How to Keep House While Drowning: A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing
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(as of Nov 01, 2025 20:27:06 UTC – Details)
An NPR Best Book of the Year | USA TODAY Bestseller
This revolutionary approach to cleaning and organizing helps free you from feeling ashamed or overwhelmed by a messy home.
If you’re struggling to stay on top of your to-do list, you probably have a good reason: anxiety, fatigue, depression, ADHD, or lack of support. For therapist KC Davis, the birth of her second child triggered a stress-mess cycle. The more behind she felt, the less motivated she was to start. She didn’t fold a single piece of laundry for seven months. One life-changing realization restored her sanity—and the functionality of her home: You don’t work for your home; your home works for you.
In other words, messiness is not a moral failing. A new sense of calm washed over her as she let go of the shame-based messaging that interpreted a pile of dirty laundry as “I can never keep up” and a chaotic kitchen as “I’m a bad mother.” Instead, she looked at unwashed clothes and thought, “I am alive,” and at stacks of dishes and thought, “I cooked my family dinner three nights in a row.”
Building on this foundation of self-compassion, KC devised the powerful practical approach that has exploded in popularity through her TikTok account, @domesticblisters. The secret is to simplify your to-do list and to find creative workarounds that accommodate your limited time and energy. In this book, you’ll learn exactly how to customize your cleaning strategy and rebuild your relationship with your home, including:
-How to see chores as kindnesses to your future self, not as a reflection of your worth
-How to start by setting priorities
-How to stagger tasks so you won’t procrastinate
-How to clean in quick bursts within your existing daily routine
-How to use creative shortcuts to transform a room from messy to functional
With KC’s help, your home will feel like a sanctuary again. It will become a place to rest, even when things aren’t finished. You will move with ease, and peace and calm will edge out guilt, self-criticism, and endless checklists. They have no place here.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
Customers say
Customers find the book helpful and practical, with one noting it provides countless solutions to household challenges. Moreover, they appreciate how it helps shift their mindset and approach to self and home care, while being straightforward and easy to understand with actionable items to follow. Additionally, the book receives positive feedback for its concise format with short chapters, and customers report it brings stress levels down and reassures them.
10 reviews for How to Keep House While Drowning: A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing
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Double D –
Functionality over cleanliness
As someone who works part-time and writes in most other times, I struggle to have a clean house. I know Iâm not alone. How to Keep House While Drowning was written by a mother who was suffering from COVID lockdown and postpartum depression after the birth of her second child, whose husband worked full-time, seven days a week. She, too, struggled, until she found a new way of looking at the process. Her secret? (Well, one of manyâ¦) The cleanliness or functionality of your house is not a moral issue. There is no reason to feel guilty or ashamed if you canât get all of it done and still have time to rest.Instead of cleanliness, she focuses on functionality, on making your living space work for you, not the other way âround. Most of her little suggestions and tips/tricks were mind-blowing for me simply because Iâd not thought of them that way. Of course, a simple shift of perspective is only the beginning; it takes practical action, too, for a shift toward real-life functionality in the home. Things like using baskets to organize, putting laundry and waste baskets in every room, and cleaning a room in categories â prioritizing for health and safety first. For example, pick up trash first, dirty dishes second, since those can carry bacteria, germs, etc. Then pick up trip hazards and carry on from there. So many great ideas can be found in this little book!But this book applies to more than just cleaning house. Itâs about doing the best you can do in a particular circumstance, a rough day, or even a specific moment. Itâs about giving yourself permission to not feel guilty if your efforts donât measure up to absolute perfection in every little detail, in every area of your own personal world. Since finishing How to Keep House, Iâve found myself applying KCâs attitudes and permissions in other areas of my life tooâlike my scheduleâand itâs really helped.In addition, Author KC Davis worked to make the book accessible for readers with reading challenges. Fonts and formatting style were selected specifically because they help to facilitate reading for those with ADHD, dyslexia, and more. Chapters are short, simple, easy to follow, and to-the-point. (Do note that the ebook, which is the format I purchased, doesnât hold to that font style, but that is almost impossible to do for an e-reader device.)How to Keep House While Drowning is billed as a book for anyone feeling overwhelmed in their life. I know itâs definitely a worthwhile resource to have on hand. Even after reading it once, you may want to skim back through it to refresh your memory on different ideas and suggestions. Enjoyable, kind, useful, and ingenious. Definitely recommended.
Jennie Hamilton Overcast –
Life Altering; A Must Have for Anyone Who is Overwhelmed
Fantastic book with life altering views on whatâs acceptable and doable for people who have too much on their plates. Made me feel seen and deeply understood in a way no one has before. Iâve read and reread and shared with family and friends and even my therapist and the city codes guy where I live (codes sees a lot of overwhelmed people).Stop being ashamed snd start getting some control back. The suggestions are great and youâll feel human again. I was in tears in parts of the book.
Jen Baker –
Life Changing!
Life changing. Literally. Perspective shifting and practical application in the same book. Easy to read. Love this.
mary Leach –
Great info.
Mind shift ideas in the book are fantastic. I need to figure out more how to implement them. The 5 step cleaning process is great method. I had difficulty wading through chapter 1, but once the chapters got easier to read, it’s a good book. Good techniques for those with difficulty concentrating.
hulachick –
Functional Without Shame is Key
I love love love this book! It’s short (thin), easy to read, and the author seems to be talking to me, rather than at me or about the person I could be if I only had time and no personal barriers (as seems to be the problem with so many other self-help books and online programs). Ms. Davis acknowledges that we all have different parts of our lives that can be barriers. ADHD, depression, fatigue, anxiety and more. If you are a single parent with one or more children, or you work multiple jobs to make ends meet, or you have the seemingly perfect marriage, or you are able to or not able to leave your job at work, or you are in survival mode daily, or you just look at your space and feel overwhelmed and don’t know where to start, or your head is filled with other thoughts from other people about how your home and space “should be”, this book can work for you. Ms. Davis reminds the reader to focus on thinking about making spaces functional. They don’t have to be sterile or even organized to the standards of what we often think they should be. Our spaces need to be functional for the people who live in them. For example, if it’s easier to leave clothes on the back of a chair than to put them folded neatly in a drawer and that’s functional to you, then do this. She also repeatedly reminds her reader about care tasks being “morally neutral”. This helps us remove the shame we too often feel. One final note to consider when deciding if this book might be for you, is that unlike with books and programs that exist online and in print, “how to keep house while drowning” is NOT a program. It’s, as Ms. Davis says, “a philosophy”. It’s a new way of thinking and changing one’s mindset. I originally listened to the audiobook and borrowed the book from the library. I decided I needed to buy my own copy. This is the book that makes sense to me. (Ms. Davis has a great TED talk video online about laundry that provides an idea of what you can learn on the book.
Amazomer –
A highly recommended book for individuals dealing with ADHD and executive dysfunction. The techniques presented are refreshingly unique and have a fresh perspective. The wording throughout the book is meticulously chosen, making the methods feel seamlessly integrated rather than imposed. Itâs genuinely a one-of-a-kind book. If you suspect you may have undiagnosed ADHD or find yourself struggling with seemingly overwhelming homemaking tasks, I encourage you to dive into this read. Iâm confident it will provide you with eye-opening insights just as it did for me.
Reddingsvestje –
I’m probably too non-American and Gen X (old) for this “book”. I hoped for a book full of tips for neurodiverse or depressed people to get a grip on their household. Instead I got a bundle of blogs full of excuses just to give up. Also, writted from a very privileged point of view (rich white stay at home mom?). Some people actually do have to work and can’t throw all their plates out because they don’t feel like doing the dishes. Think of the planet, woman!
Mary T. Love –
First off, I almost never write reviews. I don’t even answer people’s texts, when am I gonna be sitting around writing reviews? But I am doing it for this book in the hope that someone in a situation like mine sees it and is convinced to give this book a try. It’s that important.About me: chronic depression, anxiety, single parent. Recently diagnosed with ADHD and trying to sort that out, while still never having found an arrangement of therapies that gets me to mostly functional. If anything, as I get older I’m getting less able to cope with simple daily routines and every new thing lands like a sack of bricks that is too overwhelming to contemplate. I have read dozens of books, blogs, tried apps, made lists, anything to help me handle the basics in a way approximating something like a healthy neurotypical.This book blew me away. It’s short – almost a pamphlet. You won’t get bogged down in the first chapter and leave it somewhere “meaning to get back to it.” It’s simple. You don’t have to remember multiple acronyms or have lists and sublists and timers. It’s exceptionally compassionate and inclusive – I loved the acknowledgement that “drowning” could be: life changes, overwork, new babies, mental illness, physical restrictions, neurodivergence, anything that affects your resources and functionality. There is a repetition of non-judgment that is soothing if you’ve spent a lifetime beating yourself up.But most importantly: it was advice I’ve never seen before. How rare is that? Everyone has heard “start with one area” or “only touch something once” or any of the other tips that seem to help a lot of folks. This gave me a strategy I had not already thought of that helped me FOCUS and take care of progressive layers that would make me feel more comfortable and safe in my space at each step.I am at risk of writing something longer than the book itself, so I’ll stop.TL;DR : If you’ve ever stared at the chaos and mess around you and just curled up and faced the wall for a cry, buy this book.
Jae –
This book helped me to navigate life as a mom who does it all. Worth the readð
Pam –
I haven’t read the book yet, but the font is way too small. Even with my glasses on I find it difficult to read. With that said, I e started reading this book and it really easy to follow, especially when you have an attention disorder. Looks really interesting.