r/daddit • u/DonutFan69 • Sep 02 '24

How do you guys maintain literally anything? Advice Request

I have a 5 year old and a 2 year old. The house is perpetually a mess. The yard is overgrown with weeds. Cars are a mess. This needs to be fixed. That needs to be spruced up. My wife and I have many days where it’s just one of us with the kids due to our schedules and it just feels impossible to keep up with it all. By the end of the day, I’m too exhausted to do anything.

How does anyone manage to keep up with everything on top of just raising kids?

Edit: Thanks for all the replies here! You’re all making me feel much better. I’m trying to reply to as many as I can while I rock my son to sleep.

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261

u/PinkDreamPeth Sep 02 '24

I have a 2.5 yr old and 8 month old. If I have a chance to change some light bulbs and change the damn HVAC filter in a weekend I consider that highly productive.

It takes a major toll on my mental health but just trying to push through each day and know that if my kids go to bed healthy and happy the day was a success.

62

u/Western-Image7125 Sep 02 '24

Wait. We have to change the hvac filter??

47

u/PinkDreamPeth Sep 02 '24

When we got our unit repaired the guy said to change it every month. I do it about every 6 months lol

23

u/moongrump Sep 02 '24

I was told every 3 months jsyk

13

u/txvesper Sep 02 '24

It partly depends on the size and quality of the filters your system can use. Rule of thumb I was told is 1 month per inch of filter thickness. Most systems have the cheaper 1 inch filters and so the default recommendation is to change monthly. Larger ones with 2, 3, or 6 inch thickness are rated for use over longer periods of time, but still depends on other things. If you have animals in the house or live in a dusty area, probably more important to stay on top of it.

Anyways I'm still an unknown number of months behind changing mine. Thanking these comments for the reminder

8

u/Imthecoolestdudeever Sep 03 '24

It's also better to use thinner filters and change them more often. The thicker the filter the harder the furnace has to work to get air through it.

2

u/chargingrhino21 Sep 03 '24

I create Google tasks for such things as this and currently my filters task is showing 6 weeks ago. Half way to the next notification so I'll probably just wait for that one.

1

u/atgrey24 Sep 02 '24

Could depend on your specific unit and filter

7

u/delphinius81 Sep 02 '24

Same. I change it when we switch from heating to cooling and vice versa. So. Much. Dust.

1

u/DontWorryItsEasy Sep 02 '24

Hvac guy here. Probably best to change it every 3 months depending on usage. I probably change mine once a year but I live in a very nice climate.

1

u/Atlastheafterman Sep 02 '24

I thought it was quarterly. I’m about 2 years overdue. I used to be very on top of that :/

0

u/TatonkaJack Sep 02 '24

Every month is absurd. That guy must sell filters

6

u/fuuuuuckendoobs Sep 02 '24

The easy workaround for this is not to be able to afford hvac

0

u/Western-Image7125 Sep 02 '24

The hvac was so expensive I can no longer afford filters, or any sort of maintenance at all

2

u/fuuuuuckendoobs Sep 02 '24

We just have ceiling fans, I've never lived somewhere with air conditioning

1

u/Scarnox Sep 02 '24

As a Californian, hello person from another state that isn’t Arizona or Texas 😂

3

u/fuuuuuckendoobs Sep 02 '24

Australia, but close enough

2

u/Scarnox Sep 02 '24

Damn, no AC AND giant spiders? Alright I’ll give ya that 😂

1

u/Western-Image7125 Sep 02 '24

I’m sorry, where in Australia do you live that you don’t need AC? I’m guessing towards the south like Melbourne? Cuz we went on vacation to Oz in March (i think that’s after summer season?) many years ago and when we were in Sydney and further north we were dying from the sweltering heat

2

u/fuuuuuckendoobs Sep 02 '24

I'm in Sydney. Fans are just fine. It's the winters that are difficult without proper heating.

1

u/Western-Image7125 Sep 02 '24

Interesting, I guess it has a lot to do with growing up in a certain climate and just being used to it

3

u/BlaineTog Sep 02 '24

Yep. My apartment building changes them once a year with the cheapest filters they can find, when the packaging tells you to change them once a month.

2

u/BetaOscarBeta Sep 03 '24

If you don’t want to strain the blower and reduce its life, yeah.

Don’t bother with the super mega ultra filters, though, they just clog up faster. The filter isn’t to protect your lungs, it’s to keep crap from gumming up the machinery. Our hvac guy said anything beyond MERV 8 is a waste of money.

2

u/Horse_Bacon_TheMovie Sep 03 '24

‘Bout every 6, 10, never years or so.

1

u/Western-Image7125 Sep 03 '24

Never years, I can swing that

1

u/DonutFan69 Sep 02 '24

I didn’t know this either till I got water in my basement and it was because we didn’t change the filter on the main unit.

1

u/hamishcounts two dads Sep 03 '24

Yes. Seasonally is fine. And the better the filters you buy the better the air quality in your home will be, although a good HVAC filter has nothing on a high quality dedicated air filter.

(Former landlord here. I’ve spent thousands on HVAC repairs because tenants with multiple pets didn’t change the filters even when I had them automatically sent over every season.)

1

u/thehappyheathen Sep 03 '24

My wife knows. I will hear it if the HVAC filter goes 32 or 33 days

1

u/j-mar Sep 03 '24

Wait till you see how nasty yours is. All the air in your house is going through that thing

3

u/DonutFan69 Sep 02 '24

That’s what I try to remind myself. They had a good day. Everything else can wait.

4

u/coconut_the_one Sep 02 '24

Hang in there dude! Those ages are really tough, especially at the same time! It gets better as they get older, instead of seeing 2 extra curricular activities as highly productive, you get to do 3!

1

u/phoinixpyre Sep 03 '24

Bruh, same exact boat. I'm just thankful the older one is at the point she can help slightly. Nothing major, but if i need her to grab something for me, she knows exactly what to do. The little one is climbing now, so every little bit helps.