r/hoarding

We three - me, mom and father have a lot of stuff mainly clothes and shoes bought secondhand. Each has a lot of stuff that we bought for our hobbies. I have beads, paints, paper, brushes, wire, wire tools, etc. My mum has a lot of fabric, around ten sewing machines even outside and lot of threads , needles, wool etc. My father has a lot of junk that he got from scrapyard. Also lot of stuff that he found thrown away. Work tools, woodworking machines, hammers, saws, some chemical stuff ... I don't even know what.

We don't throw anything of ours away, we put it outside or into a room that no one lives in. Like we throw away thrash -the easy stuff. It's not hoarding like on the TV show though. We have two rooms full of stuff like this.

I said to myself that I'll clean it out this summer, but summer is over. I'm 21 years old and I go to university, a new school year is starting soon and I didn't clear it out at all. I also wanted to sell some of the stuff like furniture online...which I didn't. It's hard because I also have a problem throwing things away. Especially when I can't sort it into recycling bins as plastic/metal/glass. A lot of it would end up in a landfill.

I tried to tidy the scrap metal once this summer. I put it into a big pile and I wanted my father to drive it to a scrapyard. He spent three days looking it over, taking things which can still be used. He hid it in our garden and I don't know how much he actually threw away.

My mom is tired from work. Dad doesn't tidy his stuff, but takes care of the garden and our animals. And I spend a lot of time on my phone or buying/taking care of houseplants. At this point we have clothing for three lifetimes and there's nowhere to put anything. No one wants to deal with it. My father is no help at all but I can't throw away his stuff.

We had an argument (not about the hoarding) and he told me that because I don't respect him, he doesn't respect me. I asked him if he plans to change anything till we die and he said he doesn't want to better our relationship. We don't go anywhere, don't enjoy our time together, can't talk without arguing. The amount of our belongings is equal to his, but his stuff is trash (in my opinion) so his stuff is the biggest problem.

And after we argued life goes on, nothing changed. He's still my father. He's helpful if I don't want anything complicated, sometimes asks about my day...but nothing changes concerning our lack of space. He thinks we (me and mum) shouldn't buy any more shoes/ clothes online and I agree but it doesn't solve the issue.

My friend has a long history of severe hoarding. I’ve tried cleaning out her car, her porch, organized her garage, and done sweeps through her house to collect newspapers, old magazines, and general trash. She has a house she cannot live in, built a garage apartment as a place to live while she cleaned the house, then the apartment ended up in the same condition. She also has a rental house where the garage is full as well.

On top of the things simply dropped and forgotten in the floor, she has both valuable collections and bins of sentimental items that her siblings gave her after her mother died.

She’s been in therapy all of her adult life. Her therapist is well aware of the problem and they’ve discussed the problem for years. She should retire, but she and her therapist agree that she needs a place to go, because otherwise, she wouldn’t leave the house. She is overcome with depression, anxiety and shame.

She has chronic mobility issues, so she cannot kneel to clean her tub or stand for long. I live overseas, so I can’t be there very often to be a real help.

Most people who want to be helpful just want to park a dumpster in front of her house, but there are precious things she’s scared would thoughtlessly tossed.

Luckily, she’s agreed to let me help her this fall when I visit. I’m going to have her stay in my Airbnb while we work. I can’t do anything in her absence, because she’s both embarrassed and needs to supervise. I’m the only person she trusts to enter her space.

I know that if I show up with masks, she‘ll be mortified. I also need to figure out cat and eco-friendly cleaning supplies. Her tub hasn’t been scrubbed in three years. I don’t like using chemical cleaning products. Ironically, she’s very sensitive to artificial scents.

Any advice on how to make real progress with natural cleaning products will be greatly appreciated.

I know full well that after her place is clean, the process will begin again. I’ve had it shining and clean before, but she’s so used to living this way, she‘ll just walk in with muddy shoes (for instance) and not think about it. I just want to give her another fresh start.

Thanks for listening and I’d so appreciate any advice on how to do the heavy cleaning and what I might do to make it easier for her to keep it comfortable.

Bought a bigger house to support the hoard because that’s the problem apparently. I knew it and I’m an idiot, held off 5 years. Two mortgages from here on out. 10k a month and I just can’t afford it anymore. My own fault but she said she told me over and over she would declutter and clean up.

hi! first post here but will probably post more as i try to deal with my bedroom and the mess that it is. one of the things i struggle with the most is the things i ‘might use later’. i’ve tried going through things i’ve used recently and keeping those i haves but i keep getting caught in what if’s….

I moved to a new town, and I was having a hard time finding a room to rent and had a limited budget. Found a lady who was renting a room and didn’t have a lot of other options.

While there is pathways through the apartment - it’s pretty bad. No counter top or surface has any clear space making it almost impossible to cook in the kitchen or prep any food, there’s no room in the bathroom to put a makeup bag or anything on the counter. Kitchen table and desk, other surfaces piled high. Floor, couch covered in items and no room to sit on couch. Walking past her room one day with the door open, I realized you can’t see the floor and the bed is piled with stuff to the point she only sleeps in one spot.

My mom thinks I should try to help her clean and organize. But I don’t have the energy for that - I’m recovering from a failed engagement where I was cheated on right before the wedding - amongst other things.

My friend thinks I should have a candid conversation with her and tell her it gets cleaned up or I move out. But will that actually do anything? I’m doubtful. If she wanted to she would type thing, and I shouldn’t have to have a conversation with her about picking up.

Also - we have gone out to Costco and bookstores together on occasion, and she wants to buy everything. Giant stuffed animals for the couch (she’s already got 20), more craft supplies or journals or stationary, more clothes…..

She blames ADHD and rampant disorganization and says she should just buy a bigger house and claims then it will get better because she has more space. She also wants me to move with her.

Moving somewhere else would be financially rough. But I’m not sure talking to her will actually change anything - and I’m not sure it’s my job. I’ve never dealt with a hoarder before.

Apart from if I really want to help her or not - how effective is talking to a hoarder or helping them organize actually realistic?

Hey guys so pretty much im the only one in my family that isn't a hoarder. My room is one of the biggest but my sister has an even bigger room but because it's so full of stuff ( she has stuff blocking her door now so she struggles to get in her room) she usually sleeps in the living room. My other sisters room is a mess but isn't that big, it's tiny. I've kept my room clutter free with a tv, desk, chair sofa and my double bed. There is a spare room but my dad is a hoarder so it's full of junk.

The thing is my sisters now are constantly sitting in my room whenever I go out and treating it like a living room. To be fair to them, as soon as I'm home I tell them I'm heading to bed and want my room to myself and they leave.

I can feel myself slowly getting annoyed though as ill deep clean it and feel like they are making it dirty? Like eating there and leaving crumbs etc. Also the fact they hoarders and can't sit in their own rooms and haven't even bothered to make it nice also pisses me off because it's not my fault they refuse to make their space nice.

How would you go about it? It doesn't effect me to much but I kind of want my space back. I hate getting back from a long day and then having to kick them out and wait.5 mins when I just want to jump on my bed and relax.

This is my first time posting anything, so please forgive me if I mess things up.

I'm currently getting counseling for various psychology/spiritual things that resulted primary from abuse from my dad. It has helped me immensely; so much so that I have come to the conclusion that I don't need to hoard things to keep me safe and in control. My sister and family are currently helping me purge. Mom, someone whom I believe is a hoarder, is also getting rid of things. We live together in the same house.

We rented a dumpster and she's been a real trooper! The problem is, that she brings things in that I have thrown out or donated that belongs to me. I've told her that she has control over her things and I have control over mine. If she wants to keep certain things, I won't complain. Eventually, she might come around and throw out. It's gotten to the point that I might take a hammer to my furniture out of her eyesight.

How do I handle her disrespecting my boundary? I'm trying to be compassionate and understanding. It's an illness that we both struggle with. Thank you!

Are bedrooms supposed to have nothing on the floor? I'm looking at bedrooms on google and they look like minimalism to me. I'm unsure of how a bedroom is supposed to look like.

My room is a massive mess. Everything on the floor and I have to move things to move around. A massive fall hazard,(I am a fall risk).

Im deeply confused.

I know it’s against the rules to ask if we are hoarders as you guys certainly can’t diagnose us, but I promise I’m not asking! I’m just writing down my thought process to make sense of it.

I was always the kid with a perfect room, my mum would go crazy at me if I left a chocolate wrapper on the ground. I was VERY tidy. Then life happened, and a lot of the trauma I experienced, my mum doesn’t know to this day (I’m in my mid 20s). I think she assumed I just became a messy teenager. Although, looking back, it was definitely more than that, but it was contained to my own room so it didn’t impact anyone else. Until very recently, I explained it as “I was depressed. I had depression room” etc.

Anyway, cut to now, where I live with my partner in our own house. There’s a lot in between of different places I’ve lived and I’ll answer any questions if people have them, idk if this will reach anyone though since it’s my first post. Before we met, I knew my partner had about 4 years of severe depression. In that time, his house (now ours) got incredibly messy, beyond what we could just set aside a day to clean. Honestly, I think there was a sense of “oh thank god, someone we don’t have to hide our messiness from!”. Just for reference, his mental health is much better now and he’s been off antidepressants for nearly two years - he’s doing great and I’m very proud of him. We ended up living together very quickly after getting together, there were alot of factors going into that but I don’t regret it at all. What it did mean was that our combined habits made for a house which now feels like it’s falling apart, and neither of us have any clue where to start or what to do.

We aren’t at the point where anything is unsalvageable or unsafe (beyond tripping hazards I guess). Some rooms are worse than others, the front door opens into the living room which is cluttered but not outright embarrassing if people see it. The kitchen is a wreck but mainly because of broken things and clothes left around the washer & dryer. It’s upstairs that’s the main problem. But it’s intense, and it’s where we spend a vast majority of our time (the only room with a TV, the sofas are covered in clutter & our bed in the only thing we can sit on really). I think if we were to get professional help we’d be able to stay on top of it. Maybe that’s optimistic because we have cleaned before and it got worse, but it was FAR from a hard reset, we just managed to clear a route from our bed to the bathroom to the stairs.

We want to eventually move but that means house viewings and evaluations. I’m feeling so overwhelmed and stressed. I don’t even know what I want people to reply with. I’m just coming to terms with the fact we aren’t problematically messy. It’s deeper. It’s more to process than I thought.

My boyfriend (M17) is a hoarder and has been for many years. He mainly hoards clothes, and other fashion accessories, as well as makeup and crafting supplies. He's young, so he still lives with his parents. It's just his room thats like this. His parents don't seem to care much and don't do really anything about it. I'm the only one who seems to express concern. I'm tired of pretending I'm okay wit the mess, I'm not. It bothers me a lot. I'd like to consider myself a clean and tidy person and being in his room gives me high stress and frustration. I don't like sleeping over or being in there for long periods of time, but I do it anyway, because I love him. I've become increasingly frustrated with it and I'm considering just not coming over anymore. I've tried to help him nany times, but it is such a large accumulation of stuff, it's so difficult to even make a small dent into it. Even if I clean off his floors, theres still tons of amounts of shit hiding in his multiple closets and drawers. Its even harder when I have to ask him if I'm allowed to throw away something and he keeps saying no, and picking things out of the garbage. I just don't know what to do anymore. I need help. I don't want to damage our relationship but I can't do this for much longer.

Hi there. I'm a single mom of an 18 year old young man who is a hoarder. We live together in a two bedroom apartment. His room is so full now he cannot sleep in it and he sleeps on the sofa. This is a problem because that is also where I work so I have to wake him every day and try and get him to move out of my work space so I can start my day. His belongings have taken over pretty much every surface in the living room, dining room and kitchen also, every closet and cupboard. I can't entertain like this and it's very stressful and overwhelming for me visually. As a neurodivergent person I find this extremely over stimulating and I'm losing my mind.

He has always struggled with hoarding since he was young but unfortunately because of the many traumas he has gone through it has been deprioritized by therapists for appropriate reasons or the extent has been not believed (passed off as "mom upset about messy bedroom")

He went through six months of day treatment for mental health issues but declined treatment around hoarding issues. I offered support from a therapist who specializes in hoarding and he declined treatment. I have offered to bring in an organizer or have our former regular housekeeper help him address his bedroom but he has declined assistance. He says he needs to do it himself. At the same time, he's not doing so. We completed an OCD and a DBT program as a family in hopes it would help but it has not moved the needle.

Whenever cleaning his room gets brought up with any level of urgency he gets very volatile, he yells like he is being murdered, punches walls, calls names, self harms or threatens to self harm if approached further which is really concerning (but not seriously enough for hospitals or law enforcement to get involved). I'm really concerned about this jeopardizing our housing with noise complaints and this is very upsetting to be on the receiving end of. At the same time, it's not feasible to continue to live in an apartment where I'm not able to have anyone over, where common spaces are not able to be used for their intended purposes, where it's becoming difficult to cook, where it's hard to know when I can start my work day and where I'm subjected to verbal abuse. I also can't look for cheaper accommodations because moving this is a non starter. He sleeps here and is gone for pretty much all waking hours so he is completely unbothered by the state of affairs.

I don't know what to do to get this moving when efforts to do so are met with such hostility. I can't live like this anymore either. It's not healthy for anyone.

I don’t mind any given advice. I’m not looking for much more of a rant since I’ve done about everything I can. I currently still live at home and the kitchen is always a mess thankfully I’m still able to cook (stove cleared occasionally) but there’s no counter space to prep for cooking making it very frustrating. There’s sometimes bags of groceries left on top of the stove which is annoying as well. From not being able to find certain ingredients/seasons to the hassle of playing Tetris whenever it’s time to cook. It’s stressful i genuinely find cooking to be a fun thing i tend to enjoy. However it get to a point where it’s beyond frustrating. I’ve cleaned the kitchen myself and organized multiple times and it becomes the same mess. If there’s anything I can do other then be the only one cleaning I’m happy to hear but I’m not sure what else to do and every time I cook it’s more and more frustrating

I was trying to declutter today, currently have 3 large garbage bags of clothing I will be donating, and a couple smaller garbage bags with actual trash in them.

During this process I was feeling pretty good about how much I was able to let go of and decided to try something I haven't attempted before; getting rid of some stuffed animals.

Well, I set aside two to donate that I never really played with, I told myself they would be better off in a home where someone would use them and cherish them, but in the end I couldn't do it. I felt so guilty trying to get rid of them and ended up having a mini breakdown where I've just been crying a bit the past hour.

I've been somewhat aware I have hoarding tendencies for a while, but never thought much of it. I think today it's just really starting to click for me, hence finding this reddit page.

My dad was a hoarder and my room at his place usually matched the environment. I'd leave trash on the ground and sleep on one half of the bed because the other side was also covered in garbage. However, my mom is a clean freak so I would sometimes(very rarely) have huge cleaning spurts and make my room tidy again. This wasn't too difficult at his place because most of the mess in my room really was just food and drink containers which I hold no attachment to. At my mom's place it never got bad because my mom would make me clean it and would also decide to clean my room if she felt like I took too long (I hated this and told her many times that I would clean it myself since I hate other people cleaning for me)

I moved out of my mom's place 4 years ago, which happened to be the same day my dad passed away. Because of this I've ended up with some of his stuff in my apartment that I'm not sure I'll ever be able to get rid of, along with his car that I only really hold onto for sentimental reasons. I hate driving and the insurance isn't cheap, but I hold a lot of memories of him driving me around and now that I've had it for a while I also love the car as my own.

It was an incredibly stressful ordeal when he passed, my sister and I couldn't keep the house and had very limited time to go through items to keep. Since there was so much stuff it was literally impossible to dig through everything and ultimately 99% of what he had was thrown out and the house was sold, very distressing, but it also felt a bit relieving to know I wouldn't end up with it unable to get rid of anything. We had been helping our dad out with cleaning the place up a couple weeks before he passed and he was in good spirits because of that, I think he was finally ready to say goodbye to the mess as well.

I know my tendencies are not nearly at that level, but I'm worried about ending up in a similar situation and I see my friends who have so little around their places and it seems freeing, which is what made me try to declutter more recently.

Overall I know I've improved a LOT at keeping things tidy since moving out but there is still much to do. I'm proud with how much I have managed so far.

Tl;dr I think I've really started to realize the affect that hoarding has had on my life and.. if you have any advice on how to get rid of stuffed animals I'll take it.. lol

Thanks to anyone who stuck around through all that, I guess I just needed to try to express how I was feeling, though I'm not sure it was that cohesive

My mother is deeply in denial about her hoarding and obsessive collecting. She gets on kicks of buying dolls or teddy bears or jewelry on EBay. She goes to Goodwill nearly every day and buys millions of kitchen items or just misc stuff. She obsessively buys storage bins, even when visiting family in another state a flight away.

She didn’t use to be this way. My father has hoarding tendencies too, but mostly he’s her enabler.

But now there are mice. So many mice droppings. I come and help clean up, but last time I got sick with mild salmonella despite wearing a KN-95 mask and gloves.

She’ll sometimes let me clear out a lot of trash, and I thought I was getting somewhere because she said she didn’t miss the stuff, but I think the empty space signals to her to fill it again?

I now can’t visit my old home without a panic attack. I’m so scared I’ll end up like her myself.

I’ve let her know it’s trauma induced, it’s a mental disorder and that she needs to work on the psychological aspect, otherwise we are spinning our wheels. She had a brain tumor removed a few years ago, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s contributing.

She has an addictive personality, and I’ve had to fight her off opioids before. Thank God she doesn’t know how to get them when not given them by the doctor, and her doctors are sensible enough to be really strict.

I’ve offered to find counseling, professionals to help do things gently, etc. She says “no” and that she’d rather “do it ourselves” - but what that really means is me.

But I’m so tired of clearing out crap only for it to grow back and for me to get sick in the process. I have to ban her from buying stuff for more daughter because I know mice have been all over it. She intermittently throws me out for crying and “being ridiculous” and then feels terrible and calls me back to just hang. But I’m so grossed out I can’t. Literally, I can’t sit anywhere.

I snapped a few weeks ago and told her I would get counseling and mental health resources, and when I got them for her, she had 5 days to make an appointment within the next month or I’d be calling the health department.

I’ve been busy so I haven’t gotten all that together, so she thinks I’ve forgotten that promise, but I told her that the delay is me getting it.

I love my mom. I’m worried dementia is starting, but the hoarding is definitely there. She has no sense of reality and blames everyone else for not helping her, but she blocks what we do. She resists the mental help.

Am I wrong to really push it? If it were any other elderly couple, I’d call the health department. For their safety and health. I feel bad doing it to my parents and humiliating them, and I feel bad not doing it and allowing the squalor. They keep saying they’ve caught a few mice so they’re working on it, but I know there have to be hundreds. I keep telling them this.

Is there any hope?

There is also an inheritance issue from my grandmother, who I don’t want to stress out, but want to tell to restrict funds to my parents so they don’t piss everything away at Goodwill and leave me and my sister nothing. My grandmother originally had the principle in trust for my sister and I, and my parents could live off the interest, which was very generous IMO, but my father and aunt, all of them threw a fit, felt this was unfair and pressured her to change it and trust them to make sure the grandkids were taken care of.

My grandmother is 99 and still lives in her home. She’s a neat freak, and it feels so much better there. I also don’t want them staying with her and stressing her out, although she wants them to come and stay to live with her.

So now I’m worried about my own financial interests on top of it all.

Am I wrong to demand action taken for mental health? She’s supposed to be seeing a neurologist for issues, which is good, but they only test her and ask her questions she is in full control of answering. I want to give them more info myself.

Will I be wrong in calling the health department to force the situation if she refuses to even get counseling?

I’m feeling so hopeless and alone in all this.

I hope it's okay for me to post here. I'm not a hoarder in that I want to keep all the trash in my house and have attachment to it, but my house is horrific due to depression and mental illness.

I ended up getting in contact with someone who does free cleans. They say they'll definitely come over here and help clean my house, and I was so relieved and nearly cried.
The only thing is that the set up cameras in the house and record their work to post it online, and do before and afters. That doesn't bother me at all.
You also cannot be in the house while they clean.

But here's the issue.

I'm paranoid. I have all my things in this house, all my most beloved items, all over the place but especially in my room. Things I've collected over the years, electronics, desktop computer. Things precious to me. Because of this, I have a little security camera in my room. It was cheap, got it on sale, but it's given me some peace of mind.
It's been in there for months, well before I contacted about cleaning or even knew that people will help people like me for free.

The cleaners coming will be volunteers from around the area. People I can't talk to, that are different from the cleaning person I was in contact with. I don't know these people, I can't contact them. They're just people that will accept a volunteer job. They're not vetted, they don't have social media profiles or an online presence, they're just random people that want to help out.

This makes me more paranoid.
I let the person I'm in contact with know that I have a camera set up in one room, and if that's okay. They immediately got uncomfortable, I could tell over the phone, and said they would really, really prefer that I take it out before they come clean and they aren't comfortable being recorded. I said I'm just paranoid, and I know people who have had things stolen before and this is where all my most precious things are. They said they understand, but they would really much prefer me to not have that in there when they come over.

I didn't think it would be that much of an issue. I thought it would be okay since this is my private room where all my things are, not all over the house. I don't want to get rid of it. It's almost a dealbreaker for me, even though this clean would be lifesaving and amazing and help me out so much, because I'm terrified of people I don't know taking or throwing things away that are mine, things that are important to me.
I'd take them all with me but I wouldn't have room to do so in the car when I leave for them to come over, and some things are in areas I can't even get to behind garbage.

I was told that I would be contacted again in a little while, and asked to send some more pictures. I did. I haven't been contacted yet and it's been a while.

I think I ruined everything with my stupid paranoia. I think I ruined it all and I chased them off by being weird and coming off as ungrateful or insulting that I don't trust them and have a camera in my room, and the idea of being recorded creeped them out even though they were going to send volunteers instead.

I think I messed up big time.

Hi Reddit, I could really use some helpful advice and maybe a list of tools to rent or buy for cleaning/disinfecting a hoarder house. My friend and I are going to take over his grandmother’s house in a rent-to-own situation. She was a hoarder and also hoarded animals.

The house is almost empty (just a few odds and ends left over) but it reeks of animal urine/feces. She has a loft that she let the animals basically destroy and had not been up there in almost 10 years. The walls has been painted with a glossy paint and has so much wall paper on the walls. We know we will have to pull up the flooring in the loft and his grandmother has agreed to purchase the materials for the project.

Fortunately/unfortunately my friend and I have never had to deal with this type of situation before. I’ve lived in apartments for the last 10 years and he’s lived in remodel apartment style duplexes.

Please any advice, tool list, cleaner list, etc would be very helpful. We don’t have much money saved up so we are going to try to do it ourselves before calling in services. Thank you in advance!

Hoarding sucks!

The title says it all! I've been hoarding since I was a kid. When I was probably just thought to be messy or lazy. Now 23 years into owning a home I've ruined it by hoarding.

Every trauma I've faced, Dad passing away, Mom in a major car accident, sons cancer scare, husband hit by a car and killed, my Mom passing away and facing having to now be the breadwinner for my family. I built my walls higher and higher, literally. In the process I've hurt my two children by having them endure living this way. The two, and only people I have left in my life.That I love dearly.

So I did the mental work to prepare myself to do a huge purge and clean my house, finally. I've figured out what it would take, dumpsters, supplies and some help with my mortgage (as I am soon to be 2 months late), even though I work full time and Doordash parttime.

I started a Gofundme. Here's where my rant comes in. The Gofundme suggests I send a big shout out to all of my friends so they will donate and share my fundraiser.....well, surprise surprise.....I have NO friends.

This hoarding illness has also kept me lonely, isolated and friendless. I am a hoarder who is ashamed and embarrassed of my home and life.. My home is now falling into disrepair, so to neighbors I'm probably also a pariah. I don't get close to people or neighbors because It's not like I'll ever get close enough to let people into my world.

So here I sit needing help, ready to work hard, and yet living in fear every moment of losing my home. I really have to go through things as important belongings and mementos are mixed in with trash.

I belive two months of solid working will get the job done. So, along with my rant I guess my plea as a fellow hoarder would be please please share the Gofundme information in my bio. You people are my only connection to people. I truly pray for you, and all of us. As they say the struggle is real.

I am tired of feeling and being isolated. I am so tired period.. Hoarding is exhausting.. My kids need to see me come out the other side of this. I need to see me come out the other side of this. I need to breathe. I feel like I'm suffocating. Please help. Please share.

Also, I really want to connect with others. I'm a good person, I care. I just want to live and not have our world taken away from us.

I am moving and I’ve always kept all my computers and phones from the early 2000’s. I have no need for the items and the overwhelming electrical cords.

Do I just throw away? I have no attachment to the items but not sure why I hoarded them.

Thank you so much in advance for advice.

I already let go of 5 garbage bags of hoarding clothes and shoes and still have clothing I think best I donate because I’m overwhelmed.

Wow what an emotional time this has been for me. Shoutout to groups like this existing because it’s already helped me understand a lot more about what’s been going on.
So I grew up in a hoarding house. There were other types of abuse going on which I understand is fairly common because usually you have to be unwell be a hoarder. I am 26 years old and I’m just now able to really understand/articulate this.
How I live now is much better than how I grew up, however, it’s been brought to my attention by my fiancé that I have hoarding tendencies and behaviors. Being “better” doesn’t mean it’s normal, healthy, or acceptable.
I’ve been looking into this (and doing a lot of crying) because the pieces are finally coming together, connecting the baggage, trauma, and shame. I can’t believe that I grew up in such a terrible environment, and still fell into something similar. I’m extremely ashamed and honestly, I’m in complete disarray. I can hardly think straight or function at work because everything’s clicking and I am so overcome with emotion. the clinging to things and clutter has impacted every area of my life and somehow I was blind to it for so long.
The biggest buildups right now are happening around my dishes, laundry, and trash/clutter - but I also have a major problem with knickknacks.
I’m much better at throwing actual trash away than I used to be, and there are a lot of other subsets that I’ve actually course corrected pretty well on throughout the last few years, but I’m just now realizing the scope of my problem and how much it’s affecting me and how I function.
Also, my mom is in my life and I’ve come to realize that she’s an enabler/still a hoarder herself. She’s always looking for things to get for me and is constantly bringing me unwanted gifts. Some of them are very thoughtful and special or usable but a lot of them are just junk that neither one of us needs, but we think is cool or might be useful someday. I’ve actually asked her to stop a few times because like I said, I’ve been making progress over the last few years but if you couldn’t guess - she hasn’t stopped.

This has been completely devastating and one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to come to terms with, but I just keep telling myself I can deal with this pain if I get to come out on the other side a better person. I don’t wanna do this to the people I love and I’m afraid to lose everything I’ve been working for and my future to this. If there’s any hard truths you think I need to hear, Please tell me (as gently as possible I’m so sensitive rn 😭) and please come forward with any advice or tips at all especially if you’ve been in this situation.
Thank you all for your time, your compassion, and your group ❤️

Admitting to yourself that you have a mental health issue with a negative stigma attached to it can be really daunting. I know I'm a hoarder. I know I've let garbage and recycling pile up while dealing with additional mental health issues and figuring out that I have a chronic illness. I've been talking to my therapist about it a little, and for a bit I've been trying to take out a bag a day, but it doesn't make a difference, and often I'm not feeling well enough. There's still so much stuff there.

But today I researched "hoarding cleanup near me" and talked to someone and got a quote. \o/ The price is daunting too, but that's something I'm determined to figure out, because I need to get this done. But idk, this feels like some kind of progress and I think when I tell my therapist tomorrow that she'll be proud of me.

I'm sending all the "you got this" vibes to anyone in a similar situation. <3

It's hard, but you can do it.