Not quite a horder - decluttering
Comments
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Varadoll- taking photos before and after is a great thing to help you remember where you started and ended up. I cleared out a box of paperwork last week and wish I had taken a pic before, but often do with bigger spaces (especially my garage otherwise known as the "final frontier").
You go girl!
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Vargadoll, You're making great progress! I took "before" photos once, but never cleaned it up. I think it looks better now, but the photos were years ago. Perhaps the poop was from the now dead mice and there's no new infestation.
Condolences on your double losses. I was lucky that I didn't need to clear my parents' house when they died 6 mos apart. The family took what they wanted and called in an auctioneer. He said to keep everything because you wouldn't believe what people would buy.
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V your very good hearted. Hopefully it is old poop. Love the pic. That before is like my house.
Jazzy that's so sweet to use your skills to help a friend.
Let's keep the momentum going!
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We purchased this house in 2011 but it took my DH almost 3 years to get me to move. The original owners were the only family to ever live here. (Built in the late 1960's true brick rancher) the downstairs was an apartment years ago but due to the septic backing up it was stripped down to concert and walls. It has worked well as a holding area but we are ready to clean it up
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We purchased this house in 2011 but it took my DH almost 3 years to get me to move. The original owners were the only family to ever live here. (Built in the late 1960's true brick rancher) the downstairs was an apartment years ago but due to the septic backing up it was stripped down to concert and walls. It has worked well as a holding area but we are ready to clean it up
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Jazzy--what a great way to use the decluttering skills and info gained to help a friend!
Vergadoll--mice are real nuisances. Because of the construction of myhouse it's practically impossible to keep the critters out. Not only the mouse poop issue when cleaning is there, but the little buggers steal dog food and store it in the strangest places! Air tight containers are my best friend in this battle. I can't believe how many deaths you experienced in such a short period of time. Anyone would get knocked off their feet and get behind after all that.
Great before and after pics!
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Varga, oh my, yes those are difficult losses you have been through since 2013 and I extend my condolences. And then towards the end of 2016, you were dx with bc! You’ve really had tough years recently. Life is forever altered and yet somehow goes on. Your cleaning efforts look great. Nice work! I’m sure you’ll arrive at a good solution to get rid of the mice problem.
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Varga - thinking of you. I hope you're putting YOU first sometimes.
Jazzy - helping your friend reminds me... My BFF died of pancreatic cancer in 2005, but we'd been friends for 30 years. She brought home every leftover from eating out. Saved all leftover food bigger than two bites. And never looked at it again after it went into the fridge. Sometimes a jar with only one olive was stuck in the back of the fridge. From the time her only son was in HS he used to call me periodically and say "time to clean Mom's fridge again". Many thing were unidentifiable. I had fun doing it but it pained her to watch all those moldy drips & dribbles carefully saved in Tupperware going into the trash and down the disposal.
It only occurs to me just now - why didn't her son clean out the fridge? Stupid questions really. My son wouldn't have done that either at that age. Now my son doesn't buy much & is ruthless about tossing stuff or giving it away. Probably comes from living on a sailboat with no room.
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DIL doesn't do leftovers like that, but does leave a jar in the frig with one olive or 1 tsp peanut butter. DS is ruthless when he cleans it out. At least it's still edible. DIL's mother is a true horder, so DIL is doing pretty well considering what she grew up with. She says she came home after her first semester at college to discover her room had been stuffed with stuff.
My goal this week is to get the filled bags to Goodwill.
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MinusTwo, my mother hoarded leftovers, too. She was very possessive of them and would not allow me to discard anything. She became very anxious at any mention of throwing out leftovers or freezer foods, no matter how long they had been in there, especially with me. Some of my sisters were able to get her to give up the old food, but not me. I think it had to do with the fact that I am not a "saver." I don't save leftovers, rubber bands, aluminum foil, bread bags, or lengths of string and this bothered her tremendously.I think Mother felt that I didn't value things like she did (which is true.) Mother was always suspicious that I was going to throw her stuff out. I had to be very careful not to go in with an agenda, but let her lead me to whatever project she wanted to work on at the time.
Unfortunately, Mother never did get around to culling her stuff. She got very ill with end stage renal failure, then diagnosed with stage 4 renal cancer. The last 6 months of her life she didn't have energy to do much of anything. I felt bad about it, but when Mother entered hospice, my sister and I took that opportunity to start cleaning things out. We spent days being with Mother, then go back to her house and spend 3-4-5 hours going through her mountains of black trash bags and gigantic hoard. She would have cursed us if she knew what we were doing. Still, even with that head start it took 7 of us over 6 weeks to go through the stuff enough to even clean the floors and walls. What a headache! When I got home from that big job I went straight to work on my own junk! I can tell you one thing--my kids will thank me for it!
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I did not tell you ladies how broken hearted I was when we moved! We had been in the same how for 17 years (my grandmother's house ) it sat on 28 acres and it was my home. My DH wanted to move and purchased the house we live in now. It is bigger and is so much easier with my girl (adult multiple handicap child) I have one little bitty step in the carport to get her in and out of the house. It really was better for me to have her in the bigger house with wider halls, doorways, no steps (the she has to use I wear the ones out going downstairs! ) and she got her own bathroom. 2013 was a hard hard year! ( to pour salt in a wound our cat of 18 years died in August that year to) I was just getting my act together when my sister died. (2015) We stayed the same age for 3 weeks every year. She was barely 11 months older than me. Then BAM... BC...in December 2016. My parents still don't know. They have lost 2 children I didn't need them worrying about me. Sorry about getting off the subject of hoarding but it's this stuff that leads to hanging on to every sentimental scrap of paper, picture or useless object!
So today's update:
Cleaned and organized the upstairs closet that holds stores the cleaning supplies and equipment and cleaned out the med cabinet to!
This stuff has got to go!
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Hugs Vargadoll. It's wrenching to leave the home you grew up in, then add on losing family members. You must have felt like a punching bag after losing so much. Good for you for finally having the will to tackle things. Give yourself a great big star.
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Varga, I’m glad you feel comfortable enough with us here to tell us more of your backstory. I think it can be cathartic to talk about the past as it keeps the present in perspective. You are where you are at because of all that. It is very understandable that you have stuff to declutter. You have been dealing with heavy life issues!
In some respects, you also dealt with the “loss” of a house you loved. I can understand that. In March, I sold my 2005 car that I owned 13 years, and got a beautiful 2015 suv with less than 20,000 miles on it. I needed to upgrade but still pine a bit for the old car and it is taking time to adjust to the new. I hadnt expected to feel like that!
Isn’t it amazing how many people are actual hoarders? I wonder why. Then there are others who lose everything in a flood or fire or hurricane and never go back to owning as much. Its all kind of fascinating.0 -
That is so much to deal with Varga. Big hugs!
Today I got down to the serious business of cleaning out stuff in the old house for our downsizing move. I started with the master bedroom and bath which are the worst rooms! (well, other than the garage...didn't someone post about their garage being in a different dimension. yeah, that is mine.). Basically, neither hubby nor I are much for housecleaning, so we'd let our private space go more than elsewhere...all the more reason why we need less stuff to throw around, right?
I have a large, old solid wood dresser and mirror set that I don't want to take with us when we move: it is too big for our new space and not the right style. However, it is in good shape, so I hope to sell it. Will be happy to get $100 for it but I imagine it is worth more than that...Anyway, it is (was) stuffed to the gills with clothes and such: so much so that I never use it: too full to even figure out what is there! So today I emptied it completely out and cleaned it up to get it ready to sale: end result: two garbage bags of stuff not worth keeping that have already been tossed, one box of clothes in good condition to donate, about a grocery bag worth of paper stuff that went into the recycling, and one small box of things I want to keep, that I boxed up and marked for the move. I was delighted to find two t-shirts with true sentimental value, that I will wear now that I can get to them, a few pics from my daughter's wedding ten years ago, and about ten dollars worth of coins in the top drawer!
Progress!
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Nice for the dresser to give you a tip!
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Divine- we do get comfortable in our familiar surroundings. Whether it's our car rolling down the highway or the four walls of our home.
Octogirl- got to feel good to get that much accomplished! Somebody's going to look up with that bedroom set.
My upstairs is always clean and organized. The downstairs is a different world 1250 square feet of sheer hell waiting on me to put out the fire!
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didn't have much time for decluttering and packing today, but I did manage to clear out two small chests with drawers: two bags of garbage, two bags of recycling, two small boxes of photos and momentos to keep. Yay!
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Every tiny bit counts. Baby steps are good.
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Wren, Poodles--I always wonder what was in someone's past experiences that made them hold on so tightly to things , even when it makes no sense.
Vergadoll--Wow, that is a lot of change and loss in a short period of time. No wonder it's hard to let go of stuff sometimes! But now you are 2 projects up, Good For You!One step at a time, a baby step if necessary, they all add up.
MrsM--I think that we sometimes do not realize that change involves loss, and that losses need to be grieved. If we aren't allowed to grieve the losses in our lives maybe that makes us hold on to things harder?
Octogirl--Progress, Indeed! Great job! And $10 worth of coins is a real bonanza! And now two more projects done, way to keep the momentum going!
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Native- I think you just nailed it for me....hanging on to all the things downstairs and in the storage building has been my grieving time. I realize now that keeping all the things will not make me any closer than I am to loved ones I've lost. All making plans to donate the valuable things to Meals on Wheels for their silent auction. Keeping a few really sentimental things.
Keep on it girls! I cleaned out the 2 storage cabinets in the carport yesterday. Sent DH out with 3 bags of trash this morning! Glad we have dumpsters at the rental properties!
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Verga--it sounds like the things you had downstairs was part of your grieving process, and having them there was necessary for a time. Now the grieving has reached a different point and having those things are no longer needed, and you are moving ahead. GOOD FOR YOU! And there is nothing wrong with holding on to a few things of sentimental value. Decluttering does not mean we have to get rid of EVERYTHING.
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Right. If you love it and it's meaningful, it's not clutter. Although there are limits on how many meaningful things you need to hold on to.
Does anyone else feel creepy getting rid of photos of people? I have a baby photo of a great niece that means nothing to me, but I feel like it's bad luck to throw it away.
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So, others may have many more photos than I do, but I will admit that photos are one item I don't toss....I have much more clutter from knick knacks, household items, clothes and books than from photos. But regardless I don't toss them. Part of this is because many friends lost almost all of their photos in a wildfire that burned almost all of my neighborhood but spared my home. I saw the anguish of losing irreplaceable items, especially photos, and remember it still, so that is one item I keep...I do enjoy looking at them, even if I keep them in a box in the closet and only pull it out once a year or so...
If there are just too many of them you do have options: first, you can put them on a disk or computer or some other form of virtual storage. Even better, ask relatives if they'd like to have any of the pictures....but if you've tried those options or they don't work for you, I wouldn't feel bad about tossing them either...
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Oh Wren - exactly. I have a ton of photos of my brother who died in 1994, including a large wall portrait when he was 4 years old. He was 10 years younger than me so I was more like an aunt than a sister for many years. He didn't marry & there are no kids. I have snap shots special to me sitting around in small frames, but that's all my son will want - if that. There is nothing to do with all these pictures but I haven't been able to bring myself to toss them.
I did go through his diaries last year. What a bittersweet endeavor. I ended up tearing out pages that had special meaning and now those are in a folder.
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I'm not one to save a lot of stuff, but I do have two Rubbermaid containers filled with miscellaneous pics. This are what remains from boxes and boxes of pictures I found prior to selling my house. The sad thing is that so many of them were meaningless. I can't tell where they were taken or who the people in them were. Some are dated and have names on the back, but they don't ring a bell with me. Why did I keep all this stuff? I don't want it and I know for sure my kids don't want it. The pics I've kept are meaningful to my family. When i die, my kids won't be going through endless boxes of crap they don't care about.
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I have a lot of photos but keep them in photo boxes, not albums. They store soo much easier that way, one box holds easily six hundred photos or more, and the boxes can be stacked and stored away. I have four or five boxes and they barely take up any room. Nice and tidy. In addition to that, last year, I went through my photo albums, had about 10 of them, and took out the photos I wanted to keep, put them in the boxes and tossed the albumns. There were two albums of photos I kept. I did go through all the photos at one time and tossed the blurry ones, ones of people I didnt know or care about, some of scenery and some bland, meaningless ones. I have a thin stack of larger photos.
As kids, my brothers and sisters and I would sometimes sit on the bed and look through all the family pictures kept in a large box. It was great fun and terrific memory. But then, at some point, my mother, who had mental illness, had one of her "spells" and burned most of the photos. When she recovered from that episode, she was very remorseful but the pictures were gone. Thats one reason I always took lots of pictures. Nowadays with digital, I save some online and print out very few.
It is hard to toss out old pictures of people from a distant past. Really, there is no harm keeping them.
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Bad memory jolt there Mrs M. We too used to look through pictures regularly & the older generation would tell stories about the people. My Mother took tons of pictures too and always wrote the date on the back of each one. However one time when she got mad that her age 20's children weren't "towing the line" and turning out like she hoped, (we chose different churches) she went through and cut her head out of most of the snapshots that showed all of us. Very discouraging. My remaining brother said he rescued all the negatives, but if that's true - he's had them in a storage warehouse for 50 years. And they were mostly from pre-1960. I don't suppose they've aged well if he even knows where they are.
Never the less - I have 5 or 6 huge moving boxes full of photos from my parent's house. Some are back to my great grandparents. I do have a cousin i can send some of the old relatives, but no one else will want my parent's wedding picture - for example.
Poodles - I don't know if it makes it easier or harder if you don't know the people in the pictures. I need to do exactly what you've done. There are so many I know my son, who is not having children to pass them on to or tell stories to, won't even do more than a cursory glance - if that.
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MinusTwo, I attribute the massive oppression of women, you know, the “June Cleavers from the 1950s" type. for the ways our mothers and others acted out. My mother in law wacked up some of her family photos, too. She cut other people heads out of some and herself out of others. I thought it was so immature of her. A disregard for posterity, a lack of understanding of the importance those photos might hold for others. Yet, maybe she did know the importance and thats why she did what she did. But women of that generation had such stringent societal norms pressed upon them. Anyway, thats how i explain their photo revenge.
The father of a woman I once worked with owned rental properties. Two of his tennants, young parents of a couple toddlers, were both sent away to prison on drug charges. No one in their family ever came to rid the apartment they rented from him of their belongings. Eventually he had to clean it out himself, and there were all kinds of baby photos of the kids as well as wedding pictures of the couple. The woman I worked with made her dad put the pictures in storage because she couldn't bear for them to be destroyed. She hoped that someone from that family would come back for them. Can't say how that ever worked out, but I understand how she felt.
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Hi Ladies, I have seen this thread title for as long as its been here, but never checked into it. Now that I am actively getting stuff sorted and moved along, I found you all again, and am very glad I did! I want to keep plunking away at streamlining our household goods, and am very interested in cheering on anyone else's success, as well. I will read back aways and see if I can catch up some.
Last week my husband and I took one hour and sanctified it to attend to a single shelf unit in our neglected garage. It was so gratifying to see how much we got done, and that since it was just an hour, we maintained good dispositions. He took stuff to ReStore shop, and I put trash out. I took a few things to Goodwill, and we had a cleared space, like magic. We both got revved for doing more. I know that other things will get in the way, so want to stay connected here for motivation. Thanks to you all for sharing
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Pictures are funny things. Hard to tell what will be of interest to a later generation, if to anyone, but doesn't seem right to destroy them either. I've got some old pics from one of my grandparents that don't mean much to me, even with dates and names on some of them, but the little historical society where they lived is interested in them. They want to try to match some to people, places and events in their records and to augment their ancestry data base. What they don't keep/use they digitize then respectfully burn the pics in conjunction with ceremonial burning of retired American flags once or twice a year. So that's where that box of pics is going later this summer. I feel ok with it cuz the pic won't be totally lost, but won't be wasting space in my home or anywhere else. And some mayeven be useful!
Good idea about storing pics in boxes, does take up a lot less room and is probably better for the pics, too!
MameMe--the time limited attack of a single area is a great tactic!
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