Hoarders Anonymous. Thread #8. We Are Keeping On Keeping On. Fighting The Cluttered Fight.

[Solo]

We are a group of likeminded householders who are leading somewhat challenging lives; be that living with too much 'stuff' that we find difficult to deal with, houses that are falling apart (mine is), health issues within the family unit, wider family, or ourselves (me too) that means sorting out our households is challenging to say the least. So...

You are all welcome to join us for support, adding your ideas to help others out, storage ideas, and even tips on actually getting those items out of the house which sounds so simple when you say it, but this part can be so very difficult; we are often attached emotionally to our 'things', afraid of letting things go just in case we need them.

Encouragement and support abound here in our band of clutterbugs. We never ever criticise anyone! We even try not to criticise ourselves as it's not helpful to anyone, but this can be very difficult to achieve.

If you are feeling overwhelmed by clutter, mess, disorganization and generally don't know where to start. If you can't be bothered, but really do want to be bothered. If you think you are a bit lazy, or if you just need to see your highs and lows and everything in between on the screen here, join us, and we will help you. We'll virtually high-five your achievements - small or large, and virtually hug you when the need arises. If you want a hug, just ask because we are here for you, here for one another because we get it. The art of washing up is sometimes our great achievement of the day, but it's still an achievement

Some helpful links. They aren't for everyone, but have a look if you fancy:

• Help For Hoarders by Jasmine Harman (the author/producer of the BBC1 documentaries My Hoarder Mum and Me and Britain's Biggest Hoarders)
• The FlyLady Cleaning Method by Marla Cilley
• The Organised Mum Method by Gemma Bray
• The KonMari Method by Marie Kondo
• A Slob Comes Clean by Dana K. White
• The Getting Things Done Method by David Allen

And a LINK-#7

I'm not sure if The Flylady link is working, but if not, you know what to search for.

Welcome to thread #8 of Hoarders Anonymous. Thread #8. We Are Keeping On Keeping On. Fighting The Cluttered Fight (and winning, one small step at a time).

@Elleherd I'd only intended to do a few mins but turned out to be about and hour and a half. Once I get started I seem to always just want to do that little bit more with gardening and only stop when exhausted.

For housework, once I get started I'm usually ok, but then hit he wall suddenly at some point then stop.

I've cleaned out the plugholes in the bathroom., cleaned the basin and pedestal and surrounding tiles and the storage box underneath. Started the bath cleaning. Rested. About to head back to do some more.

Climbed in the bath and cleaned the tiles to the ceiling. Cleaned the shower unit, and fixings, scrubbed the grout. Spent half an hour on that. Got the bath to do yet.

Put some of the used bottles in the recycling bag.

Fetched Ds's clothes.

Need a rest.

@TalkToTheHand123 Identifying what it is that keeps you at gardening might be useful... For me it's being outside and it being sunny. I'm definitely not as enthusiastic to keep doing 'one more thing' if cloudy, wet or cold! I find I achieve achieve the same thing inside using warmth and interesting radio programs or audio books. Silence is the thing that reminds me what the time is...

@BlackeyedSusan That bathroom's sounding clean and shiny. Well done, not surprising you need a rest..

Today ended up mainly a different set of things than intended. Spent far too long convincing next doors monster dog to get out of my garden and go home. Then repairing and dealing with the latest fence panels that it had ripped down.
Ended up clearing up the supersized dog poo's it had liberally deposited everywhere! Thought I was done, but came out to discover either it or something related size wise, had crapped all over the path and other tenants had trodden in it and trekked it over the hall and up the stairs. Have cleaned it and the hall up, and accepted probably will all get trekked down the stairs and back into the hall again. Eventually made it out to storage unit and managed to clean a few more boxes and move them.

Well, the bath is cleaner but not perfect. It missed its clean last week due to all that driving.

We managed a little bit more. DD did an emergency wash up. Some of the pots have been put away. Some are still drying.

Waited up for ds.

Sent recycling bag down.

Put some shopping away.

You could really do without the extra hassle Elle. It's that sort of thing that really annoys me when one has enough on already.

@BlackeyedSusan Well done, every little bit helps, and imperfect but good enough will carry you through. (took a long time to accept that, but it's true)
Yep, it seems like the minute I take my eye off anything, something happens to it. It's exhausting.

So far very small amount of shredding done, and lots of calls with insurance companies, hoping to maximize today as have (paid) work tomorrow.

@Elleherd I do the gardening when it's nice weather, not too hot though. Nice to get fresh air. Ideally I'd like it all done in one go but I don't have the energy.

Yesterday:
drove 90 miles.
Petrol
Supermarket shop
Carried shopping up two flights of stairs
Put fridge stuff away
Two bags of washing back downstairs
Watered my plants in ex's garden.
Helped ex clear up spilt drink.
Washing
Sort kids clothes outx3
Collected recycling,sent bag down
Collected rubbish from bathroom, sent bag down.
Rang /emailed school re child being late.

@TalkToTheHand123 Sympathies. Time and energy are sadly in short supply for most of us here.
(I reckon 'all in one go' would be about two months full time work here,😂and that's with someone else magically replacing the fencing and removing remains of neighbors fallen tree.)

@BlackeyedSusan Those stairs alone must take a lot out of you! The fact you've listed 'helping ex clear up spilt drink' makes me suspect this was a bit more than a simple 'spill.' 😬Keep on keeping on, I can see it must feel relentless, but it does get us there in the end.

Yesterday's 'maximizing' was a bit over hopeful. Plodding along systematically turned out to be the only realistic thing to do if I wanted to be able to do paid work later today. I'm ragged physically and not recovering.

Lots of cleaning of damaged stuff in unit, now waiting to move to repaired one.

Start of writing up lots of insurance forms. Absolutely hating this. It's literally days of work trying to figure out where things came from, when, how much was paid, can proof be provided? etc, knowing that it may be a waste of precious time that could be urgently used elsewhere, as they will probably try and wriggle out of all they can. (only good news is there are a fair amount of filed receipts)
But, not trying to use the insurance paid for, in order to hang onto time to do other urgent things seems equally stupid. Just keeping fingers crossed over so much at the moment.
About to try and look like I'm fit for work,😟another thing not getting any easier.

He "threw" hot chocolate across the table, onto kids possessions, onto electronics, dripped behind the table.

Disability means even smallish jobs take up a spoon or two of energy.

Good luck with work Elle. Hope it goes well.

I hate forms so sympathies there.

Had a bit of a fright earlier. Heard my neighbour have a fall so rushed out to check on him. He's ok. A bit shook up. Now patched up.

I need to buy a grab and go first aid kit for home. Got one in the car.

Sounds like a lot to have to deal with? Is everything alright @BlackeyedSusan ?

I say "threw" because it was all over the table...a tall narrow cup with a lot of hot chocolate in it went a long way.

We have five disabilities and several conditions (asthma, allergies etc) between three of us . Their dad has a handful himself.

Exhaustion is easily achieved. Not many spoons to go round. Hence one of today's achievements is an hour and a half nap!

We ate getting some literal spoons back though as i.have managed quite a bit of washing up.

My neighbour has been retired and old for 21 years since I moved in. He is getting frail. It's a bit concerning.

NAP is good then!

@BlackeyedSusan Sounds like a major clean up job. We have what's known as the 'massacred pony' incident here. Plate of pasta drowsing in mascarpone sauce was accidentally launched across the room when Ds tripped carrying it.
It went everywhere and somehow managed to effectively double it's sauce quantity as it flew through the air. It did look like a murder scene, and took days before I stopped finding the evidence.
Sorry to hear about your neighbor, that must have been quite unsettling for you too.

Up early trying to motivate myself. Got back from work last night to discover a letter informing us new contractors have been appointed and all work resumes next week!
All contents including flooring's to be cleared and full daily access as a through route to the rear will be required in five days (inc yesterday) time.

If we can get straight back into the storage company building we had to come out of, transport will be arranged for Monday. If not we are on our own In getting out again
.
Started packing up again last night, and about to do more while waiting for previous storage company to be open. Fingers crossed.

I do need a new large gate in the garden to the shared archway. I've finally managed to secure it for now as no hury as neighbour has filled it all with his clutter and has been this way for a few years now. So ignorant. I've had to have gutter repair men coming through the house because of this.

I'm tempted to put some clutter at the front where he has his lawn mower to make it difficult for him to access so he knows how it feels to have an ignorant neighbour.

Not sure if I've previously mentioned but if I have decent sleep and don't eat too much, I have some motivation to tidy which is a bit of a relief to have figured out. Hopefully I can do some when I return home later.

This is fucking ridiculous the way they treat you.

At least with my unreliable contractor I can say when I'm free!

@TalkToTheHand123 Your neighbor sounds annoying! Glad you've found what works to help motivate you.

@BlackeyedSusan There's no respect from either landlords or most of the contractors towards tenants at all here. We're just in the way cash cows. They're having to do this work because of the new renters bill coming in, and we're all looking forward to what happens when they can no longer summarily evict anyone who complains.

Can't get back into the previous storage company for love or money, so the removals van deal for Monday is off the table. Did try asking the removals company if they could do anything direct for us as they where on standby already, but the best deal they could offer was way above anything we could afford, so it's going to have to all be done the hard way bit by bit again.
Have managed to get a unit in another storage company a bit further away. But they do have slightly longer hours which is something.
About to go sign contract and figure out how to make this all this work out, and then get on with it.

Oh no Elle!

My task today is cooking curry before everything goes off.

I'm part way through and am having a sit down to rest. I can't cook without having a rest in between.

Wishing you all strength in your struggles - especially @Elleherd - I can’t thank you enough for keeping us informed of the challenges that can happen with storage. It has been so tempting to store stuff, especially from hoarding parents house clearance, but I’ve stuck with living with boxes.

Tackled some seriously old boxes today - tip tomorrow. DH helped and I’m getting used to having help and the pros and cons - but it isn’t all my mess, so I do need it.

Well done finite.

Neighbour is a nightmare, although could be worse from what I read.

I put my council garden waste bin by the front of the arch about 2 months ago. I did it before but gave up hinting. I keep it there now just to make it awkward for him to get his lawn mower out.

He had a bag of concrete leaning against the gate for months. I put it in the arch as it was annoying me, but it's damaged the gate.

I did a little light tidying in the living room last couple of days. I haven't had a good tidy up for a few weeks now.

@BlackeyedSusan Paced curry prep sounds good.

@FiniteSagacity Storage does have it's plus side, but you have to not be unlucky, and be in a position to use it properly to declutter, and few of us are. Something else always happens.
Well done with the boxes, and navigating the help. It can be as challenging as having none. Living with the boxes is more likely to motivate you to do something about them, than 'out of sight out of mind' does.

@TalkToTheHand123 well done on the tidy up's however 'light' it all helps stay in the groove and stay the encroaching tide.

Got shelves into new storage ( 🙄) unit, got through work in one piece, and got other furniture and lots of boxes to it, but am really struggling at this point and starting the day exhausted and in pain.
Have to finish insurance claim, and clearing everything out for contractors today, regardless.

Hopefully Ds can make themselves available this evening for moving what I just can't maneuver alone, because there's a limit to what weird and wonderful strategies I can come up with to get round problems, and we are at that limit.
I can't do what I can't do.
Paid someone to help yesterday who then turned up hours late in the wrong place, had to be picked up, then did half an hour, before needing to go! Hoping for a better result today, but counting on little.

Good luck Elle!