Hoarding - Springing Ahead

Picklepot

Littlegreen parrot thanks for the challenge shredding now completed!
The jacket is used for the garden but the 'parka' style hood was always too much.

Catshark88 - I too am a' putter off' i have to remind myself not to let the job settle into my 'to do list' but just get on with it. I also tend to leave a lot of jobs unfinished and leave a trail of destruction behind me..i think its as a result always multi tasking when the children were small.

Nix143 - i 'm inspired! i often wondered if i could truly change. I come from a family of hoarders/collectors/keep that for your bottom drawer/ you never know when you might need it types and it frustrates me that i am the same and cant make definite headway

Nix143

Me too Picklepot. Growing up, like lots of people, my parents didn't have much. And my dad was OBSESSIVE about keeping things, including their boxes...... just in case. I've only just cleared the attic of all the boxes from my son's toys over the years - 20 years worth of empty cardboard boxes kept 'just in case'. In case of what? I remember how proud he always was of me and my sister when he would look at a board game and the box would be pristine after years of use. Maybe it's that thing of if you ever need to sell or return something then you'll need the box. Crackers

It's hard to stop seeing the 'value' of something. That's what stops me in my tracks. It's so deep rooted.

Look at this pic - this bag has been in the loft for.....I don't know how long. Years. (It's been in my back bedroom for 2 months waiting for me to decide what to do with it) A massive Ikea bag of CDs and DVDs. 10% of that bag is complete, the rest is empty boxes. If you challenged me (as ex's have in the past) I would defend that bag to the death - it's MY Bag! Try as I might I can't bring myself to throw the empty boxes away - what if I find the DVD/CD? What will I do then? The reality is even if I DO find the disk I'll put it in the box never, ever to be listened to or watched again. So why not just throw the empties out? I just can't. Not yet. Maybe next week baby steps



You know, reading all your stories, sitting and thinking about my stuff is really helping undo those last few emotional ties I have had to 'stuff'. I thought this was about decluttering but it's something bigger than that. Cheers guys x

thriftwizard

I thought this was about decluttering but it's something bigger than that. Cheers guys x

Totally with you there! I rather think we have some IKEA bags full of kipple here & there too; with us it's going to be PC game boxes & woe betide me if I chuck them without permission. I'm actually longing to get cleared up & move on now, to the extent that I would cheerfully give away most of my spare stock - in theory! I shall see whether I actually can, over the next few weeks. Part of me is laughing, because one of my trader friends is always just about to give up and go totally zen/minimalist in her home - she's a Buddhist, and she talks about it with such longing in her voice - but she never does! Like me, she's an addict... but I am actually resolved to give stuff away rather than live like this any longer.

A minor triumph today; we went down to the little town that is the local vintage scene's heartland today, and the girls had a wonderful time browsing & oohing and aahhing. And apart from some supplies for an urgent commission, which I wouldn't have been able to buy locally, I bought just one small item, something that I know a regular customer is after; I'll quadruple my money & she'll still be getting a good deal. It's very good to get back & not have to think, where the heck am I going to put this?!

GreyQueen

Afternoon all.

Have been to work and went to some chazzers. I have a list of all the books I want to read from a particular author (about 30-odd) which I have cross-checked with the library for the ones they have and which I cross off as I read them. I use the library where possible, but when they are in other branches across the region it costs 60p to get them sent to my branch, so a secondhand version in the sub-£1 price range going to be bought.

Didn't see what I was after so walked away empty-handed. Discipline in action.Go, me!

Nix, I wasn't raised in destitution (my Mum was) but we had that habit also, that you didn't know if you were going to be able to afford to replace something, so you hung on to everything, regardless if it was even feasible to re-use it.

Mum was raised by fosterparents 50 years her senior and they died when she was a young mum in her twenties. She had hankered to have Grandma's sideboard for her own home but when she and Dad took it away from the wall, it was literally riddled with woodworm, so bad that it was crumbling and too dangerous to bring into the cottage in case the critters got into the beams.

So, it had to be burned in Gran's back garden. A small lesson about holding onto stuff for too long.

When we put stuff away for later, for best, for the unforeseen need which we fear is around the corner, there's always the sense that it is still existing in the state which we last saw it in; perfectly good.

Only often it isn't anything of the sort and has kind of 'died in storage' so that when we retrieve it, to use, sell, donate, whatever, it's fit for nothing but the bonfire or the dustbin. I wonder how many once-usable things were rendered worthless by being kept too long?

Re the IKEA bagful, could you thin the 90% by saying to yourself: OK, if I threw the CD or DVD box and later found the disc, I could put it in a sleeve or a CD case, it would still be usable by me or I could give it away. I'm not running a shop here, I can let the packaging go.

Sort-of giving yourself permission to use as well as own your own items, instead of feeling like you're a temporary custodian who will have to account for them one day to Da Management.

When I have a great lump of Misc such as a bag, a box, a drawer, to confront, I find it helpful to turf it all out on the bed or the floor and scrutinise it item-by-item, rather than scrabbling aimlessly in the container.

So, I would say to myself with each item from a pile of Misc:

1. What the HELL are you?!

2. Is this mine? How did this get here? Have I been reverse-burgled?*

3. If you are a 'ponent or accessory, do I still have whatever it is you are a part of? Do I even know what that was, !!!!!!?!

4. Are you useful/ beautiful/ valuable/ irreplacable?

5. If I hadn't just opened this container, would I even have remembered I owned this item?

6. If someone did burgle me for this item, would I have noticed and been bothered to put in on the insurance claim?

7. Would hell freeze over before I bought another one of these?

8. If it was a gift and I hate it, has the giver ever asked after it/ are they still alive/ do they live in the same country as me?

9. Is it deterioating into uselessness/ attracting vermin/ likely to attract vermin?

10. If a friend or relative whose good opinion I value saw this, would I be embarrassed? Slightly? Or toe-curlingly please-kill-me-now embarrassed?

And finally, if I died tomorrow, would I want my nearest and dearest to have to sort through this and wonder what the heck was going through my head to have held onto this?

*Y'know, when people sneak into your home and leave stuff rather than taking it. They have appalling taste, btw, the reverse-burglars.

greenbee

I've taken a carload of stuff to the CS today (I've finally found one that a. does gift aid, b. takes electrical items and c. has a carpark and space for unloading).

My brother has a van on loan from a neighbour, so he came over and helped me take a vanload of stuff from the garage and garden, including numerous bags of garden waste, to the big tip. Both bins are nearly full (black bin week this week, recycling next week) as I had a major session at the weekend putting up pictures, mirrors and shelves and was able to unpack another half-dozen boxes (I've only been here a year...). As a result I can put shoes away where the boxes have been removed from the wardrobe, and I'm no longer tripping over pictures piled up on the floor!

drusilla

Nix

I had a bit of a light bulb moment about CDs over the summer. I was clearing the old ones out.

Ah I thought to myself I will make loads of money via Music magpie. So I spent ages scanning them to find out the value. They were literally worth pennies.

I decided that if I ever wanted to listen to the music I could find it via YouTube.

I had been keeping all the old CDs because they took me back to when I was younger.

I kept one basket with a lid full of CDs. I still haven't played any. Although that may be something to do with the stacking hifi being broken.:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Perhaps I should get rid if that!

GreyQueen

Nice work, greenbee, the advantage of having the use of a van isn't to be sniffed at. I covet Transit vans the way more normal people covet sportscars..............I have earned my living as a van driver before.

Hokay, have gritted my teeth and turfed out the plastics cupboard. It isn't much more than a year since I did this last, and I was left with every tub having a lid and nothing extraneous.

In the intervening months, the plastics cupboard being a porthole into an alternative dimension, the following has happened; I have acquired two lids to nice good quality containers which both not known to me and whose whereabout of their bases is yet to be fathomed. ?????

I have searched high and low and they aren't anywhere and so I must assume that the randomness of the universe - probably quantum - has just appeared these in my life and they're not actually meant to be here at all.

Also exiting are the sole surviving Vitalite flat round tub, which is tough because they don't make them any more and less tough because the ruddy lid won't stay on. Plus the two deep round tubs which I brought back from Crete in 2002 - they came with jam in. Rather good jam and super very strong tubs, but not used.

I heard my mother's voice echoing in my head But you could use them for keeping stuff in your shed. Which is why she cannot get into her shed at the moment. I dare not lapse into such behaviours, so they can go......

Exiting also are two of the six oval ice-cream tubs, which I do use a lot but their numbers have crept up and these two are showing the white scars of plastic fatigue.

The oblong rectangular containers like you get from takeout meals were scrutinised. Have kept 5 tubs and 6 lids, which means there's three in the freezer and two roaming on the draining board. The one spare lid is a sop to my anxiety issues. There are three extra spare lids leaving.

There are also a couple of random lids to tubs long gone which have been loitering with intent on the draining board.

Lastly, there is a good quality rectangular container which is just that bit too shallow for the kinds of things I need to put in it, so that will go in the next chazzer donation bag.

I am now feeling a bit light-headed and wibbly but trying to hold firm and use rationality not neurosis to determine plastic-need in this household.

Reviewing the keepers, I notice that I have a distinct preference for Addis containers, of three main types, and may acquire a couple more of the same types if they appear at the chazzer - I don't buy these things new. I am also pleased with the Lock & Locks, all chazzer-sourced, too, have three of those.

I also have a space, both in the cupboard and in my mind, for a particular type of container, deep and trough-like, to hold a pkt of bacon once opened, so will keep an eye out for one of those.

Now, I am bagging those up for the communal recycling bins and taking them outta here now before I weaken and repent my decisions.

ETA; and they're GONE. Phew!

thorsoak

I have read a theory that the socks that you lose in the laundry metamorph into ...excess plastic lids!

GreyQueen

thorsoak wrote: »

I have read a theory that the socks that you lose in the laundry metamorph into ...excess plastic lids!

Very little would surprise me these days.

I have a very small flat. Only I live here. My friends don't rock up bearing tupperwares and wander off without them (I have them trained to bring wine and chocolates). There is no rational explanation for what's happening.

The good thing about turfing out the plastics cupboard was that I found 3 half-litre bottles of vinegar which I bought a few months ago and stashed in there as there was no space in the food cupboard. And I was about to buy some more because I had used up the current one.

And now I won't have to - result all round.

PS if anyone has a rectangular pretend lock & lock container minus it's lid, very sorry but the lid is now in the communal recycling bin, the one with the gravity lock which only opens when it's upside down on the bin hoist. Totally gone and un-retrievable even if I did change my mind.

Happygreen

Good evening, everyone.
Just a quick update that I have started tackling the mountains of paper. I sort and read some every day, shove it into a bag for my friend who wants the review pages or into the fireplace, then stack the work related stuff into different piles (used to work at Uni, I can still do it, lol). Will keep you posted!