Hoarding - Springing Ahead

ivyleaf

mothernerd wrote: »

Kon Marie scares me - if I throw out all the things that don't bring me joy, I will not have anything left. Until my other house is sold I am clinging on by my fingertips as it is (recovering from an op so can't work, not entitled to any benefits as self-employed and I have two houses:rotfl:- well crying won't get me anywhere).

Planning another major move round and sort out as soon as I can move things. DS3 told me yesterday it's looking like he and gf won't be able to afford to move in together until year after next, which is a major blow to decluttering but keep telling him all the things he can take - next time I move I am taking as little as possible.

However have just dispatched one old toiletry container (left behind by DS2 but it had rolled behind the toilet and only just getting to the being able to mop/get down that far without using the grabber stick),4 pieces of Binca fabric (in bag for 'crafty' cs), 2 basket lids and a pile of junk paper (having gone through pile of old embroidery patterns and some paperwork files). Not much to show but every little helps.

My OH complained that if he got rid of all the clothes that don't bring him joy, he'd get arrested when he left the house

get well soon mothernerd x

thriftwizard

Gentle {{hugs}} Mothernerd, btdtgtts - well, the crutches & the grabber, anyway! - and also got the son & GF (otherwise referred to as TDIL) who have no idea when they'll "be able" to move out. Plus one who keeps returning from bouts of studying/teaching, and two girls who show no signs of ever planning to move out. One has gone, and rarely returns, but even he's back next week.

I've been staying very, very quiet; not only do I not have any progress to report, I've gone backwards. I decided to close down one of my "fixed" stalls as it was clear that my stepfather was not going to be with us for much longer, and I knew my mother would need quite a bit of ongoing support when he finally went. Which he has now done... before I managed to get the stall clear - which still has to be done by 4pm tomorrow, along with about 80 other urgent things - or sort any more of the clutter already here out. And my mother has promptly gone down with several interesting conditions, 26 miles away.

I've managed to stuff half the contents of the ex-stall onto my other, bigger stall, which now looks like Steptoe's warehouse. The other half is going to have to be shoved somehow into the garage, which already looks like a hoarder's paradise, what with my pop-up stall infrastructure - tables, shelving, clothing racks, display boxes, chairs, gazebo - DS2 & TDiL's furniture & effects, the freezer, the tumble dryer, the HM preserves storage shelves, all the surf & body boards, tents & camping stuff... aaaargh!

Plus I need to take DD1 11 miles for a 2-hour harp lesson (doesn't drive yet, teacher often comes to us but can't tomorrow) DD2 to the doctor (won't go alone) & to buy a dress for the funeral, stock up with food for 7-8 people for a week and finish organising a civic funeral that we're expecting 250-odd people to attend, many of them in ceremonial dress of one sort or another. Don't think I'm going to get a lot of decluttering done tomorrow, somehow...

Picklepot

Knit_Witch wrote: »

Still here - just not been de-hoarding!

Me too hangs head in shame... although in my defence I am good at not bringing stuff in.. its the garage of doom. Oh and the loft... and those pesky kitchen cupboards that go round a bend and stuff gets lost/forgotten at the back ..and a whole lot more TBH. Its all the scary emotions that are inside these boxes and bags that take me by surprise..


Slinks off to de lurk..

seven-day-weekend

Can I ask a question about hoarding on this thread? I'm trying to understand the psychology of it.

On the hoarding programmes I've seen on TV, one woman had a loft conversion, spent a lot of money on it, so that her grandchildren could come and stay. The room is now as full as the rest of the house and her grandchildren can't use it.

Another woman's daughter had just got out of an abusive relationship and her mum said she could come and live with her.....but did nothing to get a room cleared for her and just put the daughter's furniture out in the rain. Her daughter and granddaughter had to go to a hostel.

Another woman's husband had left her because of the state of the house, and while she was sad about it, still seemed to value her 'stuff' more than him.

I understand that hoarding to these extremes is a mental illness, but can anyone help me understand the thought processes here, what goes on in the head of someone who apparently prefers the junk to the welfare of their loved ones?

Just trying to understand.

Happygreen

I think our old stuff makes us feel safe, like when times were better? Probably setting in after a trauma of some kind. It's probably a similar mechanism like an addiction where you know it's bad for you but you can't stop.

mumps

I think some people are just wired that way, maybe something triggers it? I am a thrower outer as was my mother and grandmother. My husband is a hoarder as was his mother, I never knew his grandmother and I'm not going to ask him because 99% of the arguments we have are about hoarding. My youngest son showed signs of hoarding at an early age, I put my foot down and made him choose things to keep, not allowing him to keep everything. This seems to have worked. Maybe the trait is encouraged in some cases, if my husband had had his way he would have facilitated sons hoarding.

Gingernutty

People become blind to their clutter and simply don't realise how overwhelmed they are.

Some people have 'plans'. For some day. When they have more time. Or more space.

One of the phrases we use on this thread is dericharding. This is after Richard Wallace, a man who succeeded in blighting an entire village with his hoard. His escapades were chronicled in a couple of Channel 4 documentaries.

He was a friendly soul, who lived in his late parents' house and whose job was delivering newspapers. He was collecting newspapers so that he could catalogue them. They were stacked everywhere.

The fact that newspapers often have their own catalogues, one can make requests to see these old editions or everything can be looked up online, didn't seem to occur to him.

His parents possessions were also buried under the hoard including at least one car.

He couldn't open his front door. He had to climb over huge piles of paper to get through to the rooms. The kitchen was frightening.

The penny didn't even drop even when the fire brigade came to to do a safety inspection and he was describing how to belly crawl across the hoard, whilst his back was scraping the ceiling so that they could get around the house.

In many ways, hoarders are in denial of the problem, can't face the emotions elicited by the sight of certain possessions and can't see what everyone else can.

The emotions they have to face when trawling through the stuff collected during a failed marriage or their late parents possessions are too much to face.

They sometimes see themselves as curators, protectors of the 'stuff' and simply can't get rid.

Also, no one wants to admit they have wasted all that time and money on stuff rather than people. They sit on the hoard, denying there's a problem, refusing to admit they're in the wrong.

There was one woman who had effectively left herself homeless.

She'd hoarded her local authority flat so badly, that she was paying rent on the flat, but living elsewhere.

Her daughter had refused to take her in and was at her wit's end. The woman's health was starting to fail, the flat had to be sorted and she was driving people around her mad with her obsession.

She blamed the local authority who had come in to do some work, shifted the hoard about to do the work safely and had put it back 'wrong'.

All it needed, she said, was some organisation, to put it back 'right' and it would be all good.

She was blatantly kidding herself.

At the stage where the documentary crew arrived, it was a game of Tetris getting through the front door and even the thought of someone else touching bags containing her possessions caused her major stress.

Procrastination, depression and anxiety seem to be common factors.

Their obsession is such, that yes, people suffer. Children are too embarrassed to bring their friends home, marriages suffer and break down, they are left on their own as no one wants to visit and all offers of help are sometimes violently rejected (remember how these threads started?).

Each hoarder has their own story, their own obsessions and their own demons hiding under the cr!p.

The cr!p represents memories or, in the case of buying hoarders, a new life.

There are a special breed who go out and buy more and more stuff instead of collecting historical stuff so that they can be prepared.

Smaller clothes for when they lose weight, language courses for when they can go on holiday and speak a foreign language, arts and crafts stuff for when they learn to knit/paint/crochet/cross stitch.

Again, procrastinating. Putting off the actual 'thing' and preparing for it instead.

The stuff and the associated emotions are more important to them than anything else.

We're hoping to get over that.

seven-day-weekend

Thanks for your insights, especially gingernutty.

I have some experience of the 'future ' or 'just in case' kind of hoarding : my son's ex-lodger had umpteen rucksacks, each had its own particular function, and would be useful for when he went on that form of trip.

Also a friend of mine, who despite a declutter, still had a whole wardrobe drawer just crammed full with socks, each there for a particular scenario when only those socks would do.

I understand that,what I can't understand is why the rucksacks or socks become more important than your loved ones (I'm not saying they did in either of these cases, just using them as examples). If your children couldn't visit you because there was no room for them to sit because of all the rucksacks, or if your husband was going to leave you because he wanted room in the drawer for HIS socks, wouldn't that give you the motivation to at least try and do something about it? Or would you just think they were being unreasonable?

This is what I don't understand.

Gingernutty

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

I have some experience of the 'future ' or 'just in case' kind of hoarding : my son's ex-lodger had umpteen rucksacks, each had its own particular function, and would be useful for when he went on that form of trip.

Also a friend of mine, who despite a declutter, still had a whole wardrobe drawer just crammed full with socks, each there for a particular scenario when only those socks would do.

I understand that, what I can't understand is why the rucksacks or socks become more important than your loved ones (I'm not saying they did in either of these cases, just using them as examples).

If your children couldn't visit you because there was no room for them to sit because of all the rucksacks, or if your husband was going to leave you because he wanted room in the drawer for HIS socks, wouldn't that give you the motivation to at least try and do something about it? Or would you just think they were being unreasonable?

This is what I don't understand.

Although I clearly have too much stuff I don't use, I don't get it either, sorry.

pigpen

I now have 5 binbags for chazzer.. I had hoped for half term to be a week of flinging, it turned out to be a week in bed ill, 4 days I lost in total and OH's parents came to visit a 5th day.. its so frustrating... yet here I am, sat on my derriere.. I have taken a box to DD1 and have another to go. I have a small bed going to DD1's outlaws for when their boy stays over at theirs, 2 boxes to go to DD1's friend and now I have a bag started with shoes and winter coats for OH's cousins children.. it is going down slowly... but I just seem to be perpetually ill.. I'm sure its the stuff!


Oh, I sent a fish tank to DS1 and threw out 2 broken drawers.. I am trying!


2 items shifted via ebay too.


Knitting up a jumper for DGS3 so that is another bag emptied from my stash.. I haven't bought any wool for a while so it is reducing.