Do You Suffer from Low Mobility? There ARE Other Ways to Clean Your Home!
Keeping your home clean can turn out to be quite a challenge. When you have limited mobility, whether caused by a recent injury or a chronic condition, it can seem close to impossible. Luckily, making a few modifications to your cleaning routine or the tools and products you use can definitely make a huge difference in your capacity to keep your home clean.
Keep reading to learn more about some of the most accessible house-cleaning tips and tricks. This way, you will learn how to incorporate mobility limitations from standing in your way of having a clean home to enjoy.
Switch to lightweight cleaning tools
If you still have that ancient vacuum or any other cleaning tools that are simply too heavy, now is the ideal time to make a switch. Even if it might not seem like it, carting a heavy vacuum around the entire house might actually wear you out. What we would deeply advise you is to find more lightweight tools that you can easily drag or carry on your lap.
There are plenty of lightweight stick vacuums on the market, like the Bissell Cleanview XR Pet Cordless Vacuum. The majority of them are cordless, so you won’t need to worry about navigating between outlets to unplug or re-plug the machine.
Grab a grabber tool to aid you
If you find bending down to pick up something or reach inside the washer or dryer quite challenging, then a grabber tool, like the RMS Featherweight The Original Reacher, might be the right solution for you. All these tools can help you extend your reach.
All you have to do is squeeze the trigger with your hands to open or even close the claw at the base of the long arm. Of course, there are more advanced models that will also offer a rotating head to help you work at the most comfortable angle for each of your tasks.
Spread tasks out over plenty of days or weeks
Cleaning doesn’t have to be done in one day, and cutting it up into separate weeks can make the chore more manageable. Instead of just cleaning the entire house in one go, you might want to consider spreading the tasks over several weeks.
This way, you efficiently limit your fatigue and stress. You can pick a room a week to clean and then clean the house over a month. If you are ever tired of it, just stop cleaning and push your schedule back a week.
Try a few tricks that could lessen your workload
Learning a few tricks that will lessen your workload shouldn’t count as cheating. In fact, if anything, it is working smarter. It can help keep the cleaning tasks way more manageable. For instance, instead of scrubbing the stuck-on gunk on the inside of your microwave, we advise you to cut up a lemon and carefully place it in a microwave-safe bowl.
Then, heat the bowl in the microwave for a couple of minutes, and let it sit for a couple of minutes to rest a little bit. After you remove it, wipe down the inside of the appliance. The hot and steamy lemon juice is supposed to have loosened the gunk, making it easier to wipe clean.
Another cleaning trick is simply hanging your wrinkled laundry in the bathroom as you shower. The steam will release the wrinkles, which will save you plenty of time and effort in pulling out the iron and the ironing board.
Invest in cleaning tools to help you reach up high or low
When you suffer from low mobility, it can be particularly challenging to clean objects and surfaces that are up high or down close to the floor level, such as ceiling fans, crown molding, or even baseboards. What would be extremely efficient is getting a long duster and a Baseboard Buddy.
Those tools will let you clean your baseboards and molding without having to get on your hands and knees, as well as your ceiling fan without having to get on a ladder. And like with any other stand-up weeder, it can help you maintain the garden of your dreams. These tools will help accomplish close-to-impossible home cleaning tasks.
Clean more than the dishes in the dishwasher
The dishwasher can be an incredible asset if you suffer from limited mobility. However, did you know that it can also help you clean more than just the dishes? You can get the most out of these appliances by using them to igienize other items around the house.
This will further simplify your job. You can always confirm by simply checking the manufacturer’s recommendations. As a general rule, some of the items you can also clean in a dishwasher are vases, plastic combs, children’s toys (we mean the plastic and rubber ones that are not electric), shower heads, and oven racks.
Assess the furniture layout and any potential trip hazards
Enhancing home safety for seniors and other individuals who suffer from limited mobility has two benefits, and one of them is making cleaning much easier. For instance, area rugs, stair runners, and exposed cords can make it way more difficult (also dangerous) to navigate through a home.
Removing all these trip hazards might help you or your family members with limited mobility move throughout the home. On top of that, it can make cleaning the home safer.
Also, changing the furniture layout might help make it easier to move throughout the home. You can ask for help to place the furniture in a different way, having in mind to create a more open floor plan, and allowing you to move through the space with mobility aids, like a wheelchair, walker, or crutches.
Look for products that could make it easier to navigate your home
Beyond making sure you remove trip hazards and be as purposeful as you can with where you place the furniture, you can also invest in a few new products to help you navigate your home. For instance, let’s take a rolling stool; it can allow you to sit closer to the ground without having to kneel or bend.
It can also help make it more comfortable, or simply possible, to finalize some tasks, such as getting rid of spills on the floor. You might also want to consider installing a few grab bars or sturdier railings on your staircase. If you age in place, making this type of adjustments can help ensure that your home continues to meet your needs.
Use technology to your advantage
Technology has come quite a long way over the past few years. Some of the biggest advancements are very evident in terms of cleaning tools and products that are on the market. The wide majority of them can truly reduce the workload needed to take care of different areas of your home.
One of the most obvious examples is the robot vacuum, which can be a huge help in keeping your floors clean. Some models, such as the Roborock Q5 Pro+, will mop the hard floors in your home. Choosing a self-emptying robot vacuum will further reduce the role, especially since these bases can hold many weeks of dust and dirt before they require to be emptied.
If you found this article useful, we also recommend checking: 14 Low-Cost and Quick Home Projects You Can Finish in a Day
