Unfortunately, your boyfriend picked up these dirty habits long before you showed up in his life.

He either had parents that excused it and cleaned up after him, or parents that were unhygienic themselves.

This means that his lack of hygiene is a personality trait.

Now that he is an adult, his personality traits a solidified.

This means that for him to make a change to a personality trait, he would have to consciously want to do it and be ready to put in the hard work.

As we get older, we get comfortable with our personality traits and habits, whether they be good or bad, making it that much harder to voluntarily change them.

Take all of this into account as you consider how to go about getting him to change his hygiene without hurting his feelings or causing him to feel pushed away from you.

Although you want to be delicate in all this, that approach simply won’t work.

As an adult, his personality traits have solidified due to many years of practice.

To get him to change his hygiene, you are expecting him to change a personality trait that has become a part of who he is.

He doesn’t see that not properly showering for several weeks is a problem.

No, he doesn’t smell the odor that emanates from him when you are getting cozy with him.

He doesn’t see the dirty dishes that have been piling up in his kitchen sink for weeks.

No, all he has to do is grab another dish from his kitchen cabinet, and when those run out, he buys some paper plates and uses those.

He doesn’t realize that he never washes his hands after using the bathroom.

As far as he is concerned, as long as his hands aren’t completely covered in mud, there is no need to wash them.

He doesn’t comprehend that his lack of oral hygiene has resulted in dirty teeth and bad breath.

As far as he is concerned, his breath is fine.

You see, none of the areas where he has shown a dearth of hygiene is on his radar.

Only you see it.

There is no getting around the reality that to get him to change his hygiene, you must be brutally honest with him.

You are not responsible for his feelings.

He is.

All you are responsible for is making it clear that his poor hygiene is unacceptable.

There is no tippy-toeing around this.

He has to be made fully aware of how bad his hygiene is.

You are far too caught up on the prospect of hurting his feelings or causing him to feel pushed away by you.

That isn’t your responsibility.

He is a grown man.

If he cannot handle a real dose of reality about his hygiene, he won’t be a good provider and protector to you.

Surely, this isn’t what you want as a long-term partner.

Do you want a competent man or a crybaby?

He has never adjusted his unhygienic habits because no one has ever told him otherwise.

Well, if he wants to have the privilege of being your boyfriend, it’s time he hears the truth.

Tell him about all of the areas where he has shown an inadequate amount of hygiene.

Make suggestions on how to improve in those areas, and tell him that you want him to take steps in improving in those areas effective immediately.

Give him a list of products to use to clean his bathroom and kitchen.

He has to do this on his own.

Too many girlfriends in your situation make the mistake of assisting their boyfriend in cleaning.

Unfortunately, they end up doing the lion’s share of the cleaning.

This is ill-advised and unacceptable.

All it does is make him believe that he can get away with his unhygienic behavior, as you are there to assist and rescue him from these responsibilities.

You are not doing the work for him.

He has to do it himself and learn to be responsible by so doing.

Make it clear that you won’t come over to his place or get intimate with him unless he works on his hygiene.

He doesn’t have to fix everything at once, but he has to start putting in the work to fix a good number of them effective immediately.

Without being this brutally honest with him, he won’t change.