Are you one of those people who can't throw anything out?

I find satisfaction in shedding things; not hoarding them. But this story says there are up to 2 million people in the US who are compulsive hoarders. One says: "I'm confronted with an object, and I think I can save it, I can use it later, I can use the packaging, I can sell it, I can recycle it. It just takes forever. I have to make a decision, and usually I'll procrastinate." (San Francisco Chronicle)

Comments

[nellagain]

HEY! Get out of my garage! And the Shed! and the spare room ! and my kitchen...that's valuable stuff, I'm making a wall hanging from that lettuce.

[Cherie]

My daughter is sort of like this, she's organized but she rarely gets rid of anything. I'm a minimalist. The less I have lying around the better I feel. I give stuff away or get rid of stuff constantly. The only thing I have too much of is books. But they're all in their place.

[Lois Lane]

I think Delta Burke recently went to rehab for this.

I wouldn't say I hoard things. I keep some things that have sentimental value, but mostly I'm lazy and let a lot of crap pile up before I'll finally cave and get rid of it. But I have no problem whatsoever throwing stuff out once I finally get motivated.

[twerp]

Lois, me too!

[Sean, Torrington CT]

I have so many broken down carboard boxes and peanuts, but I can't bring myself to put them in a landfill.

Once there is a car load, I suppose I'll drop them off at the recycling center.

[Lois Lane]

twerp - I don't know about you, but my closet is the worst. I have to clean it out several times a year to make room for all the new pairs of shoes that keep finding their way in there...

[twerp]

mine is the den. We've been using it as a spare room and crap is piled up every where in there. I'm cleaning it out during the next few weeks.....yeah, I'm lazy and let it pile up for too long...anyhey, I'm having a yard sale and what I don't get rid of, I'm giving to Goodwill. I'm turning the room into a play room for my son. I'm just getting fed up with tripping over toys all the time in the living room.

[Cherie]

If I could get my oldest kid to get his Sh*t out of my cellar, that would make my chi flow much better! I have only a very few things with "sentimental value". I'm of the thought that "you cant take it with you" so I'm more attached to my memories than any material thing. I have a ring that was my grandmothers, then my aunts and then mine and of course my photos of my kids when they were little. Other than that...I could loose it all in a fire and care less as long as my kids and my animals were safe.

[Phranqlin]

I tend to hang on to things for sentimental reasons. Plus, I hate to throw anything out that isn't completely destroyed. Everyone in my family is the same way, so our house is cluttered. My younger son is particularly insistent about wanting to hang on to all of his stuff, although I've been successful at persuading him to give his outgrown toys and clothes to his cousins. We're not at the point of the guys in the article, but we're hardly minimalists, either. We are all in the habit of collecting interesting things with the idea that we're going to use them for something -- which we eventually do, but not as fast as we accumulate them. In the meantime, we have to find a place to put them!

We do try to deal with the clutter. Periodically we do an "organize and purge" sweep where we go through our stuff, pitch what's broken, set things aside for the thrift store and the cousins, and organize and put away the rest. A "rolling purge" of clothes works pretty well, too. We keep a bag by the closet and toss unwanted articles of clothing in it as we go along; when the bag is full, it goes to the thrift store.

But it's still challenging to keep stuff organized. Adding to the problem are relatives who give the kids large presents that we then have to deal with. Although now that they're a older, my kids want smaller, more expensive electronic items that don't take up much space, so the problem is waning.

[The Asshole Guy]

Sean a little gas and a match will take care of your problem and you can stick it to man at the same time.

I don't keep much of anything myself. If it has no real purpose I will throw it away. If you ever need something throw away, I'm the guy to do it. I don't care if you buried a loved one in a suit or dress. I'll toss it right in the can for you.

[jilldini]

My mom is always after me to clean out her garage, which I'm happy to do. But she won't let me put more than two bags of trash out for pick-up. That's sort of counter-productive, believe me. I could do a pretty good job in one fell swoop, but heaven forbid there's a full trash can and four or five bags out at the curb. 'What will the neighbors think?' Sheesh...

[the man in the trout mask]

Not a hoarder per se but certain items I'll save/collect,such as - umbrellas,old chair legs,maps of Albania,12 volt transformers,pictures of Bella Abzug,lint,small blocks of wood,anything with a chain attached to it - you know,the usual stuff.

[Rock Marine]

I throw things out constantly....I threw out two ex-wives and quite a few dollars went with them.

[Jack]

I'm a compulsive collector. But I'm happily married to a wife who cheerfully throws away everything I stash in the cellar, garage, shed, attic, under the bed, in the bottom bureau drawer. Are we lucky, or what.

[Sheila]

Hoarders' residences have a serious problem in addition to the clutter itself. Clutter inhibits cleaning, so the room, house, whatever, stinks horrendously. Disgusting.

[Soo]

Mister's a hoarder, I'm not. However, I don't just randomly toss stuff that belongs to him. I have a plan that works for us: I'll suggest he hang out in bed all day relaxing, and then drag everything I want sorted into the bedroom. I'll wade through it and he'll hear, "What about this?" until I'm satisfied we've ditched enough.

He won't sort by himself, so I sort-of strongarm him. But he's satisfied that his "best stuff" hasn't been tossed out, and I'm happy.

[Sean, Torrington CT]

TAG, I don't want to pollute the atmosphere any more than I need to. I'm not some ignorant land-whale joe-jobber. But, it is the thought that counts.

[JC]

Sean, if Craigslist is popular in your area, you can post an ad in the "Free" category saying you have free moving boxes. They'll be taken in a day or two. You can even leave them outside your place somewhere if you don't want to deal directly with anyone.

[Soo]

I love the idea that I'm "saving the earth" by recycling, except that in my area, recycling=cost discount. That's where you go through the hassle of sorting your trash, removing the labels, rinsing, etc, then the special recycling truck picks it up every other week and the landfill weighs the recycled materials before dropping it all into the landfill while issuing the town council a discount on the price of trash pick up. Lame.

California is a crazy place, but Monterrey County was hardcore about recycling. They'd accept just about everything (except paper milk cartons and the wrappers from Kraft slices). They operated a thrift store of usable stuff that would get thrown out in the trash. You can even buy mulch made out of recycled wood furniture, in several designer colours, even blue. It was pretty awesome.

[Soo]

You can also check out freecycle.org, except they require an email where they send out daily updates on stuff people are giving away or are looking for. If you're in a huge area, the inbox can get full very quickly.

Everything must be free and not on any recall list. Also, I think they don't allow stuff like rocket-propelled grenades or howitzers, but everyone has their limits.

[mydogFoster]

TAG---- If you buried a loved one in a suit or dress how do you get it back?

Just askin'.

[jilldini]

Geeze, Soo...now how am I going to get rid of all of those rocket-propelled grenades and howitzers in my mom's garage? Dang it.

[jilldini]

Artillery shell cache causes stir

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08078/865985-56.stm

[A.V.]

I thought this was gonna be about the NY gov, Idiot Spitzball.

He hoard around.

As for the actual stuff, I'd better keep quiet before someone checks out all my crap.lol

[Soo]

I wouldn't be surprised if there's a craigslist category for artillery, jilldini, just not on freecycle. My guess is they're elitist about what junk can be advertised.

[lawdog]

Jilldini: I am sure that the Michigan milita would be rather happy to take those howitzers and rocket propelled grenades off your hands.

[twerp]

Ok, this story inspires me to throw out all of my emotional baggage...I've held on to it long enough. Come to think of it, I thought I've thrown it out before but it just keeps coming back. I guess the garbage man doesn't want it! Darn you, garbage man! Take this crap to the junkyard; I don't want it!

[Wolf]

After being widowed last year, I moved from our 22,000 square foot house into a 900 square foot condo. I sold or gave away 95% of our stuff. I’m still not “lean and mean” yet, but I’m much more so. It’s less crap for me to have to move again, and if I would die it’s a much smaller job for somebody else to dispose of everything.

Among the collections I sold:

125 limited edition numbered watches, over 60 cases of hardback books and $15k worth of Disney memorabilia. It was all stuff that I realized I wasn’t attached to, and I don’t miss it.

[The Asshole Guy]

TAG---- If you buried a loved one in a suit or dress how do you get it back?

Just askin'.

MyDogFoster I was just trying to state how easy it is for me to throw things away. I'm not sure how you could/would get it back but if you did I could toss it out in a heartbeat.

My mother kept her bird cage for a good year after it died. Once I found out she still had it, it went in a dumpster. She couldn't toss it but I could with ease.

[David]

My gf and I both had entire housefuls of stuff when we moved in together. The house we moved into was less sq ft than either of our places. We have a storage unit, it's probably bigger than the house.

We are remodeling, but it is going slowly because there is no room to work on a project.

[Wolf]

Everybody told me I should just rent storage for all of our stuff. I told them I couldn't stand the thought of paying to store something that I may or may not ever get around to using again, so it all had to go.

The big purge was healthy for me too. I didn't need all that stuff. Never did. We collected it because we enjoyed it, and then it was over. Time for it to go.

I also sold about 800 DVDs and about 1200 VHS tapes. I still have about 10 tapes and about 50 DVDs.

Hell...I even gave away my fairly new refrigerator...for free.

[Wolf]

our 22,000 square foot house

Duh. Oops. That should be 2,200, not 22,000. I mean, it has 13 rooms...but it isn't the freaking Taj Mahal or anything.

I can't believe I didn't catch that right away.

[mumto3boyz]

dammit, now I feel like I should clean or something!!
y'all are messin with my chi!!!

[yowza]

Wow, Soo, paper milk cartons are a big recyclable in Japan. It's pretty high grade paper, evidently...they make toilet paper out of it. Scratchy as hell, though!

Has everyone else noticed how the slew of stories on hoarders?
It appears that hoarding is a separate and distinct syndrome They've found that hoarders have different brain wave patterns than other OCD'er's. That will potentially help in development of treatments. If you throw their stuff out, they'll just re-fill their homes within months.

Clutter? Whole different thang. Probably most of us suffer from clutter at least occassionally but not hoarding. Me, I'm not a hoarder. No sirree.

[Dave]

My roommate feels compelled to save empty boxes for some strange reason. He doesn't break them down like Sean, though. So there is a big pile of boxes in the corner of the living room. I don't dare touch them. I learned my lesson when he bought me a gift. It was a toy. The kind of thing you put on a shelf. So I put it on a shelf. And threw away the box. My roommate went nuts.
"You're throwing away the box?!"
"Um...yeah?"
"But why would you throw away the box?!"
"Because...it's an empty box?"
"But it's a cool box!"
"Still...it's just...an empty box...surely?"
I could tell by the look on his face, though, that I ought not to throw out that box. The box seemed more valuable to him than its former contents. So I dug it out of the trash and put it out on the kitchen table for him to admire. That seemed to make him happy.

[Sohbet Hatları]

twerp - I don't know about you, but my closet is the worst. I have to clean it out several times a year to make room for all the new pairs of shoes that keep finding their way in there...