My home is a mess

snookey

Hi I remember from one of the programmes on tv with regards to hoarding that you have to get to the root cause first. Its then about tackling those thoughts and actions. Often people hoard through fear as jo jo said. Maybe the newspaper has meaning due to the date not to what it contains. Maybe life became difficult from that point onwards.
Id say that having a psychologist sit down with the person hoarding would be the first point of call. Going in and taking things without the persons consent would only compound the problem.
We are all guilty of hoarding its just in different degrees . I collect books, sindy furniture and see this as a hobby. Others would see this as hoarding. Id say it only becomes a problem when it over takes all areas of your life and those around you.
Maybe help the person hoarding to clear a small space at a time. Ask why a particular item is needed and how it could be used by someone else if they were prepared to let it go. The box system could be usefull ie four boxes,one to keep,a maybe box, recycle, give away. That way the person has full control and a system to work with.

Rummer

I am a real hoarder and I have to be in the right mood to clear things out. Sentimental attachment and the fear of throwing something out that I will then need are often in the back of my mind. I have managed by throwing out all the obvious rubbish and then tackling one area at a time putting out what I know in my heart I don't use/need. Then a few weeks later I go over that area again. Taking things to charity shops and listing them on freecycle made me feel that my things were going to a good home where they were really needed so I was helping others as well as myself.

Now I try to tackle things as they come along for example I read and deal with mail as it arrives and clothes I clear out when folding the laundry, especially DDs things as she outgrows them so quickly. I think doing little jobs every day means you are slowly clearing but without sickening yourself.

jpscloud

For me I think it's not so much hoarding as not having proper tidying routines in place. I have had to train myself (and it's a slow process!) to do even simple little things like recycle junk mail rather than leaving it in a huge pile to be dealt with at a later date. I'm not sure why I'm this way, but I do know that during times when I'm emotionally down it gets much worse.

I've become much better with the kitchen (it was always clean in the essential places, but cluttered). I now make myself put the plastic containers etc. away in order instead of stacking things on top of each other higgledy piggledy - the times things all fell out of the cupboard and all over the floor!

My next conquest is the spare room and box room upstairs. For this I need to train myself to deal with laundry properly instead of leaving it in heaps everywhere! I also have to do a great deal of clearing out of old textiles, but I fondly entertain ideas that I'd like to do fabric knitting with them so I may be clinging to that hoarder tendency after all!

I imagine your Dad must be feeling very down, so maybe gently encouraging him to recycle the newspapers every week would be a start? Baby steps...

Blade26

Thanks for the insights, any other guidance would be fab! My sister and I are meeting later in the week to talk about it, then a visit to Dads is in order a the weekend I think

Blade26

YORKSHIRELASS

Good luck Blade, I guess there are many reasons why older people hoard stuff. Perhaps being brought up without much money makes it harder to throw stuff away, maybe its sentimental reasons or maybe its just being overwhelmed by it all - I think all of us on here can relate to that one. Hope you get something sorted out.

I have had a difficult week with DS who is now back to being tutored again as a normal school environment is just beyond him at the moment. The good news is that he has got a wonderful new tutor who is working with him 1-1. The bad news is that this is only for 6 hours a week so I have my boy at home with me the rest of the time. Any plans for getting a job or doing voluntary work has gone out of the window and I am really struggling to get my head around the thought of another winter stuck in the house.

To make it worse DS knows I am finding it tough and blames himself - so I have to try and pretend its all OK.

Oh well - we are going to try and get some paint today and make a start on painting the kitchen. I really dont want to be bothered but I am losing the motivation to do anything at the moment which is a bit scary. DS can help me do some painting as well which will give him something to focus on too. I really should go and get him out of bed!

Have a good day everyone.

janeym8

hiya all
loving this thread but must admit to only reading first and last few pages
i seriously need to declutter as we are planning on moving from a 3 bed semi with a huge garden(3 big huts) to a mobile home in Spain in next 1-2 years OMG what a lot of stuff to give away,freecycle or charity shop-maybe even try ebay agsain but never really had much luck in the past
i have just retired from work due to ill health so things can be a bit tricky some very very good days where i can do lots but some very very bad days where DH has to wash and dress me-im so inconsistent hence not trying flylady
house all needs redecorated before being put up for sale also and then theres all the day to day clearing and cleaning
im trying to keep living room clean and tidy but dog hairs get everywhere

PLAN
decorate spare room which is nearly empty then go from there tidying and decluttering
hoover living room every other day
iron every other day-im sorry i just cant not iron
continue to make bulk meals and freeze
continue to bake and freeze
get up at 8 in the morning and not lie in bed until 10 or 11
get DH to help as much as possible

some great tips on here ive read already so hope to get continued motivation from what seems a very friendly,chatty group of people

janey xxx

tahrey

Man ... I've moved out, and though i thought i might have had a slight problem with hanging on to a few things (old stereos, radio control cars etc) because I figured they could be repaired but i didn't have the time or parts... the sheer amount that ended up getting composted out of sight, out of mind in the backs of cupboards etc (where of course they'll never get fixed as they're inaccessible) is intense.

I know it needs to get sorted, and I'm going to commit to it - go through, see what works, and what's broken... drop the latter portion off at the recycling centre... then take my pick of the best of the former (one, maybe two of each category, depending what niches need to be filled in my life & home) and ebay/donate/also recycle the rest.

Particularly the phones, I'm sure there's £100 worth of recycling lurking there.

The problem is finding the time. Right now I'm fighting to have enough time to do the dishes, laundry and ironing in between kickstarting the rest of my independent life and various little disasters that have brewed up. I don't want to leave it indefinitely because that's a recipe for becoming a crazy old cat person (and besides, I've pulled a load of it out of the garage and utility into the lounge so I DON'T ignore it - and that makes it difficult to get people round for a housewarming )... but... are there any reasonably assured ways of punching a hole in an already packed schedule to start sorting things out? I need to be able to make it atomic, too - in the piece-by-piece meaning of the word. Don't want to pull a load of stuff out of a box, then end up leaving it all over the floor for a week, or endlessly putting it back in, taking it out, putting it back... That just leads to chaos.

Is the solution somewhere in this enormous thread, if i search? :-/

YORKSHIRELASS

tahrey wrote: »

Is the solution somewhere in this enormous thread, if i search? :-/

Hi and welcome along. Those of us that have been here from the beginning will have probably all learned one thing along the way. The only way to make progress with decluttering is very small steps.

Take one box, a set amount of time and deal with it. I did this with a couple of cupboards that were just overwhelming me. I gave myself 2 hours to sort the stuff into keep, charity shop and bin. The charity shop and bin stuff then went straight into the car to be disposed of the next day. The keep stuff went tidily back into the cupboard and voila problem solved!! OK I make it sound easy and its not but you do get a kind of snowball effect. Once you get one box cleared it will give you the motivation to do the next.

Good luck and stick around, lots of useful advice on here amongst all the chit chat and we are a friendly bunch.

Rummer

I'm not feeling well

Been coughing and spluttering all day and now I have managed to crawl onto the couch and flop into a heap. I am surrounded by mess and I just don't have the energy to tidy it all away. This is what I have been dreading, a few days illness and all my hard work will vanish under a pile of stuff

laurel7172

Tahrey-decide on a date for the housewarming and send out the invites. That will focus the mind

Allow yourself the easy victories first. I always have a box for the troublesome bits and bobs, throw them in as I go and get down to just that single box really quickly. Then deal with that one thing at a time.

EBay-you have to make a decision here. Some people eBay, and I often feel I should, but that adds a level of complexity and delay to decluttering that I personally can't afford, time and energy-wise. My number one mantra is to do first what only needs doing once, and if I can handle something just one time (straight to charity bag), then I'm ahead...