To be so angry sorting out my parents stuff

[DazedorBemused]

I've just cleared another carload of stuff from my parents attic. They were born either side of WW2, and talked. Talked so much about rationing, poverty, striking, unions, etc.
My brother was occasionally ill as a child. To compensate he had fancy Lego, computers when they first came out, hand held video games.
The contrast between his pricy toys and my enjoy your family board game type stuff is obvious.
Then my parents got into collecting stuff - porcelain, dinner services, up scaled their Christmas decorations again and again.

I'm sorting through all this stuff and finding receipts for expensive trivial stuff in the early 90s when I was at uni, working two term time jobs and full-time in the holidays and I'm a 50 year old woman upset at having to go to the tip again.

Yes....I had to phone up The Reader's Digest to stop them mailing my mum. Explained that she had Alzheimer's and kept agreeing to their offers in the hope of winning a prize. Amazingly, they sorted it out. (I didn't have POA at that time.)

I explained the situation - told them that Dad upset and didn't know how to fix things. (He had English as a second language, so Mum had always done the paperwork.)

I told them that we wanted to keep the subscription going, but not to send Mum any more books with 'free gifts', etc. I was lucky: the call handler was a sympathetic young woman and she sorted it out.

OP I can so relate 🤗🤗 hang in there. These emotions are normal and the people piling on probably haven't been through probate/house clearing etc

how on earth do they expect elderly parents to empty lofts, garages out etc, conveniently just before they pop their clogs so you don’t have to bother

They quite reasonably expect them to clear out before they get to the point where they are too elderly to do so, or ideally not fill the house with crap in the first place?

Honestly, I'd have settled for my DF NOT buying eight spare wall clocks in the last 11 months of his life, which nicely complemented the two spare electric grater/spiralisers he bought during the same period (in addition to the one already open in the cupboard, and this was a guy who bought grated bloody carrots and beetroots in 2.5kg catering jars anyway.)

If the frail, elderly relatives had got a handle on their hoards before they became, frail elderly, that would have helped a lot.

Help probably was offered to aging, late middle aged parents, but more than likely refused

Yes, it is actually quite reasonable not to want someone to keep receipts for 30 years.

I do know people who have decided to have a clear out but do so by palming their stuff on to other people. One, in particular, was very insistent that their things were going to be useful to the person they wanted to take them and she was quite upset when the person said that there was no way they had room for it. It's easy to overestimate how valuable or useful something will be to someone else (like a set of encyclopedia) - particularly if they cost quite a lot.

I counted 17 dusty bottles of bubble bath in my (perfectly capable of carrying things to the bin) mum’s bathroom the other day.

Some people really struggle with the idea that an item doesn't have any value. They use charity shops and reluctant relatives to try and assuage their guilt about throwing things away.

Please have some sympathy for the partners of hoarders. I've been telling my husband for years that I won't always be able to crawl around in the loft getting stuff for him. I've spent years trying to sort things out but I've realised I'm doing the equivalent of rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic. I honestly don't know what to do, I can still get up in the loft but I'm in my 70s and won't be able to do it forever.

My plan, if I outlive him, is that I will hire a local handyman who has done a few jobs for us to come and empty the loft and garages and shed and help me put the majority of stuff in a skip and I will then try to sell the other stuff. Even that has a time limit on it. I have to be honest and say I try not to think about it as it is so depressing.

@Waitfortheguinness the issue is they shouldn’t have let it get that bad in first place and decluttered while they were able to do it. My MIL has been saying since her mid 50s she’s downsizing and will die living in a horribly cluttered mostly uninhabitable house. She hasn’t let us in for years. She’s resistant to any offers to help eg we’ve offered to get a skip. BIL took time off work and she faffed and procrastinated.
My mum in contrast takes a bag to charity shop regularly by bus, donates to church or school sales eg unwanted toiletries and often says to me she’s sat sorting paperwork if it’s been too bad weather to go out.
No one is saying sit in bare house but one person doesn’t need piles of stuff often broken or inaccessible. Better to have a few nice things they can see and enjoy than boxes upon boxes of stuff often damp and deteriorating.
Plus quality of life. If you can’t go home after a fall as you can’t use a walker due to clutter or refuse to let nurse in it’s so sad and unnecessary.

Show them Sort Your Life Out with Stacey Solomon on the Beeb.

My mother passed last Oct. She had never been part of my life due to refusal to parent. I was an inconvenience to her. So after an interesting phone call from the police in another county. I went down to sort out her mess. The house was a 1970 time warp. There was nothing new in it this side of the 80s. It was horrible, but what broke my heart the most was. My dad died over 30yr ago when I was a teen. After years of asking for photos and things of his she told me she had nothing of his. For they were divorced not long after I was born. What did I find but thousands of photos of my dad that she had told me for my whole life they didn’t exist. She had blatantly lied to me. I’m still trying to get rid of the last of the crap. At some point in time it’s was all classed as valuable antiques but now it’s just worthless crap cause nobody likes it anymore.

Please have some sympathy for the partners of hoarders.

I have a lot of sympathy for them, but I do sometimes wonder why they stick around. Setting aside the physical discomforts, it can't be very life-enhancing when the person who is supposed to love you won't prioritise you over a bunch of stuff.

Except several posters have tried to help parents before they were too old and when they were and haven't been allowed. It's frustrating for people even if you havent experienced it or felt that way if you have.

Agreed. My dm and a couple of friends have no problem sending items to me that I don't want and charity shop or bin but wouldn't part with them otherwise. It's like they need a middleman, as though they're not really letting it go if they give it to me, even though they'll never see it again.
Dm agonised over getting rid of a purse i bought her years ago that she used once. I told her I bought it thinking it would be useful to her, but obviously it wasn't as she didn't need it (as evidenced by its one time use) and why would I buy her something so she could feel bad every time she looked at it- pass it to someone who will!

This. I have a huge amount of sympathy for anyone having to deal with this. But the reality is my DM preferred belongings to people and memories. It makes me very sad when I think about it.

Not to sound insensitive OP, but are you sure you're doing the right thing in taking all the stuff to the tip? A lot of the retro 90's toys, computers etc can be worth a lot of money. Wouldn't it be better to check how much the stuff is worth and then sell on eBay etc? You might recoup some of the money that you feel you were wrongly deprived of.

You might recoup some of the money that you feel you were wrongly deprived of.

It won't recoup the sense of hurt and unfairness though.

I'm going to try and address the money side of stuff.

So my parents were unbelievably prissy about keeping stuff mint. This is a hoarders paradise but it's mint and boxed rather than random. As kids, they were so disappointed if anything got damaged it sucked all the play out.

Fisher price - boxed but plastic fatigue, crumbled to the touch
Lego - all the boxes, sold. made a few men who never got what they wanted happy but ultimately minimum wage plus mental load.
Franklin Mint / lladro/ Lilliput lane/ readers digest - by the time we separate out the non food safe plates from the cardboard and certificates, landfill
Dinner services - no, don't go there, use the actual sold filter on eBay
Model trains, slot car - dealers insulting
Fishing - turns out no one wants 30 years old fishing gear
The internet has made clear that the Beatles sold millions of records.

The reality is that the only people who want stamp/ coin/ tea card collections from the 80s are in their 80s and downsizing their own collections.

If anyone wants an eternal beau dinner service, it's because it's so cheap, they are the props buyer for The Rivals or they've sadly broken the teapot lid.

I can assure you we have tried and my parents, like many others, were sold and believed this lie. Reinforced by daytime TV. And yet still I try.

I can assure you we have tried and my parents, like many others, were sold and believed this lie. Reinforced by daytime TV. And yet still I try.

Wow I had no idea about this but it makes sense.

It’s a bit of a wake up call for me, I have a tendency to hoard clothes and home/kitchen paraphernalia.

I need to start a clear out.

On eBay, you have to dig for it, put in Lladro Shepard, filter, go for more options and then say yes to sold. There's your answer. Might have a pre Xmas spike for your old 1985 Simon being bought for a present.

But enjoy your Home pride baking man, have him on display. Enjoy them now!.

Dinner sets omg no. I’m stuck with 4 box’s of over 100 pieces of the royal Albert country rose set. It’s now worth pence. -
saucers - loads of em - all really old pieces but yet again now worth next to nowt
slyvac pottery - box’s of it- once was valuable not anymore.
Staffordshire pottery - omg these 2 dogs are down right creepy had them valued worth something but nobody wants them.
other random pottery some bits are a good 70yr plus old but year again it’s just clutter now that nobody wants.
iv box’s with all sorts in and no idea what to do with it- can’t sell it so might just go on a smash de stress spree with it all.
singer sewing machine can’t even give it away. Due to age and size of it. - it’s one of the treadle ones.

Omg the amount of times I've encouraged my DF to just try and start clearing out or even just indicating which things were or weren't valuable, wanted etc. honestly, you've got NO idea

Exactly!!