Stuff is too hard to get rid of

[Clutterbusting]

I want to be free of my stuff. I’m drowning in it. My house is a mess and all that happens when I have a sort out is it gets moved about. I spend money on storage solutions when I need to just get rid.
I want to but where to? Charity shops are picky and I have A LOT to shift. Selling takes too long and I can’t be wasteful so a skip is out. What can I do?
AIBU to think this is just too hard?

Join your local free page on fb. We have one called free up and reuse, I get rid of loads of stuff. Or put it on fb marketplace for free

Honestly it’s not a waste to just throw things away if they have just been sitting in boxes in your cupboards/ garage etc for years. By all means try and give the best things to charity shops or sell them on EBay/ Facebook Marketplace etc but realistically if you are the sort of person who procrastinates and puts things off without a deadline are you going to ever get around to organising sending things off to orphanages abroad etc? That’s not a simple thing to do so it’s much more likely the things will just sit in your cupboard for another decade because you won’t get around to it, they may as well be taken to the tip where they can be recycled and disposed of appropriately because it honestly sounds unlikely you are going to be able to get rid of them all to somewhere useful. That’s not a criticism by the way, I am exactly the same where I struggle to do things without a deadline and hate the thought of waste but I have come to realise that this just means I store things for years until they are so outdated as to no longer be wanted.

In terms of the nicest children's clothes I would have a look if there are any local clothing banks for refugees etc that might take them but if not put them in bags by age/ size and give away free as bundles on Facebook marketplace. The same for the nicer toys and books, donate or give them away as bundles but for anything else just bin it, it’s not ideal but they are no more wasted in the bin than they are sitting unused in your cupboards.

@NearlyAHoarder

Just seen this. I started a de-clutter project 31st and I've done 90 minutes a day.

What had made me put it off for so long was the notion that you're supposed to sort it in to donate, sell, skip.

In the end, the only thing that works for me is skip the lot. If I had to slow myself down deciding which bits were acceptable to a charity shop and then somehow get it there (no car) I'd never get going.

Doesn't it bother you that this is bad for the environment?

I really sympathize with everything the OP has written. It's hard.

I've been trying hard to do this over the last six months. One thing I will say is I've missed nothing I've got rid of, I can't remember what I've got rid of even though it felt important enough to keep for years and years.

Something else I've learnt recently is that Dunelm will take old pillows, duvets, household linen etc for recycling - the clothing bins don't

@Clutterbusting

I’ve started and it feels good. I’m taking a break for lunch and setting a limit for today but I’m happy enough with the sorting I’ve done. Nothings left the house but a bin bag and recycle bag has been filled and are going out shortly.

Excellent start.

So if you can do something each day, in a week you'll be thrilled with yourself.

And the next time your parents give you stuff, don't even open the bag. Put it straight in the bin and tell them that's what you'll do every time. Might stop them forcing their rubbish on you

@TowandaForever

In the grand scheme of things, in this person's case, the environment will survive

It's not always that the person with the clutter has bought too much. My loft is full of the contents of 3 different houses where people have died and we can't bring ourselves to get rid of all their stuff.

@Lovesplasticstraws

That's flytipping is the new cancel the cheque.

Very useful thread and I will seek out the other ones. I am in the position of clearing out my parents' large home. They apparently kept an awful lot of stuff and then acquired more from deceased relatives. As each child moved out their wardrobe space has been taken over by clothes, books, hobby equipment. Yes there might be someone out there that wants this stuff but connecting them to it seems disproportionately wasteful.
Fashions change. China teasets that cost a fortune 50 years ago I can't even give away on Facebook.
Good luck OP.

Your local WI might like the teasets! They love a bit of Retro

@NearlyAHoarder

I don't know why but nothing I try to sell is ever bought so I know that that just slows me down. I once put up a new pair of uggs for sale, they had been for my daughter and were a UK 4, my daughter needed a size 5. I put them up, brand new, half price, in the box, never worn, proof they were genuine. Then I had people questioning that they were genuine, basically strangers abusing me on line doubting the boots were genuine. I'd already said I had proof they were real. It was awful. Then I tried to give them away, I said to my daughter who was about 12 to ask if any of her friends younger sisters might like them, or any friend with size 4 feet. No takers. In the end, I put them in a skip and felt relieved.

I did the same on Ebay.

Had a bidding war. You just need to find the right outlet

@Lillyhatesjaz

It's not always that the person with the clutter has bought too much. My loft is full of the contents of 3 different houses where people have died and we can't bring ourselves to get rid of all their stuff.

Why not?

If you can't use it or display it where you can see it, what's the point?

You sound similar to me, OP. I seem to accumulate stuff like it's going out of fashion. Every now and again I get brutal and just chuck loads of stuff in the bin. Then I get more stuff to fill the empty drawers.
If you really want rid of it all, just bin it.

Dunelm are recycling clean bedding and home textiles
www.dunelm.com/info/about/take-back-scheme
I sort out clean but old, unwearable clothing, mark it as rag then put it into the big bins at our local waste site/supermarkets.
Try local Facebook pages for offering usable but not necessarily saleable household items

@Lovesplasticstraws
I know the cake shop near me would bite your hand off for the tea sets, maybe see if your local (which uses this sort of thing) would like to swap a peice of cake for them. Instead of throwing.

I really like Marie Kondo's decluttering method. There's books / TV series / courses you name it, and she is of course millionaire!

But in short, this is it

Step 1 - Vision. Write down how you want home to look, smell, feel, etc. Collect pics in a gallery in your phone ( not spectacular mansions, just nice rooms being used in the way you'd like to). Go back to your Vision every time you feel you're flagging .

Step 2 - Discard.

If it doesn't spark joy - as in if you don't love it / use it - say thankyou to it and let it go.

Do categories, not locations. So instead of doing that box, that cupboard, that room, do categories in this order, over the entire house, all at once:

Clothes
Books
Paperwork
'Komono' - which means all the rest of your stuff put into categories
Sentimental last of all

Step 3 - Store. Clean your spaces so they're nice and ready to store the things you love, you use, spark joy

Fold, display, organise everything so it all looks lovely.

But start with Vision and keep reminding yourself that's what I want. Not this.

Good luck!

@Pheebs2021 and @Nanny0gg
Thanks for the ideas. There is a nice tea shop in the village I will try them.

If not of use or being used give it to someone who can use it. No point hanging on to stuff you have no need for.
My grandfather(94) has a room
full of packed up boxes, he thinks are good and worth keeping; we're talking 40 yr old paperwork and cheap ornaments, all of it will end up binned when the time comes

@Kitchenmaid I did not know that about Dunelm. Unfortunately a few months ago I had an “f it all” moment and threw loads of old bedding literally in the bin. At least I know now though so thank you.

@ParoxetineQueen Just seen you also mentioned Dunelm. I’ll get sorting out some old bedding and textiles next.

This thread has been so extremely helpful for me.

OP, I do hope you find your way into making your home less cluttered and calmer the way I hope to with mine!

@specialsauce

The thing I find hardest to throw away is my DC's schoolbooks. They send them home every year with about 20 big exercise books filled with all their hard work - I just can't find the heart to recycle all their hard work.

I still have my university books full of notes, tons of essays, journals, revisions folders. It was all such a lot of work I struggle to ditch it.

I have at least 3 big boxes full of all this old work from me and my DC - help me let go of it please someone with your words of wisdom!

I may not be the help you want because I can understand why you keep them and more than that, I see those things as precious. They are the work you've done or the children have done. They are a part of you as you were. As time passes they become an even more priceless record of your or your children's life.

Sometimes you may want to revisit them to recall or rediscover yourself, see what you thought and did or reclaim the subject you studied and be astonished at how well you did and how much you achieved. A time may come when you no longer feel the need to do that.

There are things you could do meanwhile, to reduce what you keep.

Edit them so that you select and keep a sample from each year of the child's work, choosing those that are notable in some way or that most reflect something characteristic of or particular to that child.

You could set yourself a goal to ditch, say half of them initially and work up in stages to a more stringent pruning where you keep only one in four or one in ten.

The same with your own essays and books. Select highlights from your academic studies, keeping those of greatest quality or interest or emotional significance and part with others that are less so.

You could photograph papers that you decide to part with but are not sure about losing, so that you still have a record of them.

For those you keep, decide to use them in some way, for example, reproduce and use quotes or references to the children's work - something funny they wrote or drew - in birthday cards or letters to them. You could frame or display some of them and put them up in a hallway or playroom or bedroom.

With your own work books, I don't know if you'd want to bring some highlights out of the box and into your life but you can still revisit from time to time to sift a few more out and review that part of your life and work, until the time comes when you no longer feel the need to keep them.

I think you have to landfill a lot as fashions change and listing umpteen things with pics on free cycle or gumtree or ebay takes forever and is incompatible with a job and family life

How disgusting! What is the thinking behind that decision?

The disgusting bit is dumping stuff outside charity shops, thereby expecting them to solve the problem of you having too much stuff. As pp have explained multiple times on this thread, often it then needs binning because of the state it was in in the first place, the state it's got into after being dumped, or the fact that charity shops have limited space. They're charities in the sense that they're trying to support good causes, not in the sense that they'll help you get rid of shit.

And I’m done for the day! The awful room is still bloody awful but it’s not quite as awful so that’s something. I am one of those people who wants everything to be done and finished immediately but it’s taken decades to get this way and it will take a long time to get out of it. I will take on the advice given and also doing just one or 2 things a day is better than none so that’s something I’ll also take on board no matter how shitty I feel.

British Heart Foundation collects from your home. Ditto our local council for rehomed refugees.

Please don't listen to posters telling you to dump it in a skip - that's shockingly selfish.

@FleetwoodRaincoat
PP saying skip it are probably noting that some of the stuff is a good age and unlikely to be wanted by anyone else.
Having worked voluntarily, it's quite depressing the crap people
think is acceptable to donate, it needs to be sellable, charity shops have to pay for rubbish to be uplifted.