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

[TheQueenOfWands]

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.

How’s it going op?

How is it going?

Your title made me laugh! My DML who can't bear to let go of family "antiques" has filled our house with so much old furniture it looks like a junk shop. She's convinced it's all worth a mint but is sadly deluded !

My Mum tried being generous like this years ago, bedding clothes even out of date chocolate. Quite mean so she got a buzz out of helping me when I was struggling, I would keep them for a while then secretly bin, only encouraged her.
Put my foot down, refused stuff and made her take stuff home. Very huffy but after several refusals, she got the message. Over the years, tried the odd charity shop item and this is from a well off woman. Refused every time. Love me home and try to keep tidy reused to have it trashed with dross. Now not a problem. Others in same position, you have to do the same and be firm. Don’t be affected by their hurt feelings as they do not care about what you want or feel

Oh, I am glad to have found this thread.
My mother (war baby/rationing/every item has an emotional connection) is always trying to foist stuff on me. I am vehement about what I will and won't take. She did make some beautiful skirts in the 1970s. Yes, I will accept those with gratitude. No, I will not accept your worn out gardening trousers, with holes at the knees, even if you cry at me.
The latest thing is buying novelty mugs and giving them to my daughter. It has got to the point where I said I wouldn't allow another in the house. "Oh, but my Granny gave me a coronation mug in 1953, I should give one to my granddaughter." No! That was a fraught conversation, where I just kept reiterating, through gritted teeth, that we wouldn't be grateful, we would infact be angry with her and it she would be wasting her money.
She remains resentful that I say no and won't back down. Clearing her house, when the time comes, will involve several skips.
It's such a waste of money, endlessly buying stuff!

I'm glad you said this. I love my mum to bits but she's sooo difficult to deal with and gets worse with every year. Everyone thinks I should just say 'no mum, that won't work for me' or 'actually I don't believe you're going to upcycle that discarded bread bin because you've never once in your whole life ever upcycled anything' but I know this is just chucking petrol on the fire.

She won't change. She won't learn. I just smile and say yes mum then bin whatever it is later. You can't reason people out of deeply set behaviour and I can't be arsed with drama so she can have at it, I don't have to live in her shit tip of a house.

My parents are hoarders, every time I am with them, every time, they try to give me plastic bags full of rubbish that I don’t want. I have to physically hand the stuff back, leave it at their door and lock my car or they will be trying to stuff it into the car. They are so generous and are constantly buying me things but I don’t want them!

My mum (also a war baby) was a terrible hoarder. A few years ago she was too frail to live in her 4 bed house any longer so she moved into a beautiful brand new one bed retirement flat.

It took her brother, my sister and I over 3 months to clear her house. By that point she was living between the bedroom and the kitchen and couldn't get into the other rooms because so much stuff was piled up. Literally floor to ceiling boxes of stuff she'd bought and most of it unused. We donated/sold as much as we could but most of it was just pound shop/woolies type junk that no one wanted and it ended up going to the dump. She had over 100 unused umbrellas, literally 100s of the pencils and tape measures they give away in Ikea, over 900 unused skeins of embroidery threads, about 40 unused embroidery kits, about 50 pairs of reading glasses etc etc. and It was obscene.

We did find some nice useful things that I took to her new flat. On every occasion she had completely forgotten ever buying the item and reprimand me me wasting my money.

She only stayed in her lovely flat a year before she had a fall that left her so weak she needed to move into a nursing home. In just a year she had accumulated similar levels of unwanted, unneeded stuff in her new home. I particularly remember the two radiator brushes (the flat had underfloor heating) and a long lighter thing to light a gas burner (the flat had an electric hob).

sadly she is now bedbound so can't go shopping for tat anymore. On one level I'm relieved but it's also sad - without the thrill of bargain hunting and hoarding her life seems quite empty and I think it's negatively effecting her cognitive function.

Haven’t gone through the entire thread but my impression is that many most posters are ungrateful. You know why people behave in this way yet you don’t consider this when you gaily throw what they’ve brought into a bin. So rude

Oh and not all people born during WW2 turned into “hoarders”. 🙄

I imagine most posters on this thread live in grey zones, with grey laminate flooring and zero character. Ugh

Before anyone tries to say I am a hoarder, congratulations on being completely wrong. Unlike so many here, though, I do appreciate people who collect too much stuff have a problem. Poor souls.

Yeeeeaaah, right

Biin bags of dirty, second hand, dangerously broken toys, jigsaw puzzles missing at least one piece, stained, unwashed clothes, small pieces of broken furniture all salvaged from bins, skips, pavements and charity shops, all dirty, badly stored and absolutely revolting

Hoarders value the worthless as valuable and believe they're doing good by making sure these items don't get thrown away

They don't care that these items are unwanted, insanitary and useless, they enjoy the show of gifting this shit

Bought up in the war I think has a lot to do with it
Oh and not all people born during WW2 turned into “hoarders”.

Indeed so. DM always used the excuse that she hoarded because she lived through the war. DF lived through exactly the same war, and also grew up with many fewer possessions and was not a hoarder at all.