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?

I like the idea of American style garage sales as a way to declutter. I know it's not really a thing in the UK but I wish it was because car boot sales are a bit of a faff.

I feel your pain OP. Clearing out years of stuff can be really daunting. Start small, say one black bin bag at a time. Sometimes you get on a roll and manage more. I think we are put under pressure not to be wasteful and consider the environment etc, but your mental wellbeing is just as important. if you are nervous about charity shops refusing, just box, bag and bin. I personally try to use charity shops and charity bins and find it liberating now that i'm doing it more and more. I started with one bag from my wardrobe and got better each time. Also ask people you know if they want specific items for themselves or others. Good luck.

You need to do some internet research. There are many cash for clothes sites and sites that will give you a list of what can be recycled where. Look for local dress agencies. Concentrate on one type of thing at a time. EBay the good stufff. Stock up in parcel bags and list say 6 things a week. Use freecycle/Freegle for the stuff that won’t sell. I’ve even put stuff in the garden with a sign saying ‘Free - please take’. Make lists, set achievable targets and tackle one manageable area at a time.

Lots of places to get rid of your free/unwanted items. Local Facebook groups, shelters, free ads, charities... Animal rescue places will take old bedding and towels.

Try reading Maria Kondos book or watch her methods of youtube/ netflix. The experts reckon you ought not buy storage boxes as it encourages you to keep stuff you dont need. Ms Kondo suggests you thank the item before disposing of it . This helps ease the guilty conscience . Dont keep items that " will come in handy " because they rarely do.

www.icollectclothes.co.uk/

This charity collector collects from your home on a specified day/time and you can choose from a selection of charities to donate to. This might make it easier to get rid of stuff if getting to the charity shop is a bit of a faff.
I haven’t used it myself but have heard good things.

Also, sometimes I find researching and organising to sell on ebay for example just creates stress and adds to the “mental load”. Plus I have to store those items again.

It’s easier to just get rid i.e. give away for free or bin. Recently I put a few things online for sale or for free and if they were not bought or collected in a week I put them in the bin. I don’t like waste but also it’s not good for my mental health to have too much stuff and to have to organise/store it.

Just to say, not all charity shops are bursting at the seams and unwilling to take large donations. We have taken around 30 bags of things to 2 charity shops in the last week and both were extremely thankful and thrilled with the donations. They said they hadn't received so much in years and were low on new donations. It was all good quality stuff that should sell easily so that helps, but there was no suspicion or ill feeling for it all being donated at once.

I took two sets of things last week to charity shops. One shop was quite grudging, the other delighted to receive the things. None of the donations were rubbish, all was stuff I would have happily have still worn if it fitted.

So you can guess which shop will get my donations next time.

Charity shops used to take everything but because people are getting "fussy" and wanting "something for virtually nothing" they end up having to get the items removed which could be at cost to them. My daughter dressed my granddaughter in designer clothing when she was a toddler (not my ideal) and we had a boot fair we put very realistic prices on the clothes nothing was more than £5 but amazingly little interest. One lady asked the price of a dress that had cost my daughter £60 and when she was told it was £5 she dropped it and it landled in the dirt. Totally disgusting behaviour. We eventually got rid of the items by offering a buy one get one half price. I would not have been surprised if I saw the items in a second hand clothes shop selling for so much more - that is the way the world has changed.

@Twinkleylight

I like the idea of American style garage sales as a way to declutter. I know it's not really a thing in the UK but I wish it was because car boot sales are a bit of a faff.

Our Village FB group organised a Jumble Trail. Sorted out and sold maps of it in aid of the church. Loads entered and it was very successful.

Garage or front yard 'free' sale. Poster up outside house. Post on local facebook groups. I'd do A 'Next Saturday come and get freebeeies post' then day before a 'Coming tomorrow: the great give away - come and look'. Hopefully the day is a nice day and will clear a lot of the clutter. After that post individual items on a Freecyle/ilovefreegel/trashnothing type web site.
Alternatively find local housing assistance charity - always wanting kitchen stuff, white goods, furniture and sometimes clothes for people being moved from hostel to first flat

So much faffing.

Just get a skip. Job done.

How can a charity shop be picky when you leave the bags of stuff outside?

Please don't do this! Most charity shops plead with their customers NOT to leave stuff outside. It gets wet, it gets damaged, it gets passing dogs weeing on it. And stuff gets donated that they can't shift.

I think decent clothes, books, homeward and kids toys will always be welcomed by most charity shops, OP. Larger items of furniture can go to places like Emmaus or go on Freeecycle. The problem is a lot of our rapidly defunct technology. My local shop no longer accepts CDs and DVDs because they can't shift them. Music Magpie might take more recent ones. Otherwise it's the tip.

I agree @mathanxiety
If i had to divide every thing in to 3 piles to sell, donate and skip, nothing would ever get done

Get a skip and be wasteful. Stuff is already wasteful cluttering up your stairs!

@Cocopopsss

www.icollectclothes.co.uk/

This charity collector collects from your home on a specified day/time and you can choose from a selection of charities to donate to. This might make it easier to get rid of stuff if getting to the charity shop is a bit of a faff.
I haven’t used it myself but have heard good things.

Also, sometimes I find researching and organising to sell on ebay for example just creates stress and adds to the “mental load”. Plus I have to store those items again.

It’s easier to just get rid i.e. give away for free or bin. Recently I put a few things online for sale or for free and if they were not bought or collected in a week I put them in the bin. I don’t like waste but also it’s not good for my mental health to have too much stuff and to have to organise/store it.

Just a word of warning about www.icollectclothes.co.uk/ Spurred on by the idea I booked a slot on Saturday and was given Tuesday 11th January as the collection day. I spent a good part of yesterday bagging things up only to receive an email this morning to say they don’t collect in my area! I’m so disappointed, especially as I am partially disabled and find it very tiresome taking bags to charity shops.

@Nannewnannew that is disappointing. Are there any local charities that would collect? We have a small local charity and they collected clothes from me on Sunday afternoon. That is all they take though.

I have used www.icollectclothes.co.uk/ before and they are great. Also spurred on by this thread I booked a collection for tomorrow, and my car is now full of bags of miscellaneous stuff.

Nannewnannew

^Just a word of warning about www.icollectclothes.co.uk/
Spurred on by the idea I booked a slot on Saturday and was given Tuesday 11th January as the collection day. I spent a good part of yesterday bagging things up only to receive an email this morning to say they don’t collect in my area! I’m so disappointed, especially as I am partially disabled and find it very tiresome taking bags to charity shops.^

Do you fall into any of these postcodes? thehandofhelp.co.uk/

Or this one: clickcollectclothes.co.uk/arrange-a-collection

The RSCPA charity shop took my daughter's teenager music CDs I took down there last week by the way and I asked if they wanted them and they said yes. We do have quite a lot of old people around here so I suspect they like them. Also one of my sons happily took about 10 first for himself even though he's student age.

@GloriaSicTransitMundi Thank you so much for both those links, unfortunately neither of them collect from my postcode! It would have been helpful if www.I collect clothes.co.uk/ checked the postcode before giving a delivery day.
@CheltenhamLady I’m trawling through the local charities to find one that can come out and collect.

Just a note on what is going on here -

The OP has identified a problem, namely a house full of accumulated clothing and other items, and all the stuff is having a negative impact on her quality of life.
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.
People with this sort of problem have a mental health issue commonly known as hoarding. Hoarding is not healthy.

The solution to the problem is to take steps to stop the attachment to inanimate objects, the sense of obligation toward them, the sense that they are a part of your life and you owe them care and consideration.

Hence the advice to make the decision that they are no longer part of your life, you have no emotional attachment to them, get a skip, dump the lot, and move on.
Resolve to do better in future, don't buy stuff you won't use.

Anything else - all the faffing with this or that charity - is enabling the problem that lies at the base of hoarding, which is inappropriate emotional involvement with inanimate objects. Catastrophising about the impact on the environment of one more skip of clothing and knick knacks is inappropriate emotional attachment and is holding the OP back from making the decision and devoting a week to clearance.

'Perfectly usable' is hoarder talk.
What it means is passing on the problem of stuff you don't want so that it can fill up someone else's house and cause them misery. It is failure to move on. People using that language are keeping the OP trapped in the hoarder mindset.

The idea that she would be doing people favours by freeing up 'perfectly usable' junk for them to buy is a fallacy. It's just a way of avoiding decision-making, avoiding real change, and the hand wringing about the environment is another example of failure to make a break with her habits of mind around inanimate objects.

She must make changes to her mindset in order to shake to shake the mental load off her back. The best way to change is to decide it has no part in her life, no claim on her care, and to get rid of it all.

I agree. That's what puts me off clearing stuff out. I've not car and although people may judge me for not sorting everything in to three piles, the guilt about not doing just that meant that I let two years of clutter build up. I'm not done yet. Have to do under the stairs and a few cupboards. I'm going to try and buy less in 2022 but it's landfill the moment your purchase it. So I will just have to take some comfort from the fact that although I'm putting bags in a skip, I am not putting a car on the road to contribute to that environmental problem. I'm doing my best. That feeling that I OUGHT to sort things in to three piles had me paralysed for nearly 2 years. So glad I finally decided to just over ride the guilt (which is still there) and throw it all in to a skip.

[quote Nannewnannew]@GloriaSicTransitMundi Thank you so much for both those links, unfortunately neither of them collect from my postcode! It would have been helpful if www.I collect clothes.co.uk/ checked the postcode before giving a delivery day.
@CheltenhamLady I’m trawling through the local charities to find one that can come out and collect.[/quote]
@Nannewnannew that's a pity - have you tried googling charity collections your postcode and seeing if anything comes up?

@NearlyAHoarder - don't give up on yourself. Keep at it. You will free yourself.

The FOG - Fear, Obligation, and Guilt - that people feel about doing a big, once-and-for-all clearout is the same FOG that keeps people in unhealthy relationships with other human beings.

Fear of the change they are contemplating, and fear of judgement.
Obligation - an emotional attachment to inanimate objects, a sense of identification with them, too much care about where they will end up even when they are causing misery in your own home.
Guilt - guilt about the environment, guilt about the waste of 'perfectly usable' junk, the money spent, the time spent buying it and managing it all, the time spent hiding it all and the feelings of shame around all of that.