I binned my kids’ drawings, toys & seven sackfuls of clothes – it’s just rubbish, I was ruthless but feel so much better

ALL parents know the struggle of keeping the house in order when you have little one's running around.

But one mum had enough of the clutter and threw away over 1,000 items - including her children's drawings.

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Kylie Perkins, 25, adopted minimalist lifestyle after her son, Bo, five, was diagnosed with Doose syndrome - a rare type of epilepsy.

To get some control back over their lives, and some more room, Kylie and her partner, Ryan, 25, a real estate agent decided to embrace minimalism - the idea of living with fewer items and only using what you really need.

They went through their "cluttered" three bed house room by room and over two weeks ruthlessly decluttered everything they didn't need - including jewellery, books and furniture.

I would fill a whole closet of their work but it's never going to get looked at again

Kylie Perkins

Kylie got rid of over a thousand items including seven full bags of clothes and two buckets of toys that were all donated to charity.

As well as removing kitchen utensils and bathroom supplies, Kylie also decided to tackle her children's artwork - with pictures of "half-drawn animals" discarded, which she admitted was the toughest thing to get rid of.

"People ask how I was able to get rid of so much but I was in a youth homeless shelter when I was young so I know how to shift the mindset of knowing what I have that someone else might not," she told SWNS.

"My kid's artwork was probably the hardest though.

"We had so many pieces of paper of half-drawn animals and that's hard to get rid of as a mum.

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"I would fill a whole closet of their work but it's never going to get looked at again so we got rid of it."

Throwing away most of their kitchenware, the family now use just one bowl and one plate each and say they have "no interest" in shopping for new items - with Kylie and Ryan refusing to buy presents for each other.

Kylie, a social media management business owner, from Wasilla, Alaska, but now living in North Carolina, US, said: ";Unfortunately we have been battling epilepsy with our son for two years.

"All of a sudden it got really bad - he had 15 seizures in four days. We found out through an EEG that he was having a seizure a second.

"After the diagnosis, we had two choices - let it control our life, be super angry or think about what we can do and what we are in control of.

"We watched a documentary on YouTube about minimalism and we saw the benefits - how it can free up your mind and help with depression and we agreed that it was what we needed.

"So we went through our home and started decluttering. It was about 14 days and it's been huge.

"It's freed up so much more mental space."

She added: "With so much going on, I knew we had to start where it would be the most beneficial to see progress to keep going.

So Kylie and her partner decided to tackle their bedroom first.

"So we started with our bedroom because that's where we're going to wake up in the morning - what we see," she continued.

"We'd see the benefits of minimalism and it'd encourage us to keep going

Kylie and Ryan then continued throughout their home - completing it in just 14 days.

"We went with the flow of our home - bedroom, then the bathroom in our bedroom, then closets in our bedroom," she said.

"At the same time as that we were doing our laundry so were overwhelmed and we would end up buying more clothes and just adding to the laundry problem.

"The mental toll when your child gets sick and when you are so depressed is not easy.

"Then we made our way out to our kitchen, the coffee bar, up the stairs, the kids' rooms - so it didn't feel too all over the place.

"We pulled everything out of our kitchen and put it on our table and worked out what we needed.

"Minimalism isn't about having nothing, it's about what you need.

"We had filled it with so much rubbish that we didn't need in just six months of living there.

"We'd open up the door and things would fall out of the kitchen.

"Whereas I think we have one or two bowls and plates per person now."

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Kylie shared the entire 14-day process on her TikTok and says that if she didn't have that accountability, she may have stopped.

She said: "I feel like if I didn't have such a loyal following watching then I think it would have been hard to keep going.

"But people really liked the realness I shared.

"It can be embarrassing and seeing all these comments that I was helping people really did push us to keep going.

"Now my husband and I clean up more than we ever have.

"We know what it feels like when everything is together and organised now."

Now that their home has been decluttered, Kylie and Ryan plan to keep it up.

Kylie said: "The biggest change has been not buying things. We go out now and have no interest in buying things now.

"Clothes and toys were definitely the biggest thing - we used to buy our kids a toy every time we went to the store and that was a lot of clutter.

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"Having too many options for kids can limit creativity and add stress.

"We are now in the process of going through our home for a second time and continuing the journey."