How to overcome hoarding?

[LylaLee]

I'm at a point where I can't afford the storage unit fees. Can't open the door of spare bedroom. Living areas are ok for visitors. It's a 'normal' amount of clutter.

I think I know what the root cause of it is for me.

(1) When I was 4 we had an international move and went to the new country with suitcases only.

(2) The same happened again two years later.

(3) Then again when I was 10.

(4) When I was 20 I moved abroad for a degree.

(5) I left an abusive relationship taking only my documents.

On move 3 we had a shipping container but all the other times, basically what I could fit into a suitcase.

Now, I can't get rid of ANYTHING. A nice carrier bag. Keep. A leaflet for a birdwatching club (I couldn't care less about birdwatching) keep. A giant connect 4 game! That would be great for summer BBQs! (We don't have BBQs because the house is too messy.) Every receipt. Keep.

What do I do?

Would your GP refer you for CBT, I have heard that it can be very helpful?

You clearly have the insight to identify the root of your mental health issue, so you're in a good place to work through it.

Is hoarding the only mental health issue you have? Do you have any others like eg addiction or depression?

My husband is a hoarder because he has huge emotional issues around loss, so every item is a reminder of "something very special and important" from his past so finds it impossible to discard anything.

Moving around so much with virtually nothing growing up must have been tremendously difficult.

Allow yourself the emotional space to heal without judging your emotions, and find a good therapist.

Try working out what is it about the birdwatching leaflet that's so special. What does it remind you of? Does the thought of throwing it away amount to a significant loss in your mind? Why? You can talk these things through. You can get good therapists online and Zoom them.

For a more blunt approach, there's a technique called the three second rule-

Three-second rule
Give yourself three seconds to decide what to do with something by placing it in one of four categories: keep, throw away, donate or recycle. Any items leaving the home should be taken out right away. Don’t wait for recycling day; bring the items to the recycling center and leave them there. The same goes for charity shop donations or rubbish. Make a 24-hour plan to get rid of all of the stuff you won’t be keeping.

You've already taken the first (and most difficult) step which is recognising it's becoming a problem and that it needs to change for you to have an improved quality of life. It's great that you've got the insight into why it feels important to you to hold on to things and that's a brilliant starting point for therapy which is what I'd recommend. Speak to your gp and ask for a referral and in the meantime there are a number of charities that will offer short term counselling sessions for free. If you can afford to pay for therapy I'd look for someone who has experience in supporting people with hoarding behaviour. From there it's really about committing to going with it and committing to accepting that you will have to feel uncomfortable for a while until your emotions and system adjust to a 'new normal'. If you can do that, it will make the practical side of decluttering and reducing the amount you bring into your home much easier.

For me I try to approach things very ruthlessly. If I haven't used it or looked for it in a year then I recycle or donate. It's taken me a while to get to this point but it makes everything easier, my house is cleaner because it's easier to do the housework and that gives me more time overall.

Im sure that therapy would be ideal. If that's not accessible or affordable, maybe this book would help? Understanding Hoarding

I have had patches of stress-related hoarding. When my mum went into a home i had to clear her flat and sell it, and lots of her stuff came back to my house, which was a little 2 up 2 down. I was still grieving my husband, and my dad had also died. I felt completely stuck, couldn't make a decision on anything. In my case it really helped to have a pair of friends come over and help me sort my desk, which was the worst patch. Once that was clear I was able to make some progress. But I know it's rarely as simple - it's not about the stuff, and you know that.

I'm like this but I am slowly working through stuff, but instead of never seeing it again I take a photo before getting rid of it. Might seem silly but at least that way it doesn't feel like it's gone forever, if that makes sense

I had this as a solution, but putting things in the bin seems too final. So I end up with a photo plus a useless leaflet.

If you can afford it, can you get some help in to do the practicalities? My dad has been hoarding for years and only recently let me in to his house again after over a decade. I can't help him with his illness/compulsions so it feels very much as if I'm just binning things and he is asking what happened to it (napkins, plastic forks, broken bits of plastic - all covered in brown sticky something so unusable anyway). I feel as soon as I leave he will just replace, perhaps with more urgency even. I do really feel he would get more from someone with some specific knowledge on how to help him stop or recognise why it started. I know there are people who do this for the council and am wondering if you might do better getting actual help to start with?

Thanks for all the kind answers.

Do I have any other mental health problems?
The usual smorgasbord of anxiety & depression, plus trendy, undiagnosed, ADHD & asd.

Why would you keep the bird leaflet?

I think I also hoard information. There have been several times in the past where if I had had the right information the course of my life would be completely different. So it's a 'just in case' thing, I think.

CBT

I've done it for depression before and I feel like it didn't help.

As you've correctly identified this is an emotional/subconscious response to your early life experiences, when you didn't have an agency over your life and had to make difficult choices about your belongings. A part of your mind has set up this strategy to protect you, not realising that you're now an adult and can make the choices that were denied to you as a child. Have a think about remedial hypnosis (I did an AMA on it) as that would allow you to talk directly to that part of your mind.

Read the book 'declutter at the speed of life' by Dana k white and listen to her podcast 'a slob comes clean' and listen to ALL the episodes and listen again and again. Changed my life.

Think of it this way.
How can I love item A, if its squashed below item B, below item C and weighed down by Item D ?
You're not giving your belongings enough care if you're burying them under other stuff.

https://www.mind.org.uk/media-a/2939/hoarding-2018.pdf

Have a look at this. It's got some really good resources that could help. There's some good peer support that could be helpful. You don't need to rush anything. Go at your pace . Even acknowledging it is a huge step

I hear that.

A lot of the items are newspapers and magazines. Like piles and piles of metros in the garden shed. I even bought a wardrobe specifically to keep them in.

I know part of the reason for that is because of things like this:
(1) I was defrauded by someone. It turns out they were previously involved in some dodgy things which had been in the paper, but I didn't know at the time.
(2) I was blindsided by a redundancy. Some of the individuals/companies involved are known for asset stripping. If I had joined the dots and realised early enough that ABC Ltd is known for stripping assets, I wouldn't have been fucked.

I feel like if I sit down and read the paper/magazines cover to cover I won't be blindsided again.

Of course I never have time to read them. Then I have a growing dread that I've missed something. Like I'll see in the paper that our new next door neighbour was convicted of arson and has just come out of prison for it. I know it's unreasonable, but I feel like if I threw away the papers I am getting rid of information that might protect me.

Are you taking any medication, for the anxiety and depression or other things?

You sound as if you are building a protective shelter for yourself - I think the insight about information is really interesting. I do wonder if you are weighting yourself down somehow. To stop you being required to move again as you were in the past.

I have been medicated for decades. I had stopped and am just now starting sertraline (sp).

And yes, it's absolutely ballast.

Sorry, not sure I was very clear about what kind of help I meant. I meant there are people who will come to your house and go through rooms with you. Our local one is called Miss Organiser. She would charge for the day or however many hours you think you could handle and go through whatever part of the house you really need/want help with whilst explaining why. My friend had some serious MH issues growing up and had her over and they got on so well she is having her back again next week! Just an idea.

I don't think I could afford that kind of help at the moment and I don't like the idea of someone who might throw things away.

I can't help as reading your post was like reading about myself. Not the same circumstances around international relocations but it made me realise how some childhood events have affected my behaviour now and the fear of throwing things out, needing to read magazines cover to cover etc.

I'm sorry I can't help but please know that you are not alone.

Thank you. Can you share a bit more if you're comfortable?

@LylaLee we struggled for money when I was growing up which meant nothing was ever thrown out in case it was needed, having to buy something when you'd had it but had binned it was unthinkable (I try to get on board with the concept of 'if you can replace it for less than £20 then bin it' but I just can't).

We also moved house to a much smaller property that hadn't been lived in for years and needed full renovation (no kitchen or bathroom when we moved in). All of our toys, games and cuddly toys were put 'into storage' in a completely unsuitable place where everything was ruined (mice, rats, damp). The feeling of 'losing' everything that was precious to me (and especially precious because we didn't have much money) has made me really struggle to let go of things as an adult.

I used to get given magazines from the family next door and would save them and re-read them, but my stash got ruined and now I can't thrown any out without reading them from cover to cover (what actually happens is they sit in a pile and never get read).

I don't know if any of this is helpful to you but your post was a lightbulb moment for me.

You are very brave for taking the first step and admitting you have a problem with hoarding. I work in mental health, quite often with hoarders, and its actually quite rare to even get people to the point where they admit they are hoarders. So that is a big deal, honestly, well done to you... it's the first step on the road to sorting it.
I think the second most useful thing is to enlist help and accountability. Do you have a close friend you could confide in who might come and help you?
I know it seems embarrassing and you might feel a lot of shame but it would be massively helpful to you to have someone there... to just come round and spend a day making a dent on it, keeping you focused, keeping your energy levels up. Someone with a car who can do tip trips for you.
It's also useful to sit down and make a list before you go and look at stuff. Make a list of things that you can remember that you have that you actually want to keep. You could do it by group of items. So say you have loads of magazines. Make a list without looking of the ones you remember and would like to keep. Those are the ones you keep. Just chuck the rest in a bin liner. It would help if someone else where there to do this with you as you may find it less emotional to instruct someone to throw them away rather than physically doing that yourself. Obviously it's emotional when you look at each item and you feel a tear inside when each thing goes in the bin... that can be hard. But if you've made a clear plan before hand that makes it easier, and having someone there with you makes it easier.
There are also special cleaning services that come and deal with hoards if you feel like you'd prefer to have people you don't know there. They are used to dealing with hoarding issues so would not judge you and would work at your pace. You could Google to look for them in your area.
Good luck OP it's a hard one to deal with. But if you do manage to clear it your quality of life will be so much better.

Have you ever seen the Stacey Solomon program on TV called sort your life out?

You know that the local papers are all stored online now. Why is it important to you to have a paper copy when you can easily access the same information online?