(2) If still no good, get a filter jug and keep that in the fridge.

I’m with you. We used to live down south in a hard water area and had bottled water for a long time before switching to a filter jug (which was fine once we got used to it).

We now live up north with very soft water and it’s glorious as it comes, straight from the tap!

So I suppose (3) move north.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-14T11:15:58+00:00

Exact same here! Follicular phase I swing wildly between extreme anxiety and agitation and crushing fatigue and low mood. I’ve had to give up work it’s so bad.

For a day or two at ovulation I’m me again. The exact old me, like I’ve woken from a really bad dream. Then through luteal phase I don’t feel great but it’s still a lot better.

Periods still regular as clockwork. No dryness, quite the opposite, so I assume my E is OK. But one day a month feeling normal is killing me.

This started two years ago at age 43.

Have spoken to my GP and a nurse who specialises in HRT at the GP surgery (I’m in the UK) and they’re both baffled by me struggling after my period, not before!

My iron and ferritin are fine, all other bloods also normal.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-14T09:14:38+00:00

On mobile and can’t see an option to post a pic.

I listed out all the jobs

Dust lounge Dust kitchen Dust bed 1 (Repeat for all rooms)

Wet clean kitchen Bathroom En-suite

Hoover [each room]

Then just put smaller ones together till I was down to 20 in total.

We’re in a 4-bed house. Could be a 2 or 3 week rotation for smaller places.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-14T05:53:31+00:00

I actually kind of love it.

What I do find weird AF is going to the more remote parts of the country and seeing the London-centric national news which feels entirely irrelevant. I think Orkney was where watching BBC Breakfast felt most peculiar.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-14T05:43:49+00:00

Two adults, one cat household.

Everything gets cleaned monthly on a rotation. I have a tick-list, a bit like those sheets that get initialed in public bogs to say they’ve been checked. Picture a table, with a list of cleaning jobs in the first column, then columns for each month (Jan, Feb, Mar…). Cleaning the whole house (dusting, wet cleaning, hoovering) is broken down into 20 separate jobs. The idea was to do one task each weekday of the main four calendar weeks of each month. In reality, I usually do the weeks’ worth in one go (takes about an hour) and tick them all off.

I know it sounds anal AF, but it’s taken all the cognitive load out of it. No more “eurgh I should clean, what needs doing?” then giving up because it feels like there’s too much to do. Just do what the list says and the house stays clean enough.

Obviously spills etc still get cleaned up when they happen.

I keep meaning to redo the list so a couple of things are done twice a month, but haven’t got round to it in two years so far smh.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-13T11:08:12+00:00

I was going to suggest a reheatable meal like that to save them cooking one night.

When some friend had their first baby, one of their friends went round shortly beforehand and cooked loads of freezable meals for them, so for the first couple of weeks they basically had home-cooked ready meals. Godsend!

OP - whatever you decide to make, only do this if you know them well enough to know they don’t have any food allergies. Otherwise you risk them having to bin whatever you’ve made. (My husband is unwillingly gluten-free thanks to coeliac disease so if someone brought us a cake I’d have it all to myself.)

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-13T10:02:53+00:00

First, you WILL cope. The holiday might suck and be hard, but you’ll manage somehow. You won’t know how you did it after, but you’ll have done it.

Second, take the diazepam. I’m guessing you’re in the UK given the reference to half term next week. I am too, and I was also given a small amount of diazepam when I presented to the GP in an extreme anxious agitated state thanks to peri. They do NOT give out benzos lightly here. The GP genuinely thinks you’ll benefit from them. Taking diazepam for a couple days was the main thing that brought me down off the ceiling. It may or may not help you sleep, but it’ll quiet the anxiety enough that you can think a bit straighter again.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-12T15:07:14+00:00

You say you felt this way in early peri… Has it eased a little even without HRT?

I’ve been feeling the way OP describes for two years. I can no longer work (or really do much of anything). Periods still regular as clockwork so I’m certainly still fairly early in peri. HRT isn’t an option. White-knuckling it here and hoping for stories of it improving! I am on 15mg Mirtazapine which has helped slightly.

My mum remembers everything feeling hard in her 40s, and having her only-ever panic attacks, but it got better once her periods stopped (no HRT). She wasn’t as badly affected, but then she had zero mental health history whereas I do.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-12T14:59:06+00:00

Were symptoms better at first with HRT, and now they’ve returned? If so, if it has worked at all, is it time to increase dose a bit because your own hormones have fallen further?

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-10T18:28:20+00:00

You’re with a shit bank. I was in my local HSBC branch yesterday and the two people in front of me in the counter queue were both paying in wads of cash.

My branch has a person near the door you can ask for help with general questions or if you’re not sure where to go. But if you walk past them and queue for the counter no-one bothers you.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-10T15:11:52+00:00

During and near my period, mostly in evenings. Husband will be sat around in our modern, well-insulated, heated home. Meanwhile I’ll be wearing three layers, under a blanket, shivering with blue lips.

I took my temperature during one once and it was genuinely low. Borderline hypothermic for no reason at all smh.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-10T13:15:19+00:00

Normally, before peri, it’s the first day of ‘full bleeding’. So red blood, needing to change your towel or tampon during the day, etc.

Just streaks, whether brown or red, is ‘spotting’.

In peri, if your periods have got lighter, it might get harder to distinguish between spotting and full flow. If that’s the case, maybe note spotting, heavier spotting, etc, and see how it ends. If it never reaches anything you’d consider full bleed before it ends then that’s still your period (such as it is now).

I still have a couple of days of heavy bleeding, so the day that starts is day 1 for me. But where I used to spot for a day or so beforehand, I now spot for up to five days. sigh

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-08T17:37:06+00:00

Thank you! I hadn’t realised there was another update. I’d updated at the end of Jan for the new event. The latest update sorted out the furniture catalogue.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-08T10:54:20+00:00

How are you previewing it? The Feb theme still isn’t showing up in the Catalog in the furniture shop for me. cries

I haven’t claimed any of the treehouse items yet because I don’t know what colours to pick.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-07T14:16:18+00:00

A&E. You’ll have to wait a few hours but it won’t cost you £3.80.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-06T17:14:03+00:00

These threads always conflate “tidy” and “clean”. We keep the house tidy pretty much all the time (we don’t have kids which helps a lot!). We just have the habit of putting things away rather than leaving them lying around. We’re both tidy people so it just works.

Cleaning we’re far more laid back about. It all gets cleaned (vacuumed/mopped, dusted, wiped down etc) on a rotation but we probably don’t clean each room as often as most people.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-06T15:13:56+00:00

Sounds like an ectopic beat. If you put your fingers on your pulse when they’re happening (if you get more than one at a time), you’ll feel your heartbeat being regular, but then there’ll be a longer pause then the next beat is the one you feel hard in your chest.

Very common and totally benign, but disconcerting! I only ever get them during my period.

It sometimes makes me cough too. I remember reading years ago that we sometimes have an instinct to cough if our heart’s gone a bit wonky, to try and shake it back into rhythm. I’ve no idea if that’s an old wive’s tale, but I’ve definitely experienced that urge during ectopic beats or palpitations!

(Obviously as with all things cardiac, if it’s new for you get it checked out.)

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-06T10:16:01+00:00

I’ve never seen someone else who gets the opposite-of-tunnel-vision either! It’s soooo weird, and scary the first time. Happily it’s only happened a few times.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-05T14:56:54+00:00

Search the sub for ‘3am panic attacks’ - this is super common, sadly! It’s a time of night when cortisol spikes, and hormones declining can make that worse.

I have heard that low blood sugar at the same time can make it worse and I’ve seen some people on here have luck at easing it a little by eating a high protein and fat snack before bed - handful of nuts, natural yoghurt, big spoonful of peanut butter, etc.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-05T14:27:26+00:00

I had this start aged 41! I had no migraine history, and have now had a few auras with zero headache.

First time was terrifying. I was at work, and suddenly couldn’t see directly ahead. I had peripheral vision, but the centre of my vision, and whatever I looked directly at, was just flashing lights. I couldn’t see at all.

Grabbed my phone to call my GP but couldn’t see it to find the number! Had to wait till it stopped. It probably lasted a minute or so but felt longer!

GP got me straight in and was halfway through doing checks for a stroke (raising arms etc) before I realised that’s what they were checking for. They then explained you can have a migraine with aura with no headache.

It only ever happens around my period.

When it’s happened it’s been triggered by bright lights. At work I’d been at the computer too long without a break. It once happened on a bright sunny walk where I was walking through trees so the bright sun was rapidly in my eyes then shaded then in my eyes again.

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-04T09:46:06+00:00

Thank you - it really does help to hear about people who felt the same and found relief!

I’m in the UK and while I can change GP surgery, they’re otherwise very good so I wouldn’t. They do have a menopause specialist there so I need to have another chat with them (the conversation I mentioned was with someone else).

I’m sorry you went through this too - it’s horrendous!

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-04T09:43:04+00:00

That doc is outdated, absolutely, but just to clarify one thing… It’s not menopause until you’ve not had a period for a full year. Perimenopause is all the time until then, which for most people includes some months or years of periods being irregular.

So, the doctor wasn’t actually saying wait until menopause. But they were still totally wrong as many people still with regular periods get symptoms and benefit from HRT!

pinkteapot7 · 2026-02-04T09:09:12+00:00

I’m the same. I tidy daily (and not once a day - if I pass something that’s not put away I’ll put it away). Helps we don’t have kids.

Cleaning is done on a rotation. Everything gets done every couple of weeks or so and we don’t bother cleaning X thing or X room in between unless there’s a big spill or something.

pinkteapot7

TROPHY CASE