Organising for the Neurodivergent Family with KonMari Consultant, Caroline Thor

Ever wondered why decluttering feels so mentally freeing? In this illuminating conversation with professional organiser Caroline Thor, we discover how creating order in our physical spaces can transform our mental wellbeing and even our parenting style.

Caroline's journey began with a life-changing realisation when her daughter innocently asked, "Why are you a nicer mummy now?" after their home became more organised. This moment sparked not just a personal transformation but a career shift that now allows Caroline to help other families, particularly those navigating neurodiversity, find the same peace she discovered.

As a KonMari consultant and mother to three children (two with neurodivergent conditions), Caroline shares practical wisdom about creating systems that truly work for real families. She dispels the myth that organisation requires Instagram perfection or massive time commitments. Instead, she advocates for 15-minute decluttering sessions that make organisation accessible even to the busiest parents. Her refreshingly practical approach includes repurposing everyday items like Ferrero Rocher boxes rather than purchasing expensive storage solutions, making organisation both economical and sustainable.

What resonated most deeply was Caroline's insight that maintaining organisation is more about mindset than elaborate systems. Her simple mantra "put the damn thing away", prevents the accumulation of daily clutter that overwhelms so many families. For those struggling with the additional organisational challenges that come with ADHD and autism, these straightforward strategies offer a pathway to calmer, more functional homes.

Whether you're drowning in paperwork, struggling to maintain order or simply wanting to feel more peaceful in your space, Caroline's approach offers hope without overwhelming you with unrealistic expectations. Connect with her on Instagram @caro.thor or through her podcast "Living Clutter Free Forever" to continue your organisational journey.

Chapters

• 0:18 Welcome to Beyond Organised
• 0:57 Meet Caroline Thor
• 2:44 From Stressed Mum to KonMari Consultant
• 5:58 Creating a Home That Supports Your Life
• 11:11 Balancing Family and Career
• 15:57 Inside a Professional Organizer's Client Session
• 19:57 The 15-Minute Decluttering Solution
• 24:14 Maintaining the Order Long-Term
• 26:44 Wrap-Up and Where to Find Caroline

Transcript

Mel: 0:18

Welcome to Beyond Organised, the podcast that helps you simplify your life and amplify your purpose. I'm Mel Schenker, life coach, speaker, founder of She's Organised and, more importantly, a wife and mum of four little kids. If you've ever felt overwhelmed, like you're constantly juggling everything but never quite catching up, this is the place for you. Here we go beyond just the tidying up and creating systems. We're talking about real life strategies that bring order to your life, but also we talk about the things beyond the organizing, the things that really matter, like the parenting relationships and so much more. So grab your coffee and let's dive in. Welcome back to Beyond Organised.

Mel: 1:02

I have the lovely Caroline Thor with us today. I'll give you a quick rundown of who Caroline is and then you can all give a warm welcome. So Caroline is a professional organizer, KonMari consultant, very exciting wife and mother of three, including one child with autism, PDA and ADHD and another with ADHD. Drawing from her personal experience and professional expertise, caroline specializes in helping mums of neurodiverse kids create organization systems, habits and routines that truly work for their families. She believes a tidy, functional home can transform mental health and well-being, especially for families navigating ADHD and autism. As a KonMari consultant, she follows Marie Kondo's principles, focusing on sparking joy and creating spaces that support an ideal lifestyle. Caroline also hosts the popular podcast Living Clutter-Free Forever, where she shares practical decluttering advice, organizing tips and strategies. She also runs the growing online membership Clutter-Free Collective, supporting families in getting their homes decluttered and organized. Welcome Caroline, so good to have you on the show.

Caroline: 2:16

Thank you, Mel. Thank you for the invitation. I'm excited to be here.

Mel: 2:25

Oh, you're welcome. I'm so glad we got to connect and I've actually loved following you on the socials, and I did listen to one of your episodes a few weeks ago. So good, yeah, just so excited to have you here.

Caroline: 2:34

Thank you, excited to be here.

Mel: 2:37

Well getting into it. What inspired you to start your professional organizing journey?

Mel: 2:44

and KonMari consultant, that's exciting

Caroline: 2:48

it actually started years and years ago when my kids were little. So they're now 17, 16 and 12 but when they were all tiny, like under five, I was super. I was really disorganized. I just felt like I was chasing my tail all the time and I was a really stressy mom. I wasn't being the mom I wanted to be and one day I cause I live in Germany even though I'm from the UK. I got a copy of British Good Housekeeping through the door that someone had sent me and there was this article about Marie Kondo and her new book, the Life Changing Magic, and I was like this sounds amazing.

Caroline: 3:28

And I got onto this platform that we all use way too much, ordered the book. It was there the next day and it literally changed my life. I became totally calm, in control. I had not realized that it was actually our home environment that was causing me to feel stressed and overwhelmed. And it wasn't until about a year in, and we were getting ready to leave the house and I was in the hall with all three kids and we were getting the shoes on and the coats. You know, it can be really fraught, it can be chaotic, and it just happened. Everything was in its right place. I wasn't searching for stuff and suddenly my middle daughter turned to me and she said why are you a nicer mummy now?

Caroline: 4:14

oh, and I was just like oh my goodness, light bulb yeah, light bulb like this has been life-changing so fast forward I was actually teaching music and running my own little business at the time and fast forward to the pandemic and I couldn't teach. I was like stuck at home and I happened to see online that they were training people online to be KonMari consultants. I didn't even know this was a thing I was like I said to my husband I'm going to train and he was like oh, here we go, Another great idea. I'm always having great ideas.

Mel: 4:52

Sounds like my husband. I'm the same.

Caroline: 4:56

Yeah. So I did the online training, which took three days. I then had to work with a client for a ridiculous number of hours and do their whole home with them and take an exam and all the rest of it, and at the end of a year of doing that I sold my other business and went full time into being a KonMari consultant professional organizer. But things haven't quite panned out as I planned them to, because my child with autism went into burnout and it meant that they couldn't leave the house and I couldn't leave the house. And this was just not long after me becoming a consultant and I wanted something that I could do so that I could continue supporting people in their decluttering journeys, and that's how my podcast came about. It was like my way of putting the word out there and supporting people, and it sort of snowballed from there into online course, online membership.

Caroline: 5:56

It has become so much fun. It fits with my family life, which is great, and then on Saturdays and Sundays, when my husband is home and can take over the childcare, that's when I go to people's homes and work with them in their homes still Wow you still do that I do yes and I love that.

Caroline: 6:16

I love that connection with people. I feel really fortunate. I love all aspects of it and I love the fact most that I'm helping other women find this clarity and peace that I found and that, for me, is it's just worth it's gold yeah, it's priceless, isn't it?

Mel: 6:34

it's just priceless. Oh, that is such. That is so. I feel like your story is very similar to mine, though we've gone about it very differently.

Mel: 6:46

But yeah, I was that stress head mum as well, and just the thing that broke me was when I actually screamed at my kids. I said this in an earlier episode and I don't yell, I'm not a yeller at all and this was a number of years ago now, like when my older ones were very little, and I actually screamed because it was right before Mother's Day event, which I was hosting, and I didn't get to have my own Mother's Day I'm doing it for everyone else and I'd been cleaning for days, cooking for days, and then they went and just completely trashed the powder room and I lost it, and I was that stress head mom just because I went too far with the organizing. I went too far the other way and I needed everything to be perfect, and that's when it kind of went. Hang on a second, I can't live like this. It's not fair on my kids and all of that.

Mel: 7:38

And then it was a couple of years after that when I had hosted another event, years after that, when I had hosted another event I think it was my husband's 40th. It was a bigger event and I was okay and my kids were like, oh, mum, you're not like, you're not going wild, you're not cracking it at us. So I I can completely relate to what you were saying when your daughter was saying that, because I just yeah, and the light bulb goes off and you think, oh, wow, no, I really I have come back to a better balance and got a good balance, and getting on top of your home is it's your every, every day, it's every part of your life. It is so critical having things just balanced and in order in your home to actually feeling at peace.

Caroline: 8:27

It is priceless and I love what you said about perfectionism, because that's actually not something I've ever struggled with. It's good. It's horrible and I feel very, very fortunate for that. But what I'm driven by now is helping women realize that you don't need the perfect Instagram ready home your home, and this is where the KonMari method, I think, is great, because you start off by visualizing your ideal lifestyle, so you're creating a home that supports the life you want to live in.

Caroline: 9:03

If that doesn't measure up to what everyone else thinks, bad, luck as long as you feel comfortable in your space, and this is why I suddenly realized I'd got to a place where our home was organized enough for me to feel calm. It was declutter, organized enough for me to feel calm. Yep, it was decluttered enough for me to feel calm and it doesn't need to be any better than that. And it doesn't look like you could come in and take a photo and post it in some magazine.

Caroline: 9:29

Oh, you are the same as me. Yes, you know it gets messy. I have three kids, two dogs, two cats. It's life. You live in the house. Yeah, it's messy. I have three kids, two dogs, two cats. It's life. You live in the house, yeah, and the kids should be able to live and leave. Leave things out that they're in the middle of. Yes, it should be tidied up at some point. But the great thing now is everyone has an idea about or not an idea. Everyone knows where everything goes back to.

Mel: 9:54

Yeah, they're old it doesn't take too long, it doesn't take long.

Caroline: 9:57

We do this 10 minute reset every evening, where everyone helps out and takes back stuff and it's just.

Caroline: 10:03

Oh, it's life changing and I think especially for me, having, um, neurodivergent kids, the amount of paperwork that brings is phenomenal. I think any parent, the amount of paperwork and emails and everything that comes with that is just crazy. But the amount of paperwork and the organization that you need in order to attend meetings and all the rest of it to have that in order so that you've not got this last minute stress of oh my goodness, where's that piece of paper we need to take to this meeting or where was the email where they said that that is just life-changing yeah oh, and I can relate to that my oldest has ADHD as well.

Mel: 10:45

So I I do get it and you know the yeah, there's just all the extras, there's all the extras. And yeah, I've, you know, got my inbox sorted out and I've got everything organised enough to be able to find things quickly when I need it and fill out the forms, and got the calendar on the fridge working out when I'm doing what. I'm just so grateful it's only one out of four, you know. But so you're on a whole other level, like, how do you find you know doing what you're doing with the organizing and helping other people, as well as juggling your own family and household and balancing their needs along with what you're doing?

Caroline: 11:34

I'm very fortunate in that I'm not leaving the house on a weekday to go to work.

Mel: 11:41

Like.

Caroline: 11:41

I can fit in my work around my family, so I get up in the morning. My two oldest kids leave the house by 6.30 in the morning which sounds crazy to most people, but they do and they get themselves off to school, so that's fine. And then my youngest, who's the one with autism. I need to drive them to school, but it's always a case of are they going to go or aren't they?

Caroline: 12:05

I can't plan anything and I can't plan any appointments in the mornings and stuff in case school phone and they need collecting. So I am really flexible. I have my three things that I have to do that day. I have my three goals. I'm the same, oh my gosh. I have my three goals and usually two are for my business and like move the needle things that I'm working on, and one is like a personal personal, yeah, and, and that could be something to do with cleaning like something that I'm working on and one is like a personal goal, and that could be something to do with cleaning, like something that I don't do very often because I'm not very good at cleaning.

Mel: 12:46

Or you just don't like it, like who likes cleaning, nobody likes it. I mean, there's a little satisfaction sometimes with vacuuming and it's like, oh, and then the floor's clean again, you know, but it goes very quickly absolutely yeah, or it might be something um health related, like I'm going to go for a walk today or whatever it happens to be for yourself.

Caroline: 13:06

I can. I can then see in the morning okay, he, they went to school. Great, I now have this, hopefully, window of three, four hours before I need to collect them, which is the longest I ever have, so I can come home and I usually then work on my business stuff and then the other things. Once they're home, um, I can then work around them, so if they're in the space and the cleaning needs doing or whatever it happens to be, and I can still connect with them and be with them. And then I'll be very honest, and my husband and I were talking about this last night.

Caroline: 13:40

I work most evenings because I don't have the capacity during the day to do all the things that I want to do and need to do for my business if I if I am going to grow it so once um, the kids are sort of settled in the evening, and my oldest I mean, they go to bed when we do they're old enough to deal with themselves. If they make it out of their bedrooms, it's a miracle I wouldn't see them, even if I was sitting in the living room watching TV.

Mel: 14:08

I wouldn't see them.

Caroline: 14:08

I don't have any guilt about it. Typical teenager, hey, yeah, so, yeah. So I do a few hours work in the evening if I need to. I do a lot of my podcast recordings in the evening, as you are doing now, and that's how I sort of work it and balance it. And I don't believe in this work-life balance thing. I don't think it exists, is always going to be a phase where work perhaps needs more time and family then takes a slight back seat. But I mean, I'm not saying ignore your kids, but that you've got the energy and the capacity to put more into work.

Caroline: 14:48

And then there are other times, like when my kid was in burnout, where that has to be my main focus and work has to take a back burner, but I do feel very privileged that I have a job that I can be totally flexible around. I think if you're leaving the house in the morning to go to an office and not coming home until the evening, that is a whole different ball game um, yeah, I know that too well um yeah, and I feel really honoured that I get to have this life and that I am very aware of the fact it's a very fortunate position to be in.

Caroline: 15:23

I can support my children in the way that they need at this stage in their lives, because otherwise I wouldn't be able to work at the moment, I couldn't physically leave the house and go somewhere to work. So I've sort of created this, my ideal lifestyle, if you like.

Mel: 15:38

Yeah, it's amazing that you can do that, that we live in this day and age, and I think that's probably the one good thing that came out of COVID was the more flexibility for that virtual working. So when you're working with your clients, so you still go to their homes on the weekend. What is that like? Tell us a little bit about the inside of being a consultant and what that does like inside people's homes if you're allowed to share.

Caroline: 16:08

Yeah, no, it's, I love it One. It's always fun and I can honestly, hands on heart, say I have never had a session with a client that hasn't been fun. And they will all also say it's fun, which they didn't anticipate it would be. Who thought decluttering?

Caroline: 16:25

and organizing could be overwhelming. So fun is good, yeah, so we do always manage to have fun. I usually spend five hours in a block with them and I work for the whole five hours. They can take a break when they need to, but I just work through for the five hours in a block with them and I work for the whole five hours. They can take a break when they need to, but I just work through for the five hours, and it's always different, which is what I love about it.

Caroline: 16:45

Some people would like to start with the KonMari method at the very beginning, as you should do with clothes. Other people, when they contact me, are just like my kitchen's driving me nuts and I just have to have my kitchen sorted out first. So we will I start. I'm really flexible. I'll start wherever the client has their biggest pain point, um, and we do focus very definitely on the joy aspect of it.

Caroline: 17:10

What do we? We're not deciding what to let go, we're deciding what to keep. So it's like it's like what in your kitchen do you use every day? What? What do you love? Um, and once we've decided what those items are, then the other items can go. So it's deciding what to keep and then letting go with gratitude those things that you've decided are no longer serving a purpose in your life. Yeah, so that is really lovely. And then the I've always find the really fun bit is then organizing it back into the space. Yes, and I know, I know and I know this from the people in my membership as well when they work on things, they're like they keep going back afterwards and opening the drawers. Yeah, even if it's just your sort of you, your usual junk drawer, yeah, like the fact of opening it and it's there's order, heidi you can see what's in it.

Caroline: 18:07

Yeah it's good and I. The other thing I do as well is I always say to my clients that they really shouldn't buy any organizing boxes or containers or anything before we've done the declutter, because usually they've got enough containers left.

Mel: 18:24

They've got enough space.

Caroline: 18:25

It can add to the clutter if you've got too many containers left over and I rock up which they all find highly entertaining with a massive bag full of shoe boxes, small boxes that I've saved from packaging Ferrero Rocher boxes. Do you have the?

Mel: 18:42

chocolates Ferrero Rocher. Yes, yes, they're very handy trays, they are amazing.

Caroline: 18:49

And the lids as well, for like putting office drawers for collecting stuff. I actually have a lady in my village who collects them for me from all her friends and then every few weeks I get a pile of empty Ferrero Rocher. So I try to be as environmentally friendly as possible, that we're not going out and buying loads of new plastic. We're repurposing stuff, um, and I find I love that challenge to to try and do the whole thing without costing them any extra money.

Mel: 19:18

That I love, yeah, and it so far it's worked yeah, and plus then you get used to the containers and the sizes and you know what fits in it and it makes life easier when you work with the same kind of materials. So exactly exactly that's so good. So in your experience experience working online, now sort of moving more into that space what do you think is sort of the main challenge that you're people face? I know what I'm seeing, but what are you seeing in your space that you think is sort of the biggest challenge around organizing that people face?

Caroline: 19:57

I think there are two in my experience. The first one is just not knowing where to start.

Caroline: 20:03

They just feel so overwhelmed looking at the space that it's like I don't even know what the first thing I should do is. And this sort of they freeze and then it's easier not to even start. So that is the first thing. And then the second thing, which is very genuine from everybody, is they genuinely don't think they have time to do it. They genuinely don't think they have time, and that has been. I think my biggest challenge has been helping people understand that you don't need to spend five hours in one go. Yes, my clients when I go to them in their home, that's a real luxury that you can start and finish a space in five hours.

Caroline: 20:50

But the reality for most of us at home is that we perhaps have got 15 minutes here or there. So what I am really focused on, especially in my online membership, is that we are using 15 minutes when we get them. If we put the pasta on to boil for 15 minutes, I passed it far too long, I know.

Mel: 21:10

Um everyone keeps going, it's not 15 minutes, it's 12.

Caroline: 21:14

I'm like no, I didn't mind. Um, when you, when you find you've set something off, or you've set the washing machine off or whatever, then what can you do while you're waiting for that to finish?

Mel: 21:25

oh, you are me.

Caroline: 21:27

Yeah, I say the same thing yeah, that's so good, and what we tend to do these days, sadly, is we get our phone out and start scrolling through it. Yep doom scrolling, doom scrolling and and what are we doom scrolling images of beautiful houses that make us feel like we're not good enough. Yeah, all the rest of it. So we I work really on 15-minute blocks for everything and it really has made a huge difference in everyone's lives that I've been working with, that they are getting through so much stuff because 15 minutes feels manageable.

Caroline: 22:04

And the lovely thing is you don't think like, oh, this is going to take hours, like I'm actually set a timer and stop after 15 minutes. You stole what?

Mel: 22:13

I was about to say, yeah, I was going to say, well, another thing that I do, along with that, is a stopwatch instead of a timer, because the amount of people that go, oh, it takes me too long to do this, too long to do that, blah, blah, blah. And then I say, well, set a stopwatch and actually see how long it does take you. Because there was this one lady that was just she kept putting off making a bed every day. Look, it's up to people if they want to make their bed or not, you know to say, but she wanted to do it, she wanted to have her room organized and all this kind of stuff, but she kept putting it off because it's like, ah, it takes too long. She set a timer, took her about 50 seconds, and she could do that while the kettle was boiling. Yeah, you know. So it's using that time, as you said. You know it's doing other things at the same time while you're waiting for something.

Mel: 23:09

And so she'd go make her bed while the kettle was boiling to make her tea, and it was done. And then she's like, oh, my goodness, I've been putting this off for years because it's like it was like that's too hard, I don't have the energy. It takes too long, because in her head she thought it took her 15 minutes, yeah, but reality is a lot of these things don't actually take as long as what we think they do. So if you are someone that thinks I don't have the time because it's going to take too long, well, I challenge you to set a stopwatch and actually see how long it takes. Maybe it does. Maybe it takes as long as you think it does, but chances are with these littler things, it does not take as long as you think it does.

Caroline: 23:52

So definitely yeah, and I think the other thing that, um, because you asked what, what I find that they find difficult, I think, once the decluttering and organizing is done, the being able to maintain it yeah they're not believing that it can stay like this, and that's why, actually, my whole membership is actually more to do with mindset. Yeah, love it like james. Clear atomic habits, all that sort of habit, stacking um all like so that, and we have.

Caroline: 24:29

We have this thing in my membership which everyone finds highly amusing. We have like every few weeks we have a put the damn thing away week, because how often do we use something and think I haven't got time to put this away now. I'll do it later.

Mel: 24:44

Well then, later we get distracted.

Caroline: 24:48

And by the end of the week, all the things that we haven't had time to put away are lying around. And what are they? Their clutter, I know.

Caroline: 24:54

I've got a lovely lady in my membership who actually lives in Denmark and she said she was out on her balcony the other week pruning some plants. She looked down and saw that the guy had come to to check the water thing and whatever. He was getting out of his van and she was about to put the the scissors down that she'd been using and she actually said out loud to herself in English put it away. Yay and so. And she said it took me like 30 seconds to put the scissors away and I still had time to go to the door and greet. Oh I, I had more than time to go to it because you have to get up the stairs.

Caroline: 25:32

So like, like these are the sort of things that I and I'm when I'm working with my clients in their homes and we're we're organizing and decluttering, we're talking about all these things at the same time and I'm I'm sort of helping them see how, when we finished, what they can do in order to maintain it, because I don't want, in six months time, a phone call saying, well, that didn't work. I'm back to square one again and I can hand on heart say that that that has never happened, and I do stay in touch with people.

Caroline: 26:01

So, um, yeah, so that's fun.

Mel: 26:05

Ah, I love that. I love that. I just I feel like the we keep talking, the more I'm just like I swear we're the same person. The stuff we keep going with it's a different continent, oh, totally different parts of the world and a slightly different audience, but not by much. So I think we've got more ahead of us together. I reckon I'm really enjoying this. So I guess, probably to more wrap it up, where can people find you, what? What can they do like if they want to hear you? I know you've got your podcast on the um living clutter free forever socials. Let us know where, where we can find you. Yeah the.

Caroline: 26:51

The podcast is um is sort of the main place where I'm putting content out every week, um, although I am on um instagram every day. We are my handle. There is carothor, um, and then I have my website which people can visit and that's caroline-thorcom, and there you can find everything.

Mel: 27:15

I'll pop it in the description so everyone can find you properly. But it has been an absolute pleasure talking with you. I almost forgot that everyone else is going to be listening into our conversation. I enjoyed it so much. Yeah, me too. Thank you for coming on, and I will be sure to keep following you on Instagram and listening to your podcast and I encourage everyone else to do it too so you'll get a lot, a lot, from Caroline. Thank you, appreciate that. Talk to you soon.

Caroline: 27:52

Yeah, thanks, bye.

Mel: 27:54

If you loved this episode, don't forget to hit subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next. And if you want to continue the conversation, you can connect with me on Instagram at @shes. organised, or, for some free resources, head over to beyondorganised. com toolkit. Remember, organising is a tool to live the purposeful life beyond it. See you next time.