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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Fecking hoarding by proxy. Anyone else have relatives who do this?

364 replies

TheQueenOfWands · 07/04/2018 11:36

My mum just found an old, filthy, partially deflated football near my house.

It's now in my garden. The same garden which I've recently spent great time and expense tidying up and decorating.

Why? Well, I'll tell you why. Apparently a child will be 'overjoyed' to receive it once it's been cleaned up and reinflated. Also, there's too much stuff in landfill so it's obviously not on to simply throw it out.

Today is my only day off from work. I worked 72 hours last week and 50 this week. I have no interest in laundering footballs and don't have a clue how I'd reinflate it. I also don't know any children, let alone any who would be overjoyed to receive a vaguely scrubbed, badly inflated foot ball.

This isn't the first time she's done this. My parents do this quite a lot.

It's such a shame to throw something out so obviously I have to make use of it or DS would be thrilled with it.

Aaargh!!

Doesn't help that I've recently been decluttering (much love to Marie Kondo) and am happy doing so.

They know this. Yet are still determine to fill my house with crap or visibly recoil when they see me give/throw something away.

OP posts:
OnTheRise · 07/04/2018 11:45

Why didn't you tell her you didn't want it, and refuse to accept it?

MrsMaxwell · 07/04/2018 11:48

My parents do this.

Bought up in the war I think has a lot to do with it

BasinHaircut · 07/04/2018 11:49

My MIL comes over once a week and without fail brings at least a carrier bag’s worth of stuff with her because she thinks we would want it. I generally wait till she has left and either put it in the charity shop bag, the dump pile or the bin.

I tell her every week we don’t need any more ‘stuff’ yet she continues to bring it as if nothing has been said.

nutbrownhare15 · 07/04/2018 11:50

Are you going to put it in the bin?

TheyWantFeedingAgain · 07/04/2018 11:51

My Mum is the same. It's an illness of sorts and I can't change it. It's a horrible thought and I hate myself for thinking it, but I am dreading the time when she dies, and it falls to me (only child) to sort through her things.

RandomMess · 07/04/2018 11:53

There is one MNer who has several relatives that are determined to fill her house with crap to hoarding levels then complain about the state of it. They fill it faster than she can get rid, it's so extreme it's actually a form of abusive control.

As a single parent her and the DC don't deserve anything new or nice and she should be grateful for the literal rubbish they dump on her...

RunRabbitRunRabbit · 07/04/2018 11:53

I refuse to take the items. My house will NOT be turned into the same vile pits as some of my relatives. I don't mind being rude if I have to be because I expect my No to be respected.

I'm sure they bitch behind my back like "Don't take that round you know what Run's like. She doesn't appreciate / is a snob / is wasteful / blah blah blah." I don't care. I can be the bad guy.

CallingDannyBoy · 07/04/2018 11:54

Bin it. Suggest if they want to do this that DS would be thrilled if it had already been cleaned and reinflated before they gave it to you. I get this as well from PIL. I now have 2 garden chairs that they didn’t want as they were too heavy for them. Yes they are heavy, have cushions I don’t have room for and the arm is broken on one. I wish they would ask first.

IAmWonkoTheSane · 07/04/2018 11:56

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Melas · 07/04/2018 11:56

I’ve considered leaving my job because of the hoarder who works on the desk opposite.

Printouts of emails from 2004.....

Throw it away and be extremely strict with her from now on

LittleBearPad · 07/04/2018 11:58

Bin it.
Bin all the things they bring of a similar nature, preferably in front of them.
They may learn.

Birdsgottafly · 07/04/2018 12:03

I go down the absolute refusal route.

I've given my relative, my Marie Kondo book and had long conversations with her about her issues. I've been sensitive and explained to her that other people don't have the same emotional connection to objects/get cheered up by getting stuff and it didn't work. Which I know is because she has deep rooted issues and isn't at the point of recovery, yet.

So I've had to have zero tolerance and I know that a lot of her friends do the same. She switched to buying plants, for people, which she's been stuck with, she doesn't have a garden.

I say zero tolerance but she has left the contents of the full boot of her car, because she needed to fit a wheelchair in and her stuff is still here, two weeks later. I will be putting a time scale on it, though.

MumofBoysx2 · 07/04/2018 12:07

Maybe the reason she gave it to you rather than keep it herself might be a positive thing - maybe in her heart she knows you'll throw it away and sort of agrees with it but can't bear to do it herself. At least you have control over it - you can bin it but it would have been tricky to bin it if she'd taken it home.

pigsDOfly · 07/04/2018 12:07

Take it out of your garden and put it in the dustbin.

Next time she presents you with some piece of rubbish tell her to take it to her house and wash it and repair it.

I know someone like this. When they come to my home they will bring the, often broken, dirty old toys that the grandchildren of their friends have discarded, for my DGC.

Understandably my DD won't take them for her DC so they end up in my bin.

What's the point.

SeamstressfromTreacleMineRoad · 07/04/2018 12:11

Bought up in the war I think has a lot to do with it

How old are you and your parents..? Confused I'm 70 later this year - and I was born years after the war had finished..!

Freudian · 07/04/2018 12:12

This behaviour drives me nuts and its hereditary it seems ! MIL is a hoarder and so is some of her offspring. We keep quite decluttered but are overwhelmed with crap during visits. This also happens at Christmas with gifts.

I like hot sauces so i received a novelty pack of 30 hot sauces from some online catalog... it cost £40. All of them were disgusting and went into the bin. Now a decent quality hot sauce would be like £6 and much more appreciated. Who has room for 30 sauces ?

Elledouble · 07/04/2018 12:15

My in laws are like this. Quantity over quality, always. Bags full of charity shop crap. They have to ask everyone they know if they want something before they throw it out. No, no-one wants your broken, cat-scratched chair. Take it to the tip.

IamtheDevilsAvocado · 07/04/2018 12:16

Hoarding is horrible... At its worse completely wrecks relationships....

Hoarders rarely come independently for treatment... It's often family members who are at their wit's end!

Elledouble · 07/04/2018 12:18

Freudian I’ve had exactly the same! A novelty bucket of mediocre sauces, when I told them the ONE I’d really really love but apparently it “didn’t seem like enough” Confused

viques · 07/04/2018 12:18

I used to live next door to an otherwise sweet old lady who gave me "stuff". The landlord owned both houses and I knew she was his spy so had to keep on her right side. I used to have to sneak them to my friends house to put in her bin so Miss R didn't spot them in our bins.

SomeonesRealName · 07/04/2018 12:20

I just see this as a kindness I do my parents they can’t throw anything away even small scraps of leftover food get foisted on me! I just bin everything and tell them I ate it used it or passed it on. They rarely ask to be fair - I think they are just hugely relieved to be free of the anxiety!

CoolGirlsNeverGetAngry · 07/04/2018 12:22

This in spades!
My MIL went through a load of stuff we bagged up for charity and decided she wanted to keep it. And somehow it all ended up back in our house. I was fucking livid.
It went to charity in the end of course.

CocoPuffsInGodMode · 07/04/2018 12:23

So what if they visibly recoil when you get rid of stuff Confused. It's none of their business and if it really bothers them they're free to fill their own homes with crap.

If you haven't already put that ball in the bin do it right now! Left in the street it was going to end up in landfill so unless you're running some kind of large scale recycling centre from your living room you really can't take responsibility for everything that's thrown away in your town/city.

People don't stop doing this kind of shit while you go along with them. Boundaries and stop caring so much what someone else might think. In your home what you think goes.

Frequency · 07/04/2018 12:24

My mother sort of does this. She doesn't bring things to my house, but if I have anything I want to get rid of, she refuses to let my dad help me with it to the tip, insisting she will 'upcycle' it and/or sell it.

I currently have two tables because the one I bought to upcycle myself and replace my old wrecked beyond repair one is still in bits in the living room waiting for her to upcycle the old one and sell it.

Ditto wardrobes. I have three. I only want one. Two are waiting to be upcycled by her.

I'm a broke single parent. Without my dad to help me move/dismantle things, I'm stuck. Fortunately, he has put his foot down now I'm moving and has given her two weeks to upcycle my old furniture and get it gone or he is helping me to the tip with it.

I don't think he realised just how much space her upcycling projects were taking up in my home until he came to help me move things to my new house.

OTOH, she is already trying to buy a garden table from a charity shop to store in my garden to be upcycled.

RunRabbitRunRabbit · 07/04/2018 12:25

Years ago I mentioned to my grandmother that I had a new pair of slippers that I really loved.

Next time I visited she gave me a bag full of slippers, some new some from jumble sales. That was a WTF moment. The one thing she knew I did not need was slippers.

It was symptomatic of her issues.