Life Hacks Part 1: Kitchen Chores

Chores are hard.

They take up a lot of time and energy, and they're never really done. For autistic people especially, there's a lot of obnoxious sounds, smells, and textures that can make many chores very mentally taxing, and I include myself in that statement. If I didn't find ways around these sensory nightmares, my house would be a mess. Thankfully, the internet is a treasure trove of helpful tips for making these tasks easier, so I thought I'd share a few of my own. I'll be organizing these tips by whether they're a kitchen chore, a living room chore, etc. Hopefully these tips can help others like they have helped me, whether you're on the autism spectrum or just hoping to cut down on the effort involved in house chores.

1. Dishes

When I moved out, I moved into a place without a dishwasher, and I became extremely aware of how many dishes I use on a regular basis. I discovered that using disposable plates, cups, and utensils drastically decreased the number of dishes I had to wash, which meant that I had more energy to spend on things like school. For the dishes I still had to do, I still had to endure the sensory difficulties involved with cleaning soggy food particles off of wet, smelly dishes. To help with this, I got a pair of dishwashing gloves (for only about $2), and these help a ton with keeping my hands safe from all the slimy, sticky, wet things involved in doing dishes, and they work for mopping too! Also, lighting a candle has been helpful a few times while washing particularly smelly dishes. Doing dishes can also be relatively loud, with water splashing and pots and pans banging against the sink, so I usually wear headphones while doing dishes, choosing to either listen to my textbooks or some of my favorite playlists while I work. If I listen to textbooks, I get to feel twice as productive for the time I spend doing dishes, rather than feeling like it's just a waste of energy because there will always be more dishes. These strategies help a lot, and even though I still don't like doing dishes, I can appreciate the feeling of accomplishment that comes from an empty sink.

2. Cooking

I've already mentioned my love for disposable plates and utensils, but for others who dislike doing dishes, I recommend using dishes that are easy to wash when cooking. For me, I have a pretty small sink, so I tend to avoid using larger pots and pans when I can help it. Also, if I can reuse one pot multiple times within the same meal, I have fewer dishes to do overall, or at least it feels like it. One of my favorite meals right now is "fancy ramen," or ramen with soft-boiled eggs, green onions, seaweed, and sometimes rotisserie chicken, if I have it on-hand. I boil the eggs, rinse the pot, and then use it again to make my ramen. The entire meal takes maybe 15-20 minutes, counting the time for my pot to heat up, and it's a great way to "cook" without draining myself mentally. Plus, it's pretty tasty.

Compared to dishwashing, I actually enjoy cooking a lot, and it's fun to make something that other people can enjoy. For me, it's a nice form of low-stakes decision-making, because I can be very indecisive, so it's nice that cooking provides a relatively safe environment to make those decisions. I can add spices to something and it doesn't change the flavor too much, and if I don't like an ingredient, I can leave it out. For me, the hardest parts about cooking are deciding what to cook, making sure I have all the ingredients, and not making too much of it. I have a few tips for each of these.

When I knew that I was going to move out, I started making a list of all the meals at home that I liked, and things that I could make for myself relatively easily. Then I organized these based on the main protein used in each meal. Now when I am trying to plan meals for the week, I can look at this list for ideas, pick a few options for the "protein of the week," and then I plan my meals along these lines. For example, this week, the protein is Rotisserie chicken. When I got it at the beginning of the week, I looked at my list and decided to get ingredients for chicken enchiladas, taquitos, nachos, and fancy ramen. I already had a lot of these ingredients at home, so it was pretty easy to shop for these things. Rotisserie chicken only lasts for so long though, so I plan to make the enchiladas and taquitos on the same day and then freeze the taquitos for later in the week. I'm half-Hispanic, so a lot of my meals tend to be along these lines, but sometimes I'll do chicken salad or chicken alfredo instead. I also have multiple recipes that work for bacon, ground turkey, and other recipes. 

I personally don't love the process of cooking meat, so I've found ways around this that make the process a lot easier. For example, pre-cooked bacon is super easy to find at the supermarket, and usually costs about the same as uncooked bacon. I just microwave it and it's ready to eat! The same goes for Rotisserie chicken. When buying food on a budget, I have to think about how likely I am to eat it. If I don't think I'll eat it, then I shouldn't buy it, even if it's a "good idea" because of the health benefits I would get if I did decide to eat it.

Sometimes, there are foods that I think I will eat, but end up going to waste, and I have a bit of a "three strikes rule" for these. If it's relatively cheap, I'll buy it again when the first packet goes bad (for example, if I planned to make broccoli cheddar soup, but took too long and had to buy more broccoli). I'll do this once the first time it happens, and the next time I make broccoli cheddar soup, if I forget again, I'll do it again, but if I want to make broccoli cheddar soup a third time, I know I'll need to change something so that I don't waste a ton of broccoli every time I think about making that soup. Currently, I have used this method to decide not to buy six-packs of bagels because I can't get through the entire bag in time, so instead I'll buy 2-3 individual bagels instead.

In my list, I also made a list of low effort foods, for when cooking is hard. Sometimes sensory stuff makes eating harder than other times, so a lot of these low effort foods are good for that too. When I don't feel like eating food, having this list can be especially helpful, since I've found that a lot of the time, my lack of appetite is mainly a lack of appetite for my currently available food options. Running to the grocery store to get one extra thing can help sometimes, and I live close enough that I can usually make it happen. 

I've also been recently starting some fun traditions related to food that make this a lot easier. Getting up Saturday mornings is always a struggle, since it's my one real day to sleep in, and I usually have trouble deciding what to eat for breakfast when I don't get up until 11 am or later. Recently, I've been making Eggs Benedict on Saturday mornings. I love hollandaise sauce, but going to a restaurant is expensive, so I've been perfecting my own recipe over the last three weeks. I figure that if I do this as a tradition, I'll get pretty good at it over time. Of course, using toast instead of an English muffin, and precooked bacon instead of cooking it myself, makes this meal a lot more doable, and I can reassure you that it still tastes amazing.

It also helps to get foods that can be used in multiple meals, especially bread products. Are both hamburger buns and hot dog buns necessary if you're having both in a week? The answer for me is no. That's part of why I use my "protein of the week" meal plans, because proteins tend to be more expensive and are often more labor-intensive to cook. Of course, there are exceptions, but this tends to be a good strategy for me. Even if I don't really need to go to the grocery store one week, it still helps to come up with a menu of stuff that I have at home to eat that week, otherwise I'm more likely to look at my pantry, decide there's nothing to eat, and run to Taco Bell instead. I put this list on a chalkboard in my kitchen so that I have a visual reminder of what I have available to eat, and usually I'll find something I like. Again, with meal-prepping, I decided that the best strategy for me is to buy foods that I'll actually eat. Sure, I could buy stuff for salads all week, but eventually I'd get sick of them and either spend too much on fast food, or avoid eating entirely. For many autistic people, the healthiest food is the food you will actually eat. Of course, including all the major food groups is helpful too (again why I do my protein of the week), but I try to intersperse my healthy meals with fun meals. This is usually good for my mental health as well because it gives me something to look forward to during the week. The combination of all these strategies makes cooking fairly enjoyable for me, so hopefully they will help others as well.

3. Garbage

In my house, there are two types of garbage: garbage that is in the garbage can and garbage that is not. This can be things like the five plastic cups in my living room, the old food in the kitchen sink, and the cat litter in the litter box. The garbage in the garbage can is usually pretty manageable, although my cat likes to sneak outside whenever I try to take it out, but it's the garbage outside of the can that piles up on me the most. Generally, I use deadline-based strategies for dealing with the rest. What do I mean by this? At my house, trash day is every Wednesday, so that means that on either Monday or Tuesday nights, I try my best to take out my trash bag, put in a new one, clean out my fridge, empty my bathroom trashcan if it needs it, throw away my empty cup horde, and take out the cat litter. I don't always manage to do all these things every week, but I'm getting there. I also have a very nice neighbor that will sometimes move my trashcan to the street if it's getting late and I haven't done it yet, which helps. I usually do my meal-prepping stuff on Sunday or Monday, so this schedule is super helpful for minimizing unwanted smells in my kitchen, since garbage day is pretty soon after meal-prepping day. \

One last thing that has helped me deal with trash in my house is my cat. My cat has zero fear, and he's way too curious for his own good. If I leave a cup unattended, especially if it has a straw, that cup will be knocked to the floor by the time I get back, guaranteed. Knowing this about my cat, and knowing that cups are Not Safe if left overnight means that I've developed a habit of actually gathering my living room cups before I go to bed most nights, which means that I have fewer cups to clean up each day when I do this. Even if you don't have a cat, finding a similar routine could be helpful, mine's just a bit more forced unless I want to mop my floors multiple times a week.

Conclusion:

Again, chores are hard, but we don't need to make them harder by holding ourselves to a standard of perfection. This is one big area where self-accommodation can make a huge difference in energy levels and overall happiness. If I made myself do dishes every single day, every time I ate, I wouldn't have energy to do anything else afterwards. Instead, doing dishes a few times during the week while wearing headphones dishwashing gloves is much more effective for me. In the same way, modifying my environment to suit my needs helps me get a lot more done than I would otherwise. Thanks for listening, and I'll probably do another version of this with non-kitchen chores. I hope other people enjoy these chore life hacks, and if you have any other ones, feel free to share below!