DH driving me spare with clutter

[Failedspinster]

I'll try and stay concise here.

My DH is not quite a hoarder, but a terrible accumulator of Stuff - books, clothes, DVDs, etc. We live in a smallish house and have two children here full time, plus DSS part time, and the levels of clutter are making me a bit claustrophobic. Our hallway cupboard is full to the ceiling and we can't find anything in there without taking everything out. Bookcases are double stacked and often have books piled on top of them too, and every surface is a magnet for clutter. It's hard to find stuff, and I'm constantly tidying up to keep the place relatively clean.

i used to be almost as bad as him, but i have decluttered most of my stuff and it's now reaching an acceptable level. DH still has shedloads of stuff - he promises endlessly to declutter but only ever does a tiny bit at a time. Then he will often insist that he needs to eBay stuff rather than donate it, which means it sits in a box for ages waiting for him to list it.

I have repeatedly (and supportively) raised this with him to no avail - he just gets defensive, and says that he is getting rid of things, or will do, usually while buying more. He says he has no time to do it because of work, housework or our new baby, or this month he's doing NaNoWriMo - but I've asked him all the way through my pregnancy and before it too, and he still never did it! I've suggested a five minute declutter every night, or filling one bag of stuff to get rid, or cleaning off one shelf at a time, ive even sat down with him and done bits, and it sometimes helps but more often not. I'm so fed up.

We're now reaching critical mass. Our baby is due to go in his own room after Christmas, a room which is currently DSS' room when he's here. It's full of DH's clutter, like everywhere seems to be. And nothing ever gets cleared out! With two small children here full time, we really don't have enough space for all this. He accepts this, but still won't commit to actually getting rid of any substantial amount. AIBU? And if IANBU, how can I make this happen?

I feel like getting a skip and chucking it all.

tetanusburger.blogspot.ca/

hevsblogs.blogspot.co.uk/

Show him these blogs and ask if he wants his children to be writing the equivalent in twenty years.

List it on ebay for him (take some of the money earned for your contribution)

Totally understand. We have a small house too and it's very important to keep clearing out and to keep on top of it otherwise it gets out of hand.

I would like to suggest the following.

Don't ever get storage as others have warned, but I think you know that.

Get a floor to ceiling book case made for a suitable spot in the house, make it deep enough for 2 rows of books.

Meanwhile continue to declutter anyway, even if he is not investing himself in the process. Sounds like you have a bit more to do yourself anyway so keep going.

You need to let him see you touching his stuff, if he objects you just say "moving stuff around! Cleaning up!"

While you do this get rid of his stuff too. Anything broken, worn out or smelly. Get rid of anything you just know for sure is easily replaceable cheaply. Get rid of just in case items, things like a spare toaster, or spare old style TV set, or spare backup washing up bowl. (random things)

Find things that are just silly and of no use to anyone, things like out of date tour guide books, a biography of Ant and Dec, unwanted gifts with no use to anyone. Old birthday cards. What I am saying is clearly identify the crap.

In the cd's get rid of any broken boxes and take out the cd.

What sort of thing does he have that's getting in the way?

I think you need to get him to move the stuff rather than sort it. He's not done it before and he's been asked so now concentrate on getting it out of your way.

If you can let him have sole use of the shed and get as much stuff as you can in there, he's a hoarder even if you had a massive house he would fill it, and stuff you throw away will be replaced with other crap.

Just aim to get it out your way

I hear what you say, 2mins but in my experience, it doesn't work like that. Allowing him to use the (currently empty) shed would likely just 'validate' his collecting and open a door for him to continue. The house would probably fill up again within weeks.

I'm sorry if I sound pessimistic but my experience is that you can't deal with collecting/hoarding by attempting to manage the stuff - but by encouraging the person concerned to address their own issues.

It's usually unsuccessful in the longer term, I'm afraid.

Yy I would go with picking a room that is 'his' and that's the only place his stuff goes. By stuff I mean the crap he thinks is too important to part with but is obviously crap. Then keep on top of it so if something appears elsewhere you move it to the designated room. It's a compromise of sorts. It doesn't cure the OCD/hoarding tendency but makes life better for you.

Sadly, I have no answers to the problem - stuff to be sold/ bayed is boxed in the loft for a rainy day..... husband has been a hoarder all our married life ( 38 years!) and untidy . It was always the DCs mess he complained about- until they left and it was still messy. most of his stuff is 'it will come in useful stuff.' Luckliy we changed one of the now spare bedrooms into a man cave - he is allowed to be as messy as he likes in there. and as long as the door is shut I'm fine with that.

Mine tells me hates the mess & agrees that no he doesn't need the thirty years' worth of car magazines but won't tackle it & won't let me deal with his stuff. It makes me want to leave him. Every flat surface in every room is covered in his stuff. If he has a bit of a tidy in the lounge because we're having visitors hardly ever he collects it up & hides it somewhere else.

My DH is just the same. It's horrific. We just put our house on the market though which has forced a sort out. Can you move? Drastic but it's working for me.

Yy I would go with picking a room that is 'his' and that's the only place his stuff goes.

But the OP doesn't have a spare room for him to fill with crap, otherwise it wouldn't be so much of a problem. And why should he get to monopolise space that the family need to live in just because he is unable or unwilling to deal with his problem. By all means, if he is making an effort to de-clutter, then giving him time and space to facilitate that is supportive, but he's just embarked on an unnecessary and time-consuming writing project so he's clearly prioritising his needs over those of his family which is not on.

We have a spare room filled with crap, a dining room filled with crap, an office filled with crap, the extra spare bedroom that is supposed to be becoming a bedroom filled with crap. The other rooms have a lighter sprinkling of crap.

We have a big 5 bedroomed house & live in ? of the available space at the most. The loft is chocka, the garage is full - so full that my & DS's bicycles are in the kitchen & my mountain bike is in the greenhouse

Oh how I wish for a room that I could dump fit all of DH's crap into.

Oops - the extra spare bedroom is supposed to be becoming another office - DH's, so I can have his old office - it will never bloody happen - my office is currently a bureau in the spare room

It's sad to see that there are so many people living with this level of clutter. I can understand the feeling of not wanting to get rid of things, but I can't understand allowing that feeling to impinge on your family's enjoyment of their home. Have any of the hoarders on this thread sought help to allow them to tackle whatever is at the root of their desire to surround themselves with stuff? Is it something that is particularly hard to manage or is it just that most of them are in denial that they have a problem?

I've realised reading this that actually my husband isn't so bad :) - though he does hoard its either in the loft, in his workshop and now an overflow in his man cave. The main living areas he's never impinged on- well only in the corner where his little bookcase is hidden by the sofa

Should my DS ever get married his DW will be writing this in the future. He has Asperger's syndrome and he has to have all the equipment for whatever his current obsession is. Currently our spare bedroom and his room are full of various clothes, DVDs, magazines etc.
I hope someone comes up with a solution!

My name is Penelope and I am a hoarder.

There, I've admitted it. With me it is the emotional attachment- I can chuck some stuff out, but some things I like and want to keep as they mean something to me, but we maybe do not have the room to put them out at that moment. So they are stored in the back of cupboards. If my DH took them and then threw them out on the basis that I had not missed/used them in a couple of weeks, I would be furious. There have been occasions where I have got rid of things then regretted it later because I then had a use for them.

I also found it hard to get rid of things from my childhood (we are currently clearing out my parent's house, they were hoarders too). So just to put the other point of view- some people just emotionally can't let go of some things, if they are not your things you may not understand the value of them to the other person. Talk to your DH by all means, but please don't just chuck out without consulting. That is harsh.

I don't like throwing things away and I am terrible at the "I'll ebay it" and then never do. I drive my husband insane as he is Mr Clean and Tidy at all times. The only thing he's kept is his maths and scientific notes from Uni as he periodically looks something up in them. I keep birthday cards, Christmas cards etc etc from people, my childrens artwork (all of it). Periodically DH gets hold of some of it first and it goes in the bin. What happens if the unthinkable happens and they are no longer with us - it's all I'd have to remember them by. Equally, what happens if DH or I die - they will have things we have written/done with them to remember us by. Books - nobody touches my books - they are beautiful and precious. DH bought me a kindle, which I use all the time...and if I read a good book on it, I buy it for real, so I have pages to turn and something to touch and love. Now, my children can read - all the more books to buy. We have moved country twice in the last five years and I HATED the sort out, but I had to do it. So I did get rid of books - ones that had upset me and I knew I would never read again. Magazines, I really struggle with getting rid of, just in case I need to read that article again or I might cook that lovely looking meal (I hate cooking).

I do try really hard to have specific areas that are clean and tidy, because I know how upset he gets at the mess. I actually think its a problem for him, not just because he doesn't like it - it really really distresses him (childhood issues).

DH hates it when I cry and am upset. Does yours? Stare at the hallway cupboard and cry - maybe he'll get rid of a little bit?

I know that I appear to be advocating manipulation of DH through tears. I have never done it, but desperate measures are called for and if he feels that he is helping you......

I can understand not wanting to get rid of things - I keep things that are important to me, selected toddler artwork, particularly nice or meaningful birthday cards, hand-written letters etc, but DH thinks I'm cold & unsentimental about things.

I'm not, it's just that my requirement for keeping things is about set about 95% lower than his. He would keep literally every single Christmas card, even ones from companies' mailing lists, every crumpled toddler daub, every bus & train ticket - everything .

Most of it he doesn't even really look at - every Christmas he asks me to keep the cards as he hasn't looked at them yet. At the end of every January I sling them all (apart from the ones that are special/meaningful to me) without his having looked at them

Tears don't work, btw - I have tried talking, negotiating, shouting, offering to help, offering to do it myself & tears. He just tells me I'm being ridiculous, that he hates the mess too & wants to sort it out. And the years roll by...

Wine
Both of my parents are dead and I promise you I have no problem remembering them without things to remind me. That is not to devalue the things you might keep but to reassure you that you remember people because of the times you have had with them not because of Christmas and birthday cards. A few momentos are lovely but if you keep loads of them then how can they all be special.

A lot of Magazines have on line archives so you could still find the information / article / recipe if you really needed it.

Witchway - I think your husband needs professional help. Sign him up for the C4 show at a minimum.

I don't know if its possible to get a professional surveyor in, but I have a neighbour who it turns out is a bit of a hoarder. I don't think of the scale that you see on TV, but definitely the type with books piled high and boxes of essential paper, stacks of magazines everywhere.

There was a small fire in her house after a lightening strike and when the insurance assessor came by, they refused to get anyone in to do the work until the house had been cleared down so people could work safely, get ladders in and out, get into the loft to sort the roof etc. It's taken her a year to clear stuff out during which time she's had to live in alternative accommodation free of charge as it's a friend which is presumably why it has taken so long to get there.

The only reason I would advocate storage is that is what they seem to often do on the Hoarder programmes. Rent a big space and put everything out onto tables so it can be sorted through. Expensive only for TV option really though. Bog standard storage is pretty expensive.

Paper is a huge issue though - it was only because there were witnesses to the lightening strike and the fire brigade where there in minutes that her house [mid terrace] didn't go up like a petrol laden bonfire.

I wouldn't want the humiliation (for him or me) of the C4 programme.

I expect I'll leave him in the end.

The weird thing is that I'm actually quite messy - messier than him certainly if we're away & living out of suitcases. I just don't keep unnecessary stuff, or rather stuff that I suspect 95% of people would consider unnecessary.

I think Witch has hit on it here - it's about accepting that you can't keep everything and getting good at identifying what is truly important to keep. My DH has only just started to accept that he can't keep everything. He was the only child of a lone mum and when he was a child and his stuff got too much to fit in his room, his mum let him have the spare room to keep the overflow in - he was never made to clear it out or decide what to keep. So I think he needs to practise! He's also a collector, which means that he often acquires or wants to keep stuff that he doesn't really like because it forms part of a larger collection.

He is very keen to start getting the house nice for Christmas, when family come, and wants to repaint the kitchen. I've agreed he can, on condition that we declutter the sitting room (which contains only a small amount of his clutter, plus some of mine and a lot of DS1's) before he starts painting. I think this might be a manageable place to start practising, and we've agreed to tackle DS1's toys and books together tonight. (DS1 is 2.6.) I think it might be easier for him to learn to declutter using someone else's stuff first!

All the replies I've had have made me think hard about how and why he hoards, and about my own emotional reaction to it - as a PP said, I get angry and upset that his clutter occupies space our family needs, and I actually stopped my own decluttering when I realised that his stuff was moving into the spaces I'd created by getting rid of things that in some cases I would have quite liked to keep! I do feel now that I'm more willing to approach the issue piece by piece, room by room, which I think will feel more manageable to him than dire mutterings about hiring a skip while he's at work - which is where I was getting to before!

Have you suggested things like taking photos of items that have sentimental value but that don't actually have any function or purpose being in the house? Then he can still look at the photos and enjoy the memories and associations without needing the actual item itself. Same with sentimental clothing - having favourite clothes from the past or baby clothes made into a quilt can offer the chance to collect the memories together in a practical form that still has all the emotional attachments but keeps them out and in use rather than stored away somewhere that will only end up getting looked at once i n a blue moon.

With books, I look at the price on Amazon and if I can buy a second hand copy for a few quid, I consider whether it is worth getting rid of it and buying it again in the future if I regret the decision - kind of like a storage fee for someone else owning the book until I want it again (and usually that is actually never, but it's nice to know you have the option.). I also use a charity shop which send me emails (quarterly I think) which tell me how much money they have raised from selling items I have donated, which makes me realise just how much more other people are benefiting from my old stuff than I would have done.

Maybe if you could offer him some of these suggestions to show that you aren't completely unsympathetic to the emotions attached to these things, he would feel happier about getting rid of stuff, and if he has a good motivator as well then hopefully he will start to enjoy having more space and a less cluttered lifestyle and just carry on once he's got going!