Week from hell. I think DH has lost the plot.

[Fideliney]

He seems to be saying today that he would rather divorce than curb his hoard, but he's flip-flopping a lot.

Any hoarding widows about who can help me decode this escalating mess?

The background is a shit year of ill health and various stresses. The hoarding has been spiralling. Exhausted and at a bit of a loss

Unless, of course, the excuse about counselling being on medical records is just a way to avoid dealing with the problems associated with the hoarding.

But is there any chance he will agree to this, or is the work argument just another avoidance strategy.

We'll soon see.

I think it is a MH issue. Is there any way he would see a specialist about it?
If you leave him to it it will escalate.
Have you tried watching those hoarding programmes with him? I don't remember exactly what they were called but could still be on the internet somewhere. I wonder if he saw other people's 'hoards' ie mess, he would see how strange it seems to others?

Well the boxes vanished from the dining room and desk while I was lurking upstairs earlier and now he is bobbing around looking puppyishly pleased with himself. No idea where they went. It is an impressively swift disappearance of about 30+ boxes.

I have limited myself to saying 'thank you' and will see what he says this evening. Fingers crossed.

Why don't you ask him where they are?

Have you checked the garden to see if there's another shed put up?

Car boot?

Give him a pat, silly puppy !

I will when it's quiet. I suppose I'm a bit scared of the answer.

Have you checked the garden to see if there's another shed put up?

Or another chuffin storage unit.

I would be very surprised if they were really gone. (I can't imagine that any hoarder would dump stuff without trying to 'sort' through it (ie touch or eyeball everything) first and the timescale simply wouldn't allow that.) He'll likely have found a place to put them and is pleased with himself because he's found a way (he thinks) to keep you happy and still keep his stuff.

Do you have any friendly neighbours or acquaintances with large empty garages nearby?

Storage unit probably.

It's such a hard thing to deal with. Th couple of programmes on it I saw were very sad.

It is a mental health issue but getting to admit he needs and more importantly, wants, help is the hard part.

I think (armchair psychology) that he is very afraid that he will follow in his father's footsteps and that he doesn't want to go to the GP and find out that he has any kind of mental disorder, as he might equate that, in his head, to being a suicide risk.

You said he hasn't read the note - but was there any depression/MH issue in his Dad prior to the suicide? Or will your DH absolutely not talk about it?

I'm saying this because I have a friend here whose DH's mother died of an overdose (deliberate) - she had bipolar disorder and was very wild at the end, kept refusing her meds etc. He has definite OCD traits, paranoia, anxiety and extreme mood swings (not necessarily the same, I know!) and quite possibly has got some form of mental disorder himself but he absolutely will not go to the doctor, preferring to self-medicate with alcohol. It makes him very difficult to live with but she cannot get him to the doctor. :(

£500 per month!?
For how long!?

Oh, I'm so sad for you op...think of the holidays/days out/treats that money could have been spent on...

OP I think it's unlikely that he's just an arsehole or a manipulator as some people suggest. Hoarding is a compulsion, it's a mental illness - it's like an addiction. It's really hard to explain. Getting rid of stuff is almost impossible. It's really like you have a really important relationship with each piece of useless rubbish you own; every item has a meaning that is way, WAY greater than its actual inherent value.
I had a "thing" about making the wrong decision when I was at my worst: I couldn't throw anything away, even things I didn't actually like, because I was worried that at some point in the future I might change my mind and decide I DID like them after all and then regret having got rid of them. Completely absurd but I couldn't see it at all.

He absolutely has to accept that he has got a problem. If he won't accept that then I don't think there's any hope of him ever getting better. And it sounds like the only thing that might wake him up to the fact that he is not functioning like a normal person is action from you, I'm afraid. The only way I can think of for you to handle him is as if he was an alcoholic: he has got to understand that his actions are having a serious negative effect on you and that they would have that effect on any normal person who had to live with him.

He really, really needs professional help - just look at the incident with the batteries! That's not the behaviour of someone who's trying to manipulate you or sabotage your relationship, it's the behaviour of someone who just is not thinking rationally. I'd strongly recommend looking for a therapist or counsellor in your area who specialises in addiction (you might even find one who specialises in hoarding if you're lucky). Meet them, explain the situation to them, and - depending on how desperate you are - get them to come to the house. Stage an intervention. If you're getting to the point where you're booking yourself time in hotels just to get away from all the junk then things are bad and he needs someone to reinforce that message. If it's just you saying it then it's too easy for him to dismiss it as you being a neat freak or whatever. He needs a third party to tell him that he has a problem.

Good luck, I really feel for you.

Amen

Sorry to hear this; I agree with everyone who says it is an illness, he is unlikely to be doing it deliberately to hurt you (but I guess it can feel like that at the time)

My dad was a bit like this, wanted to hang on to loads of junk. He once even stopped me throwing away a torn plastic bag on the basis 'that you never know what use I might find for that'.

Yes dad, I will never know.

My mum used to get so upset and exasperated and chuck stuff out and he would get upset... he had a horribly poor upbringing and once came home from school aged 8 to find his mum had sold some of his toys to buy cigarettes so I can see where he is coming from. I think for him and many other hoarders its about trying to be safe and have things that no one can take away.

My mum died recently and he has been very upset and getting rid of stuff and saying he wished he had spent the money on mum. So he seems to be 'cured' - but at a horrible price.

Maybe your husband needs a bit of a jolt, for him to see what he is doing through the eyes of others? I have no useful suggestions for how that 'jolt' could come about.

Sorry, haven't got anything useful to suggest, just that I know it is hard to deal with hoarders because they seem to get very upset when challenged and it took something major to have any impact on my dad.

The trouble is that for a lot of our parents, they were brought up in the post war years. Make do and mend is something that goes through my head often and I have a whole in-built storage system for craft and toys to cope with it. Both of my parents had hoarding tendencies, dad is still going with his scraps of carpet under table and chair legs and bringing age inappropriate toys for DD as well as dumping anything older than he is on me. He actually is possibly more messy and piles up coins and papers and lives in a very disjointed fashion (tapes in the cutlery drawer in the kitchen etc). As I have got older I realised actually my mum, who was always a collector of antiques (very good eye and even at her wake the local dealers said how she had a nose and saved their bacon time and time again) was the biggest hoarder of all. I am still going through it and the fact she 'knew' what things were worth makes it far far harder. I am desperate not to pass it on (I had 3 family members inc mum die in 2 years - and all of their things ended up with me) but it is so hard to disassociate these items with the people. It was so much pressure, and I wonder if you have spoken to him about what happens when he dies? It may sound harsh, but if you are really considering jumping ship this will all end up on your shoulders anyway if he goes first. My mum thought she would go around putting a gold star on things 'too important to sell' but in reality she never did, as everything had a story. My dad's house will be relatively easy in the sense that what he 'hoards' is junk (napkins from costa etc) but it will still feel like a betrayal. I think he needs to know the impact it has on everyone involved, which is why I suggested the programmes earlier - they have to get to the point in 30mins!
Good luck OP and sorry for the long post!

Fideliney, my mother had severe mental health problems and actually did die in our local psychiatric hospital. Im telling you this in order to make it clear that what Im about to say is not an off the cuff remark to a very difficult situation. The reality is, and you know this - your children deserve better than this. That is the bottom line for a 101 reasons.

Well he hadn't rented new storage.

He dug a path through to the (then) new antique filing cabinet I never got to use, dashed to Rymans for foolscap suspension files and filled it. His mothers fabled (and allegedly very valuable) magazine collections from the 60s are now at the tip. Several boxes worth. On closer inspection about six remaining boxes have been strategically concealed in corners.

It certainly qualifies as a grand gesture. I'm grudgingly impressed, bless his socks, but it's clearly a panic reaction/almighty effort rather than a sea change.

£500 per month!? For how long!? Oh, I'm so sad for you op...think of the holidays/days out/treats that money could have been spent on...

BadVoc thinking (and yelping) about it was all i did.

For almost a decade before I met him he was paying an interest only mortage on a one bedroom flat in possibly the swishest district of SW London and paying for two storage units throughout that time.

This was apparently a deliberate decision to enable him to live in the posh place he fancied living (he says - maybe really to keep the hoard at arms length?).

I have pointed out so many times the economic madness of that. That he could have been close to mortgage free in a two bed somewhere nearly as nice (and used second room as walk in storage) by overpaying a repayment mortgage for the same total monthly cost. He doesn't see it that way.

None of my business really but the thought of the financial waste makes me want to cry. The irrationality scares me.

You said he hasn't read the note - but was there any depression/MH issue in his Dad prior to the suicide? Or will your DH absolutely not talk about it?

I get the impression it was fairly out of he blue Thumb. I think you are right that he equates diagnosis with illness itself.

vicmackie I really recognise your analysis. I certainly hope that that is it and he is willing to tackle it. I'm going to try and promote that.

Sorry, haven't got anything useful to suggest, just that I know it is hard to deal with hoarders because they seem to get very upset when challenged and it took something major to have any impact on my dad.

Thank's Spero. It is undoubtedly an emotional thing. He, like your dad, uses the word 'useful' for unlikely things or talks about the fact it would cost money to buy one (of whatever cheap thing it is) should you need one later or that you could raise money by selling it (which he then never does). He doesn't see the irony or the contradiction that hoarding incurs huge costs. He too comes from a poor (and very large) family.

This all sounds so much worse written down.

Granny thank you. I do understand the danger.

The truth is that every possible way in which events could play out from here is automatically running through my mind in terms of how the DC will view it looking back from their twenties and thirties and what messages they will absorb about relationships and problems. Almost too much so.

Also; DH is almost too keen to fall on his sword in the event of a split and martyr himself in a campervan. I don't really want them seeing that either. I am working out how an optimal split would work.

I've found some of the hoarding documentaries. Just having a skip through trying to decide whether would be a helpful to show DH. Thanks to whoever made the suggestion

But any TV researchers thinking of PMing me like the previous times I made tiny references on hoarding threads just fucking don't

.....His mothers fabled (and allegedly very valuable) magazine collections from the 60s are now at the tip.......

I'll believe that when I (or you) see the pictures of the loose magazines (not just the boxes) lying in the tip. It would be against the grain in so many ways.

(And if, by very remote chance, it is true, it would likely mean he's setting up their disposal as his one off grand gesture which will now and forever after be brought into play whenever he's criticized or you attempt to 'guide him'.)

I'm sorry if that's negative but I'm finding it hard to see anything positive in this situation at the moment.

Yes. It's not the money really is it? It's the irrationality of it.
Exactly.
Very worrying.
I wish I had some useful advice, but I have seen first hand how it affects people, particularly children.
It was strange, there was a thread about hoarding a while back....hoarders were asking For help to tackle their issues...but as soon as anyone posted what a terrible effect it would be having on their dc they went into denial overdrive.
Oh it's not that bad.
I will get Around to it one day.
It's my house I can keep what I want.
Sobering reading...hoarders are - IMO- hugely manipulative. They emotionally blackmail too. Which I think is what your dh is doing now.

PS - your DCs will be affected by all this but you still have a chance to reduce that risk and minimise the oddity of their future relationship with 'stuff'.

(They may not become hoarders themselves - I've seen it go the other way when people become fervent rubbish 'putter-outers', preferring minimalist surroundings with virtually no extraneous possessions. It can get to the point when people actually buy groceries and other items for the amount of packaging which they'll produce - in order to be able to throw said packaging away. That's not a healthy relationship with 'stuff' if you've seen any examples of that recently.)