Hoarding...not just on TV

whitewing

It's a golden opportunity Val!

dumpy

sjprmc01 wrote: »

No, DUMPY, I didnt think that.

I guess just my inner shopaholic/hoarder. Is always defending purchases/keeps

I was tempted to buy a 2 pack of shortie pjs for my eldest. That were in the sale, I had picked them up and walked around. A bit then decided she didn't really need them!

Nothing went out as have been out of the house literally all day!

marvellous, sometimes messages on forums just don't come across well.

And well done you on putting the pjs back:j:j

BB I'm with the "throw the vinyl back in the bin" crowd as well.

Valk sounds like my parents house, and now I come to think about it, my house . Definately use it as an opportunity.

Not much out yesterday but I'm marking in the evening and work all day (and I watched some of the olympics )

Hopefully more done this weekend and the marking has to be done before Monday so evenings next week should be productive as well.

I must get into the garden shed before Autumn and I mean without opening the door chucking something in and shutting the door sharpish before every thing falls out.

blossomhill_2

valk - you paint such a lovely picture it actually sounds idyllic and a lovely place to grow up - reminds me of an old vicarage I used to play in when I was a child - but the reality for you is that it oppresses you so I wish you well - I inherited several times too but have recently seen the light and am boxing up lots of the lovely items to go to auction - if the only thing that I feel for them is "that was my grandmother's" then they are going, I will keep specific things of each relative, not everything they owned

Thinking about childhood and what we deny our children by hoarding - we played boardgames on the carpet when I was a child - the next generation were denied this because we couldn't see the carpet by then!

We had friends round and played hide and seek when I was a child, enjoying the thrill of hiding in cupboards - the next generation dared'n't open a cupbaord for fear of an avalanche!

Welcome to any new lurkers from the Weekly e-Mail, please thank post#1 if this thread helps you in any way - and join in any time

Hoarding alert - there is potential for serious hoarding of Olympics memorabilia - plan now so you acquire/keep just the right things and ditch the surplus

mollythewestie

We've been out all morning and came back with just 6 eggs.
I didn't enter a charity shop despite passing several. :j

Still working my way through my cookery magazines, but the kitchen is looking so much better.

I have been speaking to my elderly neighbour today, her husband is very seriously ill in hospital.
He is a very controlling man and Mrs neighbour has never been "allowed" into the attic rooms, garage or shed. It seems that Mr Neighbour had a hoarding habit of his own, from hundreds of cigar boxes to an old tin bath - it is all crammed into these rooms. It is clear he won't be returning home (He will need 24 hour care if he survives, which is unlikely) so she has decided to make a start on clearing it - she has already filled her wheelie bin with packets of seeds (some 40 year old+) and cigar boxes.
And she is planning on getting a house clearance company in to empty the rest.

You can see the relief on her face as she gets rid of all this stuff, as the sheer amount of useless things has weighed her down.

claire1a

Well after reading various parts of this board I thought I’d try my hand at a confession.

I too am a second generation (possibly 3rd, 4th) hoarder...

I now live in a 3 bed house (do have one lodger so I suppose technically a 2 bed house) but have some how managed to fill it completely... and with utter crap!

I don’t know if I have some addiction to shopping or just really like stuff (especially pretty stuff... mmm pretty stuff...). Any my buying has morphed through various stages...

Starting with buying literally room's full of clothes (18 jeans, 13 pj bottoms, 6 hooded jumpers, 80+ pairs of shoes!!). Most of which are too small for me now but bagged up in super sized vacuum bags and stored under beds until one day I’m slim enough to fit in them. I have all the clothes that are now too large for me (also stored in vacuum bags incase I get large again and don’t have to spend money on getting clothes...).

From clothes I then went onto household things, anything from Vases (I have 12, 12!!!!!!!!!!), plates, mugs, rugs, light bulbs, cleaning products, shoe liners, shampoos and conditioners coming out of my ears!!!! Also several douvets and covers, "just incase" i have the masses stay over all at the same time!

Then once I realised I had 20+ shampoos I then have seemingly moved onto food. I swear the amount of food that lives in my cupboards and three freezers, (two of which live in the garage) is enough to feed me and possibly a small nation for a good 6 months!!! Yet I still end up spending way too much money in the supermarket every week!!!

For some reason it seems that I am really anxious if I haven’t got at least 3 of something in my possession... I think it might be due to the horrible thought that if it ever comes down to me not being able to afford something (we had redundancy scares last year, although this has been going on since I first started living away from home) I have enough to live off... That and when I see something on sale I HAVE to buy it as it’s an ultimate bargain. Even though I know good and well that it's going to be on offer again in a couple of months, of which there is no way I would of got through all my stash by then anyway!!!!!

I’m really getting cranky (nice term for it) with myself and although I very rarely buy things full price and am a hardcore bargain hunter, also also buy in bulk (hoarder tendancies again) I still end up buying utter shi*e that I really don’t need, don’t have the space for and don’t want to get rid of because I spent my hard earned cash on it...

I’m thinking I need lessons in Ebaying or to detach myself from the clutter! Or in fact just stop going out the house with my bloody debit card lol...

Anyways enough of my ramblings but I just wanted to get my confession out there, hopefully this is the first step to recovery!

Cheers for reading!

blossomhill_2

mollythewestie wrote: »

I have been speaking to my elderly neighbour today, her husband is very seriously ill in hospital.
He is a very controlling man and Mrs neighbour has never been "allowed" into the attic rooms, garage or shed. It seems that Mr Neighbour had a hoarding habit of his own, from hundreds of cigar boxes to an old tin bath - it is all crammed into these rooms. It is clear he won't be returning home (He will need 24 hour care if he survives, which is unlikely)

so sad, it's a difficult time for them

mollythewestie wrote: »

so she has decided to make a start on clearing it - she has already filled her wheelie bin with packets of seeds (some 40 year old+) and cigar boxes.

Noooo! I love old seed packets - it's one of my "things" - I'd want to keep them or at least offer them to a gardening heritage group

and cigar boxes - so so useful - oh well I guess he thought that too

You can see the relief on her face as she gets rid of all this stuff, as the sheer amount of useless things has weighed her down.

I wonder if she has been planning this for years - sobering thought that a spouse may be waiting for the day when their hoarder can't see them chuck their hoard !

Hey claire - well done for "confessing" - no-one here will judge you as harshly as you judge yourself

claire1a wrote: »

Starting with buying literally room's full of clothes (18 jeans, 13 pj bottoms, 6 hooded jumpers, 80+ pairs of shoes!!). Most of which are too small for me now but bagged up in super sized vacuum bags and stored under beds until one day I’m slim enough to fit in them. is no way I would of got through all my stash by then anyway!!!!!!

I often wonder if the old clothes are actually keeping us
fat(tish) - bit like an umbrella, it won't rain while we've got one

claire1a wrote: »

Anyways enough of my ramblings but I just wanted to get my confession out there, hopefully this is the first step to recovery!

Yup, you are getting there, we'll try to help you get there faster:D

SpikyHedgehog

sjprmc01 wrote: »

I don't think anything else will come in bar some groceries probably as the girls have the hair dresser today and the optician....ooh I also made them throw ouT about 4 or 5 unused glasses cases yesterday too!

Had a look back and couldn't see if it was hols you were going on Spiky, but presume it is! Have a good time!

Thank you :-) Yes, it's hols in a caravan with mum & dad, DS1 & his best friend, DS2 & me. We're here in an 8 berth caravan, mum & dad have the ' big' bedroom, DS1 & friend are sharing, & DS2 & I are sharing. I bought 1 bag with my clothes in & 1 with all our towels & my wash stuff; DS2 had 1 bag of his clothes & 1 with books etc. I unpacked as needed & stuffed the bags under our beds, & our room looks quite neat.

I've said before mum & dad are hoarders... We're away for 5 nights, but we've got so much stuff here! The lounge area has bags scattered around with no place for them - we could tuck them away under the seats but then might forget them... Mum bought the swing ball, buckets & spades, kites, folding chairs for the beach, picnic blankets, I dunno what else! That's all still in the boot of the estate. Bless her. She wants to make sure the boys have a good time. Oh yeah, I forgot the bubble wand & bubble mixture....

smileyt_2

Hello, I'm a lurker from the weekly e-mail - I usually reside on the make do and mend tougher thread. I have hoarder tendencies but I am working hard to nip them in the bud ...

I have been decluttering/dehoarding for about 3 years now. I used to have four bookshelves almost up to the ceiling (I live in an old terrace with high ceilings) filled with books. Three summers ago it all got too much for me so I seriously culled the collection. I now have one double cabinet with glass doors. If a book won't fit in here, an old book has to go out to make room for the new one.

Two summers ago I got rid of a life's worth of jam jars and margarine tubs (oh yes, I have read the stories of plastic tub addiction on this thread :rotfl:). I now have one small box of each on my kitchen shelves and anything that doesn't fit in goes into the recycling straight away.

Last summer I sorted out my craft stuff. I still have too much but at least it is all boxed up and stored neatly in cupboards and on shelves instead of being stuffed willy-nilly into any available crack or crevice ....

Earlier this summer I sorted out my back yard. I had had chickens but the last one died last autumn. I finally sold the chicken pen, and used the chicken coop as a store cupboard for gardening bits and bobs (couldn't sell the coop because my hens had a virulent chicken disease).

Since reading this thread (I have made it to page 40 so far) I have removed fourteen threadbare, stained items of clothing from my wardrobe, cut them up for cleaning cloths (which have been stored) and thrown the remaining rags out. More clothes have been sorted to go to the charity shop. I can now close my wardrobe doors! I have sorted out three boxes of stuff that can be sold and taken three bin liners of recycling and three bin liners of rubbish to the bins - in addition to the two rusty woks that have been sitting unused on top of the kitchen cupboards for two years :eek:. I am thinking of having a table-top sale at my front door one day in the next two weeks. I have put my old bike on freecycle.

I have done a mountain of ironing and am determined to keep on top of it this time! I also recognise that I need a system to deal with paperwork, so I'm working on this.

It takes a long time, doesn't it? My downfall is that I keep things 'in case they are useful at a later stage'. The upside is that I actually hate soft toys and knicknacks and shopping, so it has been a long time since I regularly bought tat home from the shops! I'm working through stuff that has been here for yonks. I do feel slightly guilty at getting rid of things that have been bought for me as gifts, but I suffer from depression and clutter just does not help at all.

I'm working towards a clutter-free home. Once the rooms are done I will have to tackle the cupboard of doom which has heavens-only-knows-what stuffed in there. Stuff like old shelves, bits of wood that might be useful, sturdy boxes that might be useful ... there's that word 'useful' again .....

Thanks to Jojo for starting this thread and to all of you who have contributed. You are great motivators!

valk_scot

blossomhill wrote: »

valk - you paint such a lovely picture it actually sounds idyllic and a lovely place to grow up - reminds me of an old vicarage I used to play in when I was a child -

Oh, I wish...the truth is that though it's a lovely big house on the inside it's an ugly square lump on the outside, despite our best efforts with paint and garden. It's a very odd sort of building and you can see the brows furrowing when you bring someone home for the first time and stop at the door. The space inside never fails to impress though. Which is another reason to get it a bit more cleared up. The kids do like it though, there's always tons of room for toys and parties and there's not many houses where you can have six or eight pals back for a sleepover and fit them all onto your bedroom floor.

I may have just scuppered next week's working plan though...today we went to the cat rescue and got the long planned and promised third cat as a reward for my son doing well in his exams. To be absolutely accurate we came home with an eight week old kitten so I'll be too busy playing with it and keeping it out of trouble next week to be rushing about decluttering. However I was almost tempted to get two kittens...but I'm not a cat horder yet, thankfully!

blossomhill_2

Hi everyone
I have given myself a task for the day - anyone want to join in?

My task is to work out what I don't have a problem disposing of ... and working out why ... and trying to transfer those thoughts to the things that I hoard

Like disposable cutlery - I never keep it - one use and it's gone ... why?