Is it unreasonable to expect DH to check first before he chucks our stuff away

[freddiefrog]

or am I being precious about a load of junk?

We have a junk drawer in the kitchen. It gets used for dumping all sorts of random crap - bits of string, random curtain hooks, old chargers for phones we no longer own, dried out furry Prit-Sticks, etc, but it also contained lots of bits like fossils and shells the kids had collected, old tickets for days out, a couple of festival wristbands, some backstage passes from a concert we went to, badges the kids had collected - nothing of any £ value, or any real sentimental value, just things we'd collected from fun trips out, and DH has cleared the drawer out and chucked the whole lot away.

Now, I'm the first to admit the drawer needed clearing out, but I would have liked to have kept some of this stuff and it wouldn't have killed him to dump it in a box for us to go through together, or shove it in the loft.

Sad, I know, but I'm quite upset that he's chucked all this stuff out, I used to love rummaging through the drawer for something and coming across an old ticket or something and being reminded of the fun of that day

I hate clutter and stuff all over the house, but that drawer was like a memory bank iyswim, and now it's all gone

I would be upset too. If he was wanting to chuck stuff out he should have checked with the owner of the stuff first!

Yabu.
You should have put the bits you wanted to keep in a safe box or something. He was probably just sick of having loads of crap to rummage through

When you do a spring clean do you check With everyone if every bit of junk is good to throw out?

I would be upset, we always consult each other before chucking anything away that might have sentimental value.

But the junk drawer has always been the junk drawer, it is 'away' as that is where we alway put it and have done for the past 10 years.

Every now and then we take out all the furry prit-sticks and dead batteries, but the majority of the junk has always stayed in there.

And yes, unless it's a load of broken McDonald's happy meal toys or ripped up bits of paper, I do check before chucking it out

YABU really, if you wanted to keep it, you should have put it in an old shoebox and stored it somewhere safe.

Has he chucked it in the dustbin can you retrieve any of it?

My husband does this, to be honest, I'm glad, cos I can't bear to throw memorable stuff away.

I don't check with the family before I get rid of crap. If things aren't useful and haven't been given Very Important Memory status and stored accordingly, it's fine to dispose of it.

Get the stuff out of the bin and put it somewhere safely.

I imagine he thought if it was important to you it wouldn't be a junk drawer full of crap.
You should have scrapbooked all your tat memorabilia or something.

It's all in a bin bag with the remains of Saturday night's chinese takeaway so it's unrescue-able

The Drawer has always been the dumping ground for this sort of stuff, if we want to keep it, it gets put in The Drawer.

We have always had a system that, if it's crap that gets left around the house it'll get put in the bin, if it's crap that you want to keep it gets put in the drawer iyswim

He could have just emptied it into a box (minus the dead batteries, useless bits of string and old phone chargers)

If he knew thats where you kept that sort of stuff then he should have consulted you first imo.

I wouldn't dream of chucking anything away that belonged to my DP and hes got enough junk , believe me.

Oh well in that case he is BU!

He thought he was doing you a favour. The things you thought were very important were stored in the same place as duff Pritsticks and dead batteries, so it's not unreasonable for him to think it was all unwanted and useless. Let it go, don't try to make him feel uncaring for not reading your mind.

Your life will be no worse for not having those tickets. Next time you get something that you think you'd love to keep for posterity, put it in a box marked 'PRECIOUS THINGS'. No confusion that way.

YANBU. My DH does this all the time and that's after 22 years of being told not to. Time after time he has thrown away or burned stuff that to him appears to be useless but which in fact, in some cases has been vital and / or irreplaceable. More than once he has got rid of stuff that has caused a huge amount of trouble to replace and has cost significant amounts of money and still he does it.

His answer is always, always "but I'm doing it to help you". How does that work then? You didn't ask me, its something that I didn't ask you to do, it's my personal stuff and nothing to do with you, it's not getting in the way, not causing a mess - why, why why?

If he realised that the drawer was a "memory bank" then HWBU.

If he didn't realise, then YABU as you didn't make it clear that was what you thought the drawer was for, and objectively it probably did all just look like rubbish so it's not unreasonable for him to assume that's what it was.

But then I speak as someone who is ruthless with junk and clutter. sentimental stuff has to be put in the specific "sentimental stuff" box or it gets chucked.

TBH, he should realise the drawer is The Drawer, - not by powers of mind reading, but because for 10 years it's always been used as the depository (by him as well as the rest of us) for stuff that is ultimately useless, but that we don't want to chuck away iyswim - it's our version of a scrapbook I suppose.

It's never been officially designated as the place to put it, but over the years that's what it's ended up as. We've always gone through it now and then and taken out the dead batteries and old phone chargers, leaving the rest of the stuff in there.

None of the stuff was particularly important or sentimental really, I can live without it, it was just nice to have it there.

He did it yesterday while I was out with the kids and when I came back it was all gone (and covered with mingy day old sweet and sour sauce)

YABU - I never check with DH before chucking stuff out. TBH if its stuff thats festering in a drawer never seeing the light of day its not really essential is it?? Would you ever have noticed it was gone?

I'd be sad too, we have one of these Drawers. Full of batteries, screwdrivers, seed packets and a million other things that are seldom used but I don't want to bin. Thankfully DH knows how protective I am over 'junk' so always checks when binning!

When do your bin men come round?

it's the beginning of the week. Go fish what your DH threw away out of the bin bags before you put them out.

Well if he's used the drawer as a "memory bank" too then HWBU definitely.

It'd be quite nice to live with someone who actually did throw things away occasionally but I agree that this particular drawer should have been cleared together. I'd put rubber gloves on and go into the bin if some of this stuff is of sufficient sentimental value to mourn it. You mightn't be able to retrieve everything but equally, some of the stuff might be free of sweet and sour sauce.

God no, I'd start obsessing about what treasures were potentionally thrown away, even if I know there was only a load of junk. I'm quite anal about anything with sentimental value, despite the fact that I rarely look through that stuff and sometimes don't even remember what's in it.

You are sooo NBU. Mine does this kind of thing too. Not long ago he got the shoeboxes (all 2 of them) containing special cards, photos etc out of the attic and wanted me to condense them into one and only keep the things I really wanted. Fuck's sake. They went back up unmolested, of course, but he has thrown out no end of other stuff without asking. And still the house is full of crap. Complete bloody mystery.