My daughter is headed back to school in September for sophomore year. She has trouble organizing herself and her room is always a mess. She has some level of executive functioning issues as well as motor skill issues that make keeping herself organized difficult. Shelving is useless because she not able to put away and remove without pulling everything down. She has a hard time getting clothes onto hangers. Last year she had a roommate (who was neat) so there was some level of embarrassment that forced her to pick things up periodically. This year she’s in a single so I am trying to help her come up with a strategy to keep things under control. Her room was typically strewed with clothes, multiple medicine bottles with loose pills. She seemed to have trouble finding things so would buy more - we’d find 4 bottles of shampoo, 3 toothpaste tubes, multiple packages of cold medicine, etc. etc. Buying all the latest organizers from Bed Bath and Beyond often results in a room stuffed with empty, expensive organizing “stuff” plus the mess. A few ideas I had are to send her with fewer clothes and shoes. She took way too much last year and wore very little of it. We also agreed that room decorations would be limited to things on the wall vs. stuff like pillows on the bed and crap on desk and dresser. Have any of you found a product or strategy that helped your child keep things under control?
Thanks in advance for any suggestions or advice
Fabric bins work well for my D. She had a bin for under garments, one of pjs, one for t shirts, etc. She just tosses them in the right bin.
Same for toiletries and nets - big plastic bins and they are altogether.
If she needs something during the school year, that expense is on her. I’m not funding the “I couldn’t find it.”
I agree with your idea of taking less. That will help too.
My D has gotten much neater in college (she was a total slob at home). Hopefully yours will too.
I agree that a huge help would be to have way less stuff in the room. The less you have, the easier it is to find things! Perhaps she should only take enough clothes that fit in the dresser (assuming the dorm includes a dresser).
I wonder if finding a counselor with ADD specialty would help. I have a friend whose son has ADD, and he has an ADD “coach” that gives them tools and strategies for organizing and executive functioning skills.
As stated my daughter’s room at home is usually a mess but getting better but her apartment (has her own room with 3 girls), usually is kept up. Hmm…
. You mention pill bottles and this seems like adhd VS just executive functioning but they are mixed no doubt. Maybe have evaluated to make sure she is on the right ones /dose… Sorry for over reaching here. Also biofeedback works great for this. A few sessions when my daughter was young and she would come home from a session and organize her room…
Send her with a LOT less stuff. It will be less to have in a mess. If you get bins…make sure they are labeled on all four sides.
Why can’t she have pillows on her bed? Just remind her…they go on her bed. Pillows don’t look bad on the floor. Dirty clothes and piles of things look messy.
If she takes ONLY what she immediately needs, this should help. So…for start of school, don’t send the winter weight clothes, boots, sweaters, etc. Send the fall things with some layers she can wear if it gets colder. Swap out at Thanksgiving.
Oh my, this sounds just like my son used to be in high school and after. Executive Dysfunction. Honestly, it’s almost a losing battle at this point. They just don’t care! It’s not important to them. I did the same, tried helping him find ways to organize but as soon as I walked out the door…chaos.
But there is good news!!! The Executive Dysfunction gets better and they start to do it when it’s important to them…whatever that reason is I don’t know.
Exactly. Both of our kids are minimalist and neat now. But in high school, one was less than tidy. I just shut the bedroom door. But in college and after, a neater person…mostly due to much less “stuff”.
Does she recognize this as a problem? Does she want to improve?
Look for things that work. You mention clothes don’t get on hangers. Would three large bins/baskets that you could line up in the closet work better to toss clean clothes in? One for tops, one for bottoms, one for dresses/sweaters? They won’t get much more wrinkled in a tall basket than on a pile on the floor.
Is she open to scheduling a 10 minute pick up daily? 5 minutes? Like literally get it on the calendar - first thing in the morning, just before dinner, right before bed - whatever works and can fit in to her routine. Make a game out of it - she can send you before and after photos. 
Stop being messy is a lot like losing weight. You have to want it for yourself. Other peoples opinions simply won’t help you ( The embarrassment about a roommate might help. I was definitely better when I had a roommate who was neat that I admired then I was one of the by myself. But I really hadn’t Inc. being less messy into my life )
. I speak as a person who in the last five years went from being pretty messy to being extremely organized. (And also someone who lost seventy pounds in the last year)
I will say that the trigger for me deciding to become a very organized and neat person was watching hoarding shows. I think I feared becoming like that even though I was not a hoarder. ( my trigger for losing weight was seeing someone I thought was quite heavy obviously think that she and I were the same size. She was clearly right but I didn’t see myself that way. It was quite a wake up call )
I think bins are a great idea.
I tend to be really messy or really neat. It’s hard for me to be gracefully in-between. I think this may be to some ADD or visual processing (undiagnosed).
Color coding helps me to organize better. If your daughter comes to associate one color for the medication bin, one color for toiletries, one color for clean clothes and another for dirty (or better yet, a dark laundry bin for dark clothes and a white one for whites) she may be able to start putting things in the right place without having to think so much about it. Big, attractive labeling can help too. The color-coding also works well organizing paperwork. If too many competing colors are visually distracting, she could still color-code with pastel or muted tones to create a calm environment for studying. On the other hand, she could use bold pops of primary colors if she enjoys that or needs that in-your-face reminder of where things go.
Simplifying as much as possible helps. One tedious chore that I HATE above all others is matching socks. I used to have piles of random socks because I dreaded dealing with them. Now I buy identical ones in great quantity and stick with the same brand (usually all black and all white…footie, crew and ankle) so that they are matched almost automatically. The socks are boring, but my time is more interesting.
Of course, your daughter will need to have some motivation of her own to do any of this. If she has fewer things, even if they all end up on the floor there will be less chaos to deal with.
There is a huge difference between the typical teenage messy and the difficulties in organization caused by ADD and/or executive function. Many (most) kids are messy at home and more organized when away. They know where their stuff is, but prefer to pile the clothes on the floor rather than in a hamper or drawer. Not being able to find where you put the shampoo so you go and buy another bottle is next level. However, there is not a lot you can do about it unless she is willing and interested in working really hard to change this. An ADD/Life coach could help, but only if DD is willing to abide by the coaching.
How is she with her school work? Is she expending so much mental energy in making sure her homework and studying is done that she truly has nothing left to fold her clothes or figure out where she put things. Truly, for now, school is what is critical. Her energy should be spent on making sure she gets to class and does here work.
Otherwise, having her work on one aspect of daily living may help. I have read it takes around 6 weeks of doing something regularly before it becomes a habit. However, this may be a lifelong struggle for your dd.
Your best bet for “helping” her is to have her bring the least amount of stuff possible to college. Looking at and living in chaos surely isn’t helping to calm her mind. Bins and boxes and clever organizational tips help those of us who are average messy, but do not help someone who is truly challenged with the issues you describe. For your daughter, bins and boxes are just more places to stash things and then to lose them.
(all three of mine brought way too much every year. Things came home having never been used.)
True story: My oldest child’s freshman roomate was a casual acquaintance from high school. He moved into their room first, and when we arrived I thought maybe he was still moving in. Nope. He was (and is) a true minimalist. His side of the room looked like a staging photo: five shirts neatly hung, three pairs of shoes on the closet floor, etc. How he put up with the mess that was my son is beyond me. They became very good friends and still are, ten years later.
Anyway, this roomate had brought nothing more than he needed and he used everything he brought. It was calming to look at his side of the room.
OP states that her daughter has executive functioning issues and motor problems. This is not your typical “messy kid” situation. Even if she only has three shirts, it may be too much effort to get them on hangers.
I agree that less is more. But even “less” needs a system or a level of accountability that she can handle.
Being in a single may help her to be a little more focused and not have to visually discern between two people’s stuff.
The key is…it has to be a system SHE wants to use. What the parents think is great might not work at all for this kid. Sit down and talk to her. See if you can get a sense of what SHE thinks will work for her…then try it at home for the next few weeks.
Thank you all for the thoughtful responses. She does not have ADD but a host of other issues which contribute to the problem. I agree that she needs a system that she owns/wants and that works for her as well as a strong desire to keep things organized. I’m trying to come up with some strategies and then sit down with her so she can take ownership. On the one hand I don’t think she cares, but she is an anxious kid who had a hard time adjusting to college and she does thinks she will benefit from having a single and dorm room that is welcoming. I am thinking that if she’s somewhat organized and neat it might help create the environment she’s seeking of calm and control. Her therapist has mentioned this as well.
No doubt bringing the least amount possible is the best step - luckily she has no issue wearing mismatched socks and often does. I also try to encourage her to put things away as she goes along because once it’s too far along she is completely overwhelmed. @mom2and brings up a good point about school work. She is actually very organized when it comes to school work. Physically, she has a hard time keeping papers organized but she knows at any moment what’s due when and is very good at planning out her work and never misses a deadline. I think it’s probably true that all of her effort goes to school work and so she has no energy/capacity for the rest. I’m not expecting her to be a neat freak and it’s not where I need to live but hoping to help her work out a system so that she can enjoy her space.
Appreciate all the input!
@Dancer41 I could very well have written your request. D2 is the messiest person I have ever encountered in my life and yet when she goes out she looks perfect. Hair, make up, clothes. No one would suspect that behind that perfect exterior lies such a messy person. There are not enough bins, labels, fancy coat hangers or drawer organizers in the world to make a difference in her keeping her clothes, shoes, jewelry and make up organized.
She is home for a month while she starts a new job and gets her own apt. The deal we made is I won’t nag if everything is confined to her room and the door is shut.
So, when your daughter goes to school in the fall, tell her she has to respect her roommates and to keep all her stuff confined to her room. Tell her she must clean up after herself in the bathroom and the kitchen. If she has to buy multiples of toothpaste or mouthwash, tell her that’s on her dime.
Also, I would be concerned about the medication. If the bottles are left open and pills laying about it may be she isn’t taking it regularly. Explain that her losing medication is not an excuse to get a refill.
Good luck to you. I know how frustrating this problem is.
Parts of my life and my house are well organized and others are not. I’ve found that what I have to do is organize around my habits, not what I wish they were. So if I take off shoes at the front door, don’t store them upstairs in a closet, except a pair or two of dressy shoes. The laundry hamper needs to be within throwing distance of where I take off my clothes. When I pick up the mail, it does either in the in box for each person or into paper recycling. Despite my best efforts though the dining room table regularly fills up with stuff I put down and don’t feel like putting away right away.
One other thought is to just have some large bins/laundry baskets to use as a dumping ground which she can stick in the closet or somewhere if she wants to entertain in her room. The difficulty with a single is that there is no reason to keep it clean if the roommate is not there to complain or comment.
Glad to hear she is on top of her schoolwork. That is huge! I would really limit my input on her messiness if she is not open to hearing about it. School is what really counts.
I know Adhd is not part of this but there are good things to read in this article. Good Luck.
Both my children are slobs and only one has the executive-function-disorder excuse 
My daughter was actually forced to be neater than her wont while in college (roommate pressure, mostly) but now that she’s not sharing the inner slob has come out big time. She’s capable of major clean up; three days later the pigsty look is back. Sigh.