Last couple of days has been launderette for all as well as shopping and batch cooking for the masses. Some making (paid work) dealing with contractors, and trying to get on top of paperwork. (badly)
Did mange to go through a carrier bag, throw some stuff away, and ear mark other stuff to go to a charity in a couple of days.
Today's going to be hospital and hopefully a lot of paid making. Back at that point of working to pay for storage, that I need the time and physical fitness to be working to clear.
@BlackeyedSusan Well done! You are so entitled to cry. It's a hell of a long road to travel just to get to that point. I cross my fingers for all of it going forward. It's probably inevitable that there will be more to come, but it will at least be different, and they say a change is as good as a rest.
One day, I will dare to burn or shred the collections of evidence bundles from everything from fighting SS, taking them to court, educational tribunals, to Judicial Review. (Or I'll go find the two most awful officials who tried to prevent Dc's education, and use all that to commit murder by 10,000 paper cuts!)
Well done on the domestics, and actually managing to get some craft done too! Hoping this is the positive stage of a new chapter.
@WearyAuldWumman you're doing really well, especially in the application of logic, and Blue is spot on about your mindset change. All these situations didn't get built in a day, and can't dismantle in one either. We just have to keep doing the work on ourselves as well as the stuff.
@BlueSummerBaby It would have to be her moving in here which would need permission and her downsizing a lot. I don't think I could cope with her and cats as a permanent situation, and would quickly be reduced to a 24/7 carer for all
I don't talk much about who's still stuck at home here, but there's two, one not able to be fully independent who works hard long hours and has nothing left to look after themselves with, one with very high needs who can do very little for themselves, who rotates round the family a fair bit, for everyone's sanity, but I carry the Lion's share.
The 'past me' is often I think, about coming to terms with moving on, but I've noted it raises old feelings that I thought had been dealt with, too. It IS complicated!
You may actually have done enough work on yourself to run that dream 'shop', not sure about the rest of us, no matter how tempting. Personally I think a lottery win would just make a lot of things I had prior to being able to just buy anything, worth more to me in a weird way. I would however be able to get rid of all the practical 'might need that's' really easily, and actually that's a lot...
@RubySparrow Well done with stopping bringing more in. It's a big part of the battle. The guilt will get better, or at least more livable with IME.
@MissDemelzaCarne Welcome.☕ Unless you're someone whose happy to have someone else paid to make decisions for you, I wouldn't recommend most of them as the answer to realizing where you are at.
Good ones will help you reason out and understand your compulsions by talking things out, in the same way we do on here, while encouraging you to move at whatever pace works for you. But that pace is usually slow (it needs to be, to be lasting) and expensive as a result.
I've worked de-cluttering others, but wouldn't work for a company as they're mainly too 'physical stuff gone' results driven. The 'stuff' is the symptom of an underlying issue. Removing the symptom without dealing with what's causing it doesn't work.
For many it leads to more acquisition, replacement + acquisition, and a nasty cycle with problems left untreated, and others making money keeping it that way.
To my mind 'results' is measured by when someone can approach the problem tendencies (or full behaviors) equipped to deal with them, not simply by carpet space.
The former deals with the problem, the later with the symptoms of the problem.
If you're someone with too much stuff who just needs someone else to tell you what to keep and what to get rid off, they're excellent.
If you're someone who actually has a problem with how you relate to stuff and struggle to let go underlying it all, they're generally not that good a use of money, emotional energy or time, and can make the underlying problem worse.