Disturbing finds in house clearance

[Lockedboxed]

Clearing a hoarder’s house is not fun at all but the most disturbing find was locked boxes of all manner of books and sex toys. You really would never have thought it. Never felt unsafe with the owner (until their diagnosis of dementia, but meds keep them calm now).

I can’t unsee it (and I’m trying to be open minded about consenting adults). I think it might help if anyone has solidarity from their own upsetting finds, to make me feel less alone. Please tell me this isn’t the only time this has happened.

(Regular poster but name changed for this as combined my posts would be outing).

My dad went into his parents' loft to clear things out after they'd died. He climbed the ladder, lifted the loft hatch, shone a torch inside and nearly passed out when he saw a face staring back at him, glassy eyed and mouth agape. It was a blown up sex doll that my adult cousin, who had lived there recently, had stashed away to "enjoy" while his grandparents were out.
She was not alone up there, in fact ahe had quite a few companions in various states of deflation.
This cued much debate about whether to hand the little vinyl harem back to my cousin and, if so, whether to fully deflate them and hand him a box, or to pump them all up, put some frocks on them and send them round to his new house in a taxi. I thought the application of some hot chilli paste into their orifices beforehand would spice things up a bit more for him.
In the end Dad and his brother decided that this little ready made party would be too thrilling so they popped 'em and put 'em in the bin.
I still think it was a wasted opportunity.

Clearing my parents house did make me think how I'd feel about dc finding everything of mine at some point. Also more careful re what I write in my diary....

ebay?

My husband's mother was a sex worker (quite a successful one too) back in the 60s to 80s. She had a small property she used for work and one to live, the work property had been left pretty neglected for a long time when she died (holes open to the roof, birds living inside and all sorts). But yes we found lots of interesting things in those cupboards on our clear out. I try to think of it that sex isn't necessarily dirty, as humans I think we all have some weird hang ups about things.

I know that my brother found a lot of very compromising images on my elderly, disabled Dad’s computer after he died. I didn’t ask for any details. My brother had the hard drive professionally destroyed.

When my dad died at 91, we uncovered a load of hidden magazine pics of women in rubber suits and capes, but he'd stuck photos of my mums head on them.🙈 Omg I was mortified as can't unsee that now. So I definitely get where you are coming from OP!!

Same, my imagination is running riot 🤣

With hoarding, could it be more about keeping or owning the things rather than the thing itself? Hoarders keep all sorts of things, not necessarily for the same reasons you or I might.

My then FIL's business premises had a secret dark room full of dodgy pics of a woman who was not MIL and happy family photos of FIL with aforementioned woman and child.

Accounts showed regular cash expenditure indicating FIL had a secret second family.

As FIL was in hospital dying, he'd told now ex-H to go to the office and just empty and burn everything without looking at it. It was quite the eye opener.

Why do you think this find means the person is unsafe?

To be honest that is what I find shocking about your post - that leap. Unless what you found is illegal I don’t understand why you think you should feel unsafe around someone because they own these things?

is there more to this?

What happened next? Did your DH try to find his half-sibling??

Wow! What age was your DH when he found out about it? When did you find out? Did she speak openly about it? So many questions…

I was listening to a Lord Lucan podcast last night, and randomly, it seems he also had a similar stash which he failed to dispose of prior to skipping the country.

😂😂😂

My dad has a job where he randomly finds stuff quite often, and has previously mentioned finding a (fake?) diamond and a baggy of white powder that he's not sure how to dispose of, so I look forward to dealing with that in a couple of decades 😅

Lol! Similar taste to Lord Lucan then.. a bit of a concern! Perhaps rubber costumes were a thing back then?

@HarrietSchulenberg omg... Putting frocks on them and sending them round in a taxi would be absolute gold! That properly made me giggle.

I don't think adults having sex toys is that unusual unless it's full on BDSM stuff.

DH cleared out all FIL's computer stuff and media for MIL. He found some VHS tapes that he thought might have some holiday videos on. He found a working player on ebay so he could record them to a disc or memory stick. They turned out to be some very amateur porn that he'd probably obtained from his mates at the social club 😱

He told his mum that the tapes were old and knackered.

😂😂😂

I can imagine them lined up in the OPs dishwasher....

I have the impression that the choice of sex toys available some decades in the past was a lot more limited to kind of confrontational, maybe a bit nasty-looking stuff — whereas today we are more used to the wide availability of sculpted pastel-coloured vibrators that look like posh Alessi kitchenware from the nineties.

So I guess it could be that someone who might, by choice, have gone for something a bit classier did not have that option for experimentation, and ended up with items that look a bit horrible to the discerning modern eye.

I’m not sure that makes sense, just hoping to help mitigate OP’s discomfort if the toys are really grim

Glad I’m not the only nosey one on the thread 😭

I am so sorry @expandabandband . I hope your mother proved to you later that this was just a phase when she felt overwhelmed.

I think a lot of mothers feel like that at some time. It doesn't mean that she didn't love you with all of her heart.