92 year old nana pushing belongings on me

[Duemarch2021]

Feel a bit harsh here and wanting an AIBU or not check... also some advice... my 92 year old (young at heart) nan keeps trying to give me her things.. she has openly told me that she is preparing her house for when she is gone! Me and DP live in a tiny 1 bed flat with no storage and have a baby on the way we have NO room whatsoever for anything even things we need.. nan tries to give me trinkets and ornaments..and furniture and clothes.. i say no i have no room everytime but she doesn't learn and makes me look through piles of ornaments from the 80s, she says things like they could be expensive but i dont care and they're not anyway as u can tell... What do i do? She gave me flowery mugs from her cupboard for Xmas me and DP dont drink hot drinks and she sent them through a family member and knows id have said no if shed have offered them in person. She is pushing stuff on me and i feel awful cos if I take it id take it to a charity shop.. i dont want it! Lol help mee.. cant even take the mugs to a charity shop cos of covid..

She also has about 4 flowery sofas all mismatched in the garage from 1970s and asks me to help her get rid as it gets her down and depressed. I took a picture and offered to sell them on Facebook... she was disgusted at that and said she wants to keep them in the family!!... nobody wants them and we are all young and have modern houses that have particular decor... she doesnt realise that things arnt like they were in the 1940s where furniture was passed down for generations

@GeorgiaGirl52

I am guilty of doing the same thing to my children and grandchildren. My oldest daughter rolls her eyes and says "Oh, not another used thing!" It's not the item that is important. It's the story behind it. My mother told me and her mother told her etc. The plate with the pink shepherdess was my great-grandmother's wedding cake plate. The brown vase was a gift for my grandmother when her one surviving son came home from WW2. before you toss it in the garbage or take it to OxFam, maybe ask her the story behind it. After she has the happiness of telling you, maybe you won't see it as trash.

Marie Kondo the Japanese decluttering expert suggests taking photos of things you want to get rid off of but feel you can’t. In your case maybe the photos of some of the more sentimental items could be made into a scrapbook with their stories and then nan would have the comfort of knowing that those parts of her life are going to be family history and not forgotten. Then you can get rid with a clear conscience.

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@GeorgiaGirl52 - absolutely I do not think of my Pil's belongings as trash. Couple of things she asked me to take to auction , I did. I would agree with @Indiemeg - some things have a story & taking a photo and yes a scrapbook is a good idea . But some things - once you know the story & they don't fit into your house well what would we all do if all generations gave you everything they had from all sides of the family - well I guess if you have a huge manor house where everything has been passed down - great - you just move in and live with it all. My Pils did not have a huge manor house - just a nice 4 bedroomed house with an attic and a garage & a shed and there was just simply too much stuff for the sons and daughters to keep "just because" So we do have some photographs and DH & his siblings have all taken a few things which they felt were personal , but by goodness - we could not have taken everything. What we did do was take a couple of things which non of the siblings wanted but were family things and gave them to MIL's brother. He was appreciative.

Where I do agree with you @GeorgiaGirl52 - tell the story early doors. There were some things we kept because MIL had told us the story. But even so we could not have kept everything she had. & frankly - if my Dh or his siblings did not feel emotionally attached to them I do not blame them for selling them or just otherwise disposing. But I see your point.

When my granny died I lived away. I came home as often as I could to help with the clearing and was always horrified by how many beautiful, useful things had been disposed of in the interim. I felt like I was saving things from a fire. I probably managed to salvage about 10% of the things I felt I could use. Decades later I still use those things, mostly repurposed or refashioned to suit my lifestyle and I still feel a bit resentful towards that unimaginative, IKEA flat packery herd mentality that just saw rubbish.
Anyway, what I'm taking an awful long time to say is that every family will have a person like me who might value what others don't- find that person and your problem is solved.

However, the 1970s sofas are a death trap. I'm all for photo frames and vases made out of broken crockery mosaics, sending off silver cutlery to be made into jewellery or making cushion covers out of clothes but if there is a fire a 1970s settee will kill people with the smoke from the foam.
If its important to your nana that they are used you could strip them down, maybe use the fabric for something else?

I agree @IDontLikeZombies, I have my grandmother’s beautiful bedroom furniture. I have vintage glasswear and crockery. The mixing bowl I bake with was hers and I treasure these pieces. My own poor mother has about 8 different inherited dinner services that she has guilt over throwing away, they are never used as she has her own that she chose. We should only keep what gives us pleasure and what we have space for. And we shouldn’t feel obliged to keep something because someone else wanted it.

@IDontLikeZombies -Ah I hope you don't think we had a mentality which just saw rubbish - we tried to give things away - but just no-one wanted them. Actually a friend of my sister in law took a few things , but honestly we could not find anyone else. And there was an awful lot left. But some things were taken and will have been sold on - so some people will have them -some stuff honestly just was recycling things - I took some cooking things - even the house clearance chaps asked me if they could have one or two things. I wish we could have found someone like you - because the problem could have been very much solved - but we honestly couldn't . We tried to the extent we gave a car to the chap round the corner because it needed MOT , new tyres etc & rather than fix insure etc and then sell ( because not dreadfully valuable ) or realistically scrap it - he came to take it away

We did try

@Martinisarebetterdirty I agree with your philosophy , My mother has a 12 place dinner service which was her grandmother's. It 's collectable . It has been passed down to daughters. To my certain knowledge neither my grandmother nor my mother has ever used it. If my brother or his wife wants it - then fabulous - I have a much smaller house than my mother so if my brother does not want it - it will be sold because I just simply don't have the room & it has been kept for tradition's sake. I might sort out a tea service from it and keep that but honestly my mother has a cabinet dedicated to this thing, I do not have that luxury & actually neither she nor I like it that much - but it's a well known make so "can't be got rid of. "

Does it make me dreadful if it ever comes my way I will sell it - and someone else will probably love it but I have a 12 piece dinner service from my wedding 25 years ago - I just don't have room for both.

My Mother has started decluttering, she's approaching 80 and has decided to prepare herself, we've had some frank conversations about the fact that a lot of her furniture was my grandparents and I just don't have room for it and it's not my taste, so it will be discretely sold to an antique dealer or through auction when the time comes, it's not worth huge amounts and it is sentimental but I just don't have room and my DC won't want it. She thankfully accepts that, and realises it's unreasonable to expect it all to be kept. I'll make room for a few ornaments but the vast majority will go.

I'm only in my 40s but trying to keep my possessions to a minimum in case anything happens to me unexpectedly and DD has to deal with it.

Basilik, not at all. It sounds like you tried really hard to find your Womble.
Martinis, years ago I heard the William Morris quote about not having anything that isn't beautiful or useful and I try to live by that. I am a bit sentimental but I'm also pretty conscious that my house doesn't have elastic walls so if I really don't want to throw something away I try to use at least some of to make something we will use.

OP, just to add that DM was appalled (as were her other older neighbours) that her neighbours family had a kind of yard sale when he died, his things being sold so publicly so the idea of putting them on a local Facebook group would be the same for her, undignified.

I also feel that if someone else will love and value a thing as it is that they should have it, I love new life for old things but only if that thing has truly reached the end of its life.

Could you ask her what is genuinely old and what, if anything, belonged to her own parents? It would be a shame to lose that- particularly things like old wedding rings or birth certificates.

However if it’s ornaments from the 1980s YANBU. Just gently say you’re really sorry, you don’t have space, and ask your family members if any of them can take some small bits to placate her.

Don't you have a "things for free" Facebook page? I'd be inclined to take kitchen stuff etc and put it on there and not tell her. We always have people asking for furniture/crockery as they are moving to their first flat etc.

Please be careful about what you pass on to charity shops, I run a charity shop and the amount of unsaleable rubbish we are given is quite shocking ... and then we have the problem of getting rid of it which often costs money (not everything can be responsibly recycled).

I do appreciate it is a real problem, we do get donated some wonderful things but you have to be really ruthless - I know, I have had to clear out several deceased relatives homes myself .

My grandmother had a traditional china cabinet with some valuable antiques in it, including ivory carvings from China that were exquisite but controversial. She loved them as they’d come as part of an inheritance to her from a very wealthy relative and she was extremely proud to own them.
I was left with them to dispose of.
As I carefully lifted the treasures out of their hallowed sanctuary...I discovered they were plastic.
Problem solved.

I have a relative like this. The difference is she actively buys the stuff online or bags up her old clothes and then finds people in the family to offload it to. I used to take it out of politeness as she is housebound and doing it out of boredom possibly, but now I won't take anything as it goes in the bin and if I take it, it encourages her to continue.

Just help her a get rid of stuff as you go x

@Ragwort

Please be careful about what you pass on to charity shops, I run a charity shop and the amount of unsaleable rubbish we are given is quite shocking ... and then we have the problem of getting rid of it which often costs money (not everything can be responsibly recycled).

I do appreciate it is a real problem, we do get donated some wonderful things but you have to be really ruthless - I know, I have had to clear out several deceased relatives homes myself .

I agree wholeheartedly! Our charity is having to pay yet again for a clearance, our bins can't cope! Realising how many donations are unsaleable has made me think hard about what I donate and what I dump.

@Feathersinthehead

My grandmother had a traditional china cabinet with some valuable antiques in it, including ivory carvings from China that were exquisite but controversial. She loved them as they’d come as part of an inheritance to her from a very wealthy relative and she was extremely proud to own them. I was left with them to dispose of. As I carefully lifted the treasures out of their hallowed sanctuary...I discovered they were plastic. Problem solved.

Oh dear! Hope you weren't counting on inheriting a little nest egg!

@Fairyliz

Someone will have to sort everything out when she dies so surely better to do some of it now. When my gran died the council gave us one week to move the stuff out of her house. Imagine sorting it out in that time frame when you are grieving.

On the death of a tenant, both councils I worked for gave the family one rent free week to clear the property, but there was an option to pay rent if they wished to take longer. Perhaps some landlords landlords have different rules, but it is worth asking.

My widowed mum lived in a rented property all her married life, and I had to clear it. I have no siblings. Even though it wasn't a large flat, and she wasn't a hoarder, there was over fifty years of memories, and I needed time to go through everything, so I paid a couple of weeks extra rent, and kept the utilities on until I had cleared and cleaned.

My mum also very elderly tried a few years ago to give me stuff. I have enough ornaments of my own. We moved a few years ago and got rid of a lot of stuff. My DM is now resigned to the thought that her stuff will be sold on or go to a charity shop when she passes. Some charity shops take furniture one near us does. There are a few things I would like as keepsakes but have no room for any of the furniture. If you haven't room then you haven't room so maybe keep a couple of things as keepsakes.

My mother now realises that Royal Doulton ladies are not everybody's cup of tea and though they were expensive in their day they might make £20 on a good day. It's a wee bit selfish imo to impose your taste on someone else and expect them to treasure it the way you do. A couple of things are fine but not everything you own.

Could you sell the sofas online and tell a white lie about a friend or two who have just moved and are skint and desperate for sofas? After all a stranger is just a friend you haven't met yet! is reaching

How do you find out the value or auction stuff? I’d like to do this with a few pieces from my grandparents but don’t know how to start. Before my mother died she pointed out a few things that might have value, so I feel I’d like to go through the process of finding out before just tipping them.

I don’t think the op can take up most of these suggestions if she’s heavily pregnant with first baby. It takes time and physical effort to sort through a load of stuff, take photos for eBay, list it, package it up for posting or arranging couriers, taking it to the post office. Really not a process that someone with a newborn can or would want to realistically embrace in the middle of a pandemic. Can anyone else help or take this on?

I agree with finding out the story behind items, photographing them then binning. My children take photos when I want to dispose of their broken stuff (think toys where the plastic has split and has sharp edges, lots of piece missing and never played with, dressing gown too small with no cord and the loops broken).

@GeorgiaGirl52

I am guilty of doing the same thing to my children and grandchildren. My oldest daughter rolls her eyes and says "Oh, not another used thing!" It's not the item that is important. It's the story behind it. My mother told me and her mother told her etc. The plate with the pink shepherdess was my great-grandmother's wedding cake plate. The brown vase was a gift for my grandmother when her one surviving son came home from WW2. before you toss it in the garbage or take it to OxFam, maybe ask her the story behind it. After she has the happiness of telling you, maybe you won't see it as trash.

I agree with this...it is the memory some items hold. I was having a lot of difficulty getting rid of some things from attic last summer. I’m in my mid fifties and beginning to be of mindset of “don’t get more stuff” that’ll be dumped on my kids after I die. After I thought about it a bit I took a lot of photos of the items and then binned them. If I want to be reminded of memories I can look at photos. The things I kept were things that had memories related to touch and sounds - where I wouldn’t have got the same effect from a photo

I think the idea of sitting with her and going through items and asking about memories and documenting/photographing these may be a way to make her feel she will be remembered and more inclined to let the actual stuff go

I sympathise

My lovely nan was obsessed with me having a wing back chair of hers. My DH sat in it once when he came over and said it was comfortable. That was it. Every visit she wanted me to take it with me. Never mind that it wouldn't fit in my car! I really think she fixated on it. She always said things like "you're going to have a job clearing this house". We did but it was OK and I kept some small items. The best things are the little things like photos. Not the ugly trinkets or furniture.

Bless her. But stick to your guns. You'll always remember her with or without her stuff around you.

A word on sofas: nowadays there are strict fire safety regulations and a lot of charity shops won't take them without a fire safety label. So fire safety could be your get out clause there.