What's wrong with my lovely daughter?

Nothing at all to add to the brilliant advice above gilly.

DD3 has never been the tidiest person but when her marriage to the idiot was falling apart her house was too. As POGS said, lots of us have been there and come out the other side with our daughters! It does sound like depression.

You have enough on your plate at the moment so take care of yourself as well as everyone else

gilly I wonder if it's possible for you to go round to your daughter's place once a week on a regular basis to clean house together with her? It would give her (and you) opportunities to talk and also give her some responsibility for sorting the problem - and once the house is tidy and she's regained some control of that she may feel better about herself. I know it's always a juggling act to manage home, work AND be there for our adult children, but as I've said elsewhere sometimes it's better to act in the short term than deal with longer term problems.

I agree with grannyactivist in that it is easier to talk whilst doing something. Years ago...my son and I would sometimes go for an evening walk and put the world to rights. Didn't matter what the weather was like. When he said - fancy a walk mam I knew that sometime during our walk he would get to the point.

It would serve the purpose of sorting your daughter's house and also possibly be a gentle introduction to bonding time. You would be 'helping' her rather than doing it for her.

I think Gillybob from reading her other posts has an awful lot on her plate and adding in cleaning sessions ...hmm.what about her selling the house and coming back to live with you? Or even renting out the house? It could be that it's a reminder of how things went wrong. Sometimes a house can feel it hates you,always needing cleaning or tidying or repairing.

Thank you all again for such helpful advice. My DD works all kinds of shifts from 6am until 10pm (sometimes split too) so it's difficult to have a set day in which to do anything grannyactivist but I have decided though that I am going to make a point of helping her at least once a week (what am I starting?????) at least until we can get on top of things. Yes Stansgran I do have quite a bit going on with mum, dad,grandma, the grandchildren and work too but I don't think there is any way she could come home on a permanent basis. I only have a two bed roomed house and I have the three grandchildren staying 2 nights a week. Anyway I think this would mean a step back for her (she is almost 30 after all). She does stay "over" here at least once a week anyway and she knows she is welcome anytime (when the room is free obviously) I think that there is a lot more to this than just neglecting the house. I think she is probably fed up with her rubbish job and having few friends and almost a zero social life doesn't help either.

Thanks again everyone. Where would we be without Gransnet?

I've just been reading through your thread again, gilly. It does seem as if your DD feels as if she's needing her mum just now, doesn't it? You are a really close family and no doubt there's a lot of warmth, kindness and support going on all the time within it. She's perhaps needing to be near you so that she can feel more secure than she has been feeling of late. The house and her ability to keep it clean and tidy has got on top of her (I have a DD like this, although she's estranged herself from me ). All the more reason not to want to be in it very often, and for her to want to be with you where she doesn't feel judged. Mums are 'fixers'. As some of the others were saying, given time and while helping her sort her house out, you can maybe get to the bottom of how she's feeling. x