I think my mum is hoarding, what do I do?

[mummytoonetryingfortwo]

I’ve been staying with my mum over the Easter weekend and I’ve been helping her to pack up her house as she’s moving.

It’s become apparent that she has boxes upon boxes of things from when I was a child. She won’t get rid of them, despite them being of no use. Some of the things I’ve found include hot wheels cars that are broken, a Thomas the tank engine train track that’s missing half the pieces, every stuffed toy I ever had, toys that don’t even work anymore. I’ve asked her a couple of times why she won’t get rid of them and she insists that the grandkids could use them one day - they won’t.

She also keeps every pillow she’s ever bought in case the stuffing could be useful in the future, she has balls and balls of wool that she’s half used, basically everything she’s bought.

Her reasoning is that she’s spent money on the items and therefore she needs to keep them - but she’s very comfortable and they’re sitting in the loft gathering dust. She won’t even replace towels, she still has the same towel sets from when I was a child (I’m 26 now), they’re worn through and you can see the sun through them when they’re pegged out to dry but she won’t get rid of them. What the hell do I do?

Then go back home now because its stressing you out!

You are engaging in a war ot wills totally unnecessarily. If you cannot accept that she has the absolute right to take whatever she wants of her stuff to her new home then tell her you can't stay any longer and Go Home!

So what if you think it's ridiculous. It's not your stuff and it's not your home is it.

I’m 10 years older than your poor mum- and if my daughter spoke to me like that she would be shown the door and told to apologise!
So she’s keeping a lot of sentimental stuff in the loft- how does that hurt you?
When I read “hoarding “ I pictured mounds of filthy garbage, tottering heaps of old newspapers, rooms she is unable to access because of piles of rubbish, not old toys and tatty suitcases kept in the loft!

So what if her towels are thin- her choice, you are only 26 so your “old” bedding isn’t exactly ancient! Many people like to keep old sheets ect “just in case”, I am currently using duvet covers that are around 20 years old- still perfectly good, tatty ones make good dust sheets or dog beds.
Making her cry over a stuffed toy is cruel.

I think you need to take a long hard look at yourself and perhaps get some counseling for your problems.

Just leave your mum to the move herself - she is not old or infirm. You can't "cure" her hoarding. I think you said the new house is bigger so just let her get on with it. It's not worth harming your relationship. It's frustrating but she's not in any danger.

I’m currently experiencing this with my mum.

my dad died two years ago and I moved to be closer to mum last summer.

I hadn’t noticed how bad the house was until now.

she isn’t maintaining anything. She has issues around money. She is well off, decent pension, but she grew up in poverty and I think she is really struggling psychologically.

she doesn’t buy any shampoo or conditioner, as I realised a few months ago when I stayed with her. Instead she has a bathroom cabinet groaning with free samples and toiletry bottles from hotels, and crap little sachets purchased from the pound shop.

in the shower there sits bottles of expensive Gucci body wash which were a gift from somebody about 10 or 15 years ago. I think they are full, unused, and probably expired.

so she wants people to see that, but in reality, she’s rooting around in a grubby cupboard full of free samples and Asda Smartprice toothpaste etc.

i found a whole bag of the free toothbrushes they hand out to kids to encourage tooth brushing - I don’t know where she got them or why she keeps them.

she spends her time trawling pound shops for the cheapest options of things, even if they are terrible quality and she uses up petrol driving all over the place.

she goes out buying “too good to go” bags constantly, then the stuff just rots in her fridge becuase she doesn’t need or want it.

Most upsetting, she steals reduced flowers from supermarkets. The almost dead ones reduced to 50p etc. she puts them in the bottom of her trolley and pretends she has “forgotten” about them. I’ve noticed her doing it a few times but don’t know how to broach the subject with her. I can see from the look of satisfaction on her face that it’s intentional.

she buys stuff from charity shop (toiletries, trinkets etc) and stores them all in a spare bedroom. Whenever it’s anybody’s birthday or Christmas she goes up there and gifts them to people. Similarly when she receives gifts from people, they go into this room and regifted. But she often forgets to remove either the previous gift tag addressed to her or the charity shop price tag, so people know what she is doing and I feel so embarrassed for her. She is 71 now but this carelessness / forgetfulness with the tags is not a new thing, she has done it for as long as I can remember. Every Christmas my ex husband would get a box of chocolates with a gift tag addressed to her from one of her friends.

I don’t know what to do.

i was shocked and upset when I had to ask her to help me find shampoo in her bathroom a few months ago. When she started bringing all this manky crap out the cupboard I was shocked and upset and said I didn’t understand why she was living like this. She got very defensive and angry and snapped “you don’t have to understand”.

I find it all so unnecessary, frustrating and upsetting.

Hoarders are selfish and probably narcissists as they don’t seem to notice or care how it affects others.

Childhood poverty is no excuse. My mum grew up without shoes, poverty like you couldn’t imagine. FIL grew up at the same time in luxury, pretty much (theatre trips, etc.).

Yet my mum is the one trying to do Swedish Death Cleaning (when she doesn’t even have that much) so it’s not a burden on me. FIL is “happy to fester” (his words) in the hoard when he should be selling it off now and disposing of it.

The difference is he’s a supremely selfish narcissist and my mother isn’t.

It’ll be such a shame when all his shit just gets chucked into a skip and straight to landfill 🙄

OP, you help with the things you want to help her with and you kindly decline to help her with things you don't want to. And you get therapy, I'm sure you've heard some very hurtful comments about your feelings around secondary infertility from people who don't 'get' it. One person's emotional attachment is another person's irrational ridiculousness. If you are struggling to be kind, make your excuses and go home.

Are they always this rude to you? This is bullying and emotional blackmail. Does your opinion not count for anything - or the fact that you are unhappy living surrounded by their junk? Don’t they care?

My parents kept some of our stuff (including a couple of kayaks that hung from their garage ceiling ) but it was always on the understanding that it was temporary and only as long as it wasn’t a pain for them.

I think it might be better to approach it from a different angle.

You could say you know of a charity that needs bedding and towels and she has so much to spare, it would be a great help to donate some. Bag the items, label them and take them away in your car. If they are decent enough put them in the textile recycling bins, if not dispose of them.

Your mother sees value in all her items whether emotional memories or monetary. She needs to see them appreciated to be able to let them go.

Say you want your own belongings, you will put them in your loft for future generations and allow her to pass them on to you for safekeeping. Once in your possession you can do what you wish.

Is it Marie Kondo that suggests saying thank you to items before disposing of them? That might work for broken suitcases and offer reassurance that she will keep the memories that the item evokes in her..which is usually of happier times.

rickyrickygrimes

No, they are not always this rude to me. We get on well and they are often thoughtful and kind.
I think, thinking about it, this is 'the family home' and they are family. They grew up here. And it's a bit rejecting to ask them to clear their stuff out. They have suggested that if/when I move to some place smaller, it can go into storage.

I so feel for you and understand your situation. My mum is exactly the same. She keeps everything, our old toys, my dad’s clothes-he died 13 years ago. She literally does not even throw an old newspaper or the promo mags you get in them away. Her charger for phone didn’t work, I bought a new one she would not let me throw old one away. Her house it literally full of junk. She has dementia now & goes to a day centre each day. When I get the time I go in & clear bits out the positive of her dementia is she doesn’t notice when she returns. There is absolutely no chance of me doing it while she is there though. It’s an endless task though and despite days in there it has not made the slightest difference. I think it’s their generation along with my mums dementia that means they keep absolutely every fricking thing. It makes me so depressed I try not to think about it .

Hoarding is a mental illness.

It's not about what you think of her situation or how it makes you feel. There's no reason to it; the fact she's relatively well off is irrelevant.

Living in a hoarded home can be a health and safety hazard.

She's not well. She needs help. Not criticism and exasperation.

Hopefully your mum doesn't have a buying problem too. If she does she will just fill the space made with more crap.

You absolutely can recover from hoarding. It's more regonised so more help out there now. But it's got to come from her. Some people won't recover but it's not true to say you can't.

Throwing her shit out and making her cry isn't going to help either of you. She needs the right type of help which you read up on but I don't think your right person to help her now unfortunately.

If its real hoarding. Not just a reluctance to declutter she needs help with her thought process not being told she is wrong.

How about telling her there’s a charity event at your church/kids’ school/the library/scouts etc to raise funds for (insert a cause that’s close to her heart) and they’ve asked for old books/toys/bedding or whatever and it’s a great opportunity to help and make a difference. Then load up your car and take it to the tip.

I feel your pain, @mummytoonetryingfortwo . Parents in law are similar although to less of an extent. Their three bedroom house is crammed with stuff - things they will never use again but will not get rid of because it cost good money to buy it. Off the top of my head... a trouser press. a bread maker. They have 4 bedrooms and every one has fitted wardrobes all the way round, Plus multiple chests of drawers. Every one is crammed with clothes, often things that will never be worn again such as all of FIL's work suits (he's 80 and retired 15 years ago) and all of the multiple dress/coat combos in assorted pastel colours which MIL bought for weddings 25-30 years ago, again cost good money. "Units" full of nicky nacky china stuff and those silly little glasses you can get a thimbleful of wine in. Never used. When the pandemic hit they lived comfortably off the contents of the cupboards/freezer for about 6 weeks. (and have now restocked to similar levels)

It's a totally different mindset - DH keeps telling them that the money is spent and gone, and is not coming back. That FIL's shiny 1980s double breasted suits are not worth anything near what he paid for them and only worth what people are prepared to pay now, which is tuppence ha'penny for rag weight. They will not give to the charity shop because again, losing money.

For them it's not about sentimentality or trauma in the past. Both grew up in large families with not much money and to them their full to bursting house indicates just how well they have done as they equate success with the very visible symbols of having money like a detached house, a car on the driveway, mountains of "stuff". Going there depresses the hell out of me.

My distant cousin died recently and left a house full of hoard, it was up to the ceiling and took 10 trucks & skips to clear, on par with Mr Trebus almost. I tried to intervene when it was waist high but despite being compos mentis he accused the clearance people of stealing money, shoes etc. Shouted at me for trying to tidy & recycle papers and wine bottles etc as I was doing the councils job (social services)& recycling was a con. Bi polar, alcoholism and deaths of close friends contributed to the hoarding. He became avoidant of visits preferring to come to me or meet at a pub or restaurant & I suspected hoarding on an epic scale. His parents were mean to him, would give gifts then remove them for minor misdemeanors. Very sad as he was a real character and extremely clever & talented despite learning difficulties. It is a mental illness and very difficult to tackle.

Yes but OP's mum is late 50s, not 80. And OP is only mid 20s.
It's a bit early for death cleaning.

I agree. She's in her 50s - step back and let her deal with it.

I've been here lately too. My parents downsized their home without downsizing their belongings, just moved the whole damned lot!
They suddenly both needed full time care and now I'm left to deal with the stuff they left behind. Its so far taken me over 18 months!

I'm at the end now, but I can't stress enough how therapeutic it has been to throw things out, to get a skip and dump things that should have been let go years ago. I'm also talking towels older than me (terry nappy squares that have been used as hand towels for the last 40-odd years!), dried out art materials we had as kids, and cans of food, one of them from 1982!

I’ve worked with people who hoard and it always stems from a place of trauma, whether it be childhood, grief or other. And is often a way to control the uncontrollable. Like others have said it’s not something you can be sorted with a deep clean, it’s more nuanced than that. My advice would be to go slowly and explore how getting rid of things would make your mum feel. There’s some good stuff online too. 💕

We haven’t even established this is hoarding,

Using old towels isn’t hoarding.

Oof OP you started off with my sympathy but now you're really coming across as an asshole. Can you not see that there might be some middle ground between ignoring it/leaving her to get on with it and the frankly bullying behaviour that you're now engaging in? Like it or not, they are her possessions and you cannot forcibly remove them from her.
Think of your future relationship with her too - this could be really damaging. You are only thinking of yourself and how you feel here and not at all about your mum's (rational or not) attachment to things from her past as she undertakes a big move.

You don’t sound very patient or kind. Probably best to leave it to someone who can support your mother with kindness.

And to be honest oP I can’t really see how it tangibly affects you - other than you aren’t getting your own way.

It is clear from the OP that this is, in fact, hoarding.

My dad is similar, he will not throw anything away. That includes plastic tubs for recycling in case they come in handy. He was very sick a few years ago and had to move downstairs temporarily due to mobility issues so i had to clear a section to make room for a bed. It was the one and only time I had access to his house. I cleared about 7 refuse bags of recycling alone. He was very anxious that I throw nothing out so I tried to organise it all for him in the hope we could go through it together later. Not a chance. Everything is as it was when I moved it. At least the clutter is less. Its still ridiculous though, i boxed up a pile of old mouldy magazines and left the box perched on a chair, just left there in a hurry. It is still on the chair so now the chair is no longer in use. He won't let me move it. It's been nearly 3 years.

Sometimes I pretend to show an interest in some crappy old book or item and he gives it to me for the kids and I dispose of it. My sister cleared out items in her room recently and I pretended I was borrowing clothes and snuck multiple bags into my car boot while she distracted him in another room. He goes through the bins after she visits so he will return items to the house that she throws out, a broken hairdryer or old bobbles or whatever. Before we had cars we used to sneak small broken items or used items in our handbags and throw them into public bins or pass them to friends to bin. It's constant game playing and makes a relationship very difficult.

It caused me huge stress for years but I've now accepted it won't change. He won't ever move house and my sisters and I accept that he will die and leave us with a horrendous job but it is what it is. We cannot change him. We've tried everything and nothing works.

@mummytoonetryingfortwo I think you need to accept and step back a bit, don't force anything or you will not be forgiven.