I’ve Been a Busy Handywoman!

With a body that feels broken a lot of the time, with a lot of chronic pain and chronic exhaustion, a lot of the DIY type activities I used to do are off the table, which is kind of disappointing. I like to feel powerful and capable, and these things take a hit at my self confidence.

Despite this, over the past week and a half I’ve done quite a few things that many would pay a handyman to do. Some of them I managed to do entirely on my own, and some of them I did with a little bit of help from my teenaged sons. But it is a really good feeling, not to mention saving that money. And I’m teaching my kids valuable skills along the way.

The first thing I tackled was fixing my bathroom door handle. I’ve written before about my ongoing battle with problematic door handles—apparently a recurring theme in my home. Maybe it is shoddy craftsmanship, or maybe we’re just too rough on them. I’m not sure, but either way, it’s one of the repairs I’ve had to deal with the most.

The screws on my bathroom door came out of the holes that were there- I’d tried to reuse the same screws I had in the past when I last fixed it, but it wasn’t enough. Those came out and because the backplate wasn’t holding the whole system together, the spindle was moving back and forth each time the door was used until it stripped the spindle entirely and it no longer would stay inside the door.

I replaced the spindle with a spare one I had. (Remember how doors have been a constant issue here? Who else has a spare spindle lying around?) I then bought screws that were the next size up in width, and screwed them into the back plate, and hopefully together with the new spindle, my door handle will last a long time.

The next thing we tackled was the bathroom clogs. (Part of one, anyhow.) My kids told me that the water in the bathroom sink and the water in the bathtub were both not going down quickly. Because they were happening concurrently, it made sense to think that it was a problem with the bathroom drainage as a whole.

I called my plumber to ask him for advice and he suggested that I check the floor cleanout for the bathroom (that’s the hole that you use to access the plumbing, though not every country has them) and see if there is a clog there. If there isn’t, he wanted me to check if the water went down easily from there. Since it did, it showed that there were two separate clogs, not connected, and I could fix each one on its own. Since I couldn’t find my snake, I haven’t fixed the bathtub yet, but we did the sink.

To do that, I showed my son how to unscrew the trap under the sink and we cleaned it out as well as the pipe between the basin and the trap. Yes, it was a disgusting job, but someone’s gotta do it. And now the water goes down just fine.

The next thing I did was replace the faucet in my bathroom. I had never done this before, though I had put together the sink in my Ikea kitchen in my rental unit, so I knew it wouldn’t be a big deal. The faucet had become somewhat broken, as the gaskets and mounting bracket that were supposed to secure it had disintegrated. The pipes still worked, so I was still using the sink, but the faucet was very wobbly. The thought of replacing the faucet felt so daunting that the replacement one sat in my room for maybe half a year. Once I got started on my repair swing, I was pushed to replace the faucet, and it wasn’t hard at all. I needed to use a wrench to turn off the water supply lines since they were a little bit stuck, but beyond that, it was a cinch. (That made me feel silly that I waited so long.)

I found water on my floor a few times recently in my kitchen. I knew that the silicon between my counter and the wall had disintegrated in some places, and while that probably was not the source of the leak, I decided to take care of that. That was simple enough, a super cheap fix and easy (other than removing the silicon from my fingers after).

I also knew there was a tiny little leak in the pipe under my kitchen sink for a while now, but the drop of water fell into a bucket that I dumped out periodically, and cleaning out everything that was stored under the sink felt very daunting. But when I started finding the water on the floor I knew I needed to fix the leak to see if that was the cause of the puddle or something else, so I booked a time with my boys when they were both available to help me with it, and when I had physical therapy the next day, so if my body got injured from doing it, I’d have the treatment already lined up.

My sons requested that while I was fixing the leaky pipe under the sink, we also replace the kitchen faucet. Since the hose for the pull-out retractable nozzle was fraying, didn’t have a secure connection to the nozzle, and could be another possible source of the leak, I thought it was a good idea.

It turned out that the leak under the sink wasn’t as small as I’d thought. We have a double sink, and under each basin, the drain pipes had disconnected from the drainage system because the rubber seals that were supposed to hold them in place were damaged—or something like that. Fortunately, I had purchased new seals when I bought the sink, so we were able to fix them easily. We were lucky that there wasn’t more water pouring out, as the pipes were completely disconnected and just sitting on top of the drainage pipe. Unfortunately, some of the items under the sink were ruined by the water and had to be thrown away, but luckily, most were washable and could be salvaged.

Installing the new faucet, however, proved impossible for us at the moment. Installing the new faucet shouldn’t be too challenging… once we figured out what the ridiculous instructions meant.