Jul022009
Clean House’s Messiest Home in the Country is also the meanest
Filed under Pop Culture by teresa santoski at 5:11 pm
Holy cow. Did anyone catch the final installment of Clean House’s search for the messiest home in the country last night? No worries if you didn’t - it’s on again tonight at 9.
I started watching 45 minutes into the two-hour episode, and I’m really hoping I missed something that explained why this mother and her college-aged daughter treated the Clean House crew so badly. I don’t want to ruin it for anyone who hasn’t seen it yet, so keep reading at your own risk.
The folks over at Clean House aim to not only, you know, clean house, but to give people the tools they need to keep the house from reverting to its previous disastrous state, which often means bringing some very emotional issues to the surface. They’ve dealt with everything from hoarding and compulsive shopping to families who are so grief-stricken over the loss of a loved one that they’ve lost the will to clean. They provide a wonderful opportunity to hurting or overwhelmed families who really deserve it.
At the end of most episodes, you’re able to share in the crew’s feeling of a job well done. Life is never as neat as TV (even reality TV) makes it out to be, so you know the family still has a ways to go, but you still feel like at least a little bit of the emotional baggage has gone out with the clutter.
None of that happened in this episode. I think Niecy and her crew were as shocked as I was by how everything played out. The mother and her daughter weren’t really looking to change their situation; they just wanted someone else to come in and deal with the mess they had made.
They refused to admit to having any kind of compulsive shopping issues, even though the crew had to rent out an empty 7,000 square-foot department store to accommodate everything that had been pulled for the yard sale.
They refused to admit they had too much stuff, even though there was a huge crack in the ceiling because of the overloaded attic and the items they set aside to save wouldn’t all fit back into their house.
No lasting change can be made unless the people involved want to change. I’d give it a year at most before the house is in even worse shape than before.
And the behavior of these two “ladies” (I’m using the term quite loosely) was positively cringe-inducing. The mother would cuss her daughter out a blue streak for getting rid of something she thought should be kept and, moments later, look up towards the ceiling and thank Jesus for this, that, or another thing.
She may want to brush up on James chapter 3. Verses 9 through 11 say:
“With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring?”
Her daughter wasn’t much better. They were both very unpleasant to listen to. I watched the show with almost my entire family and all of us (even my little siblings) began flinching involuntarily after a while.
During a later part of the show, the daughter stormed away from the keep pile, refusing to respond to Niecy’s pleas that they try and work things out. Niecy followed her out into the parking lot, where the daughter got into (I’m assuming) her boyfriend’s car, said, “I’ve had about enough of this bull[excrement],” and sped off after slamming the door in Niecy’s face.
The daughter never apologized, saying she hadn’t done anything wrong.
The clincher came when the mother took off in the middle of the big reveal, saying that her grandmother’s old purses had gone missing, and blamed the crew for either taking them or selling them at the yard sale.
Both the mother and the daughter tore through the pile of stuff that wouldn’t fit back into the house (stored under a small tent in the middle of the street), throwing things and swearing as they searched for the purses. The daughter actually picked up a picture and threw it on the ground so that the glass in the frame shattered, saying, “If I had wanted *that* saved, I wouldn’t have just done that, now would I?”
The mother refused to come back until the purses had been located, leaving the daughter to finish the show by herself.
The reveal (even before the mother left) felt empty and insincere. They both thanked the crew and said how much they loved it, but you could tell it was more something they expected to be done for them rather than a gift they truly appreciated.
The crew’s heart didn’t seem to be in it, either. After investing so much time, energy, and money in two selfish, ungrateful individuals, it’s no wonder. I imagine it’s very discouraging to go to such great lengths for people who don’t appreciate it and will turn on you at a moment’s notice.
It’s O.K., Niecy and co. I still love you guys, and I think you did a fabulous job under the circumstances. Maybe next year’s search for the messiest home in the country will lead you to a happier, more deserving family.
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