INSATIABLE said:

i don't think you're being rough at all - it's hard to wrap your mind around these things.

i feel bad for having kvetched about people in the past... then again, we kvetch about the overly clean ones, too...

IrresistibleB1tch said:

I'm wretchedly kvetchish. Much more than the appropriate amount. And yes, them clean freaks are fair game as well.

Boy, am I an asshole. Cheers!

INSATIABLE said:

i wouldnt call my grandma a hoarder...she just likes to hold on to memories...we just said she was a "clutter clut".

my aunts are kinda like that...but just with paper...bills, magazines, newspapers...

because i've seen how stuff can collect i am the polar opposite and thats why i keep my house "minimal". folks think its cause i like the modern look...but in fact, i do it so that i dont have places to store crap.

im totally not a believer in this whole "negative" reason for our actions...i would sit there with my grandmother and she would have a reason (and story) for every lil knick nack she had kept...these were here keepsakes...

granted her house never looked anywhere near as bad as those pictures...but couldn't it just be these folks are sloopy lazy pigs?

or a drug addict...

one of my childhood friend lives in conditions like this...but he is a major tweaker. and never leaves his room.

There is more likely an untreated mental illness behind the extreme actions.
There are those that collect and have clutter but this more far reaching.










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[Edited 10/7/06 21:28pm]

i always interpreted hoarding as a manifestation of someone's fear of letting things go, or of change, or of having everything taken away. i've known someone i'd define as a hoarder - not as bad as some of the extreme examples on here, but someone who has a really extreme habit of not being able to get rid of ANYTHING, because everything they acquire has memories and EVERYTHING has sentimental value. it's weird. it's bizarre. it's certainly a control thing. but i can kinda understand it, which scares me a bit.

I hoard in a sense, but mostly its art materials and craft things, *that will come useful one day*

I KNOWWWWW

I say this on Dr. Phil (I think thats where) and I was like FLOORED! by some of these people. There was this one couple where they actually MOVED OUT of their house and into a trailer or something cuz all the husbands junk took over the house. It was AWFUL!!!!!

Seriously though. I think my mom has this. She doesn't throw ANYTHING away. Like when I was younger I would go on these cleaning sprees and throw all the junk away, cuz I HATE clutter. And my mom would FREAK OUT over it. She's a NUTT.

Anx said:

I believe that would be more of a packrat then the above described. I have gone through phases where I kept everything near to me as with the divorce I had felt erased. In time I got over it and every reciept from a foreign country ended up in the trash etc.....

sosgemini said:

naw, i think this goes well beyond sloppiness. especially some of the isolation, anger and even violence that's connected with it.

REDFEATHERS said:

well, it doesn't sound like it completely affects your life. and i didn't know you were into arts and crafts - cool!

luv4all7 said:

wow! that must have been difficult for you.

did you read some of the stories on the website?

100 cats! Yikes!!!

I'm not a hoarder at all, I give things away if I know that I will no longer use them. I can't stand having extra clutter in my house, it drives me nuts. I wonder why people do this? Is there a psychological reason? Does anybody know?

IrresistibleB1tch said:

violence? really? do share...

2the9s said:

For real?

sosgemini said:

there are several stories about that on the website. basically, they are very suspicious of people, especially family members - always accusing them of moving or throwing out things, and becoming very angry, irrational and even violent.

IrresistibleB1tch said:

ohhh..ic. thanks.

Anx said:

It's totally a control thing.

I dated a guy who would probably meet this description. He told me it was that he was a perfectionist, so if he couldn't keep his place totally orderly, he just gave up and didn't do anything with it. I think that may have been part of it, but it was more than not cleaning (which he was, undoubtedly, bad about). . . he couldn't let go of things. He kept cardboard boxes until he had a mountain of them, in case he needed them, I guess. He would NEVER get rid of clothes. . . the entire upstairs of his house was pretty much piled with them, most of which he never wore and wouldn't have fit anyway. Then there were the electronics. He could barely get his car into his (2-car) garage. Pretty bad.

At first, I was willing to chalk it up to being a messy bachelor, but then I started to get the control part. Every once in a while he would try to put that shit on me, and I would be livid, and he wouldn't get it. Like, he would get pissy if I didn't park exactly in between the lines, with even amounts of space on both sides. Why wouldn't I want to do it the right (ie. his) way?

He had so many wonderful qualities, but it didn't take long for me to find a reason to run.

HereToRockYourWorld said:

Was it control or a feeling of lack of control... It is my experience that it is the former. A lack of control drove the vehicle. They controlled what they felt they could.... For fear of that which they could not contol...the positive result which they could not contain....

OOh!!! hoarders! I was talking to my dad about this the other day, arguing about the difference between those that keep things that might come in useful and those that can't bring themselves to throw anything out.

My dad's cousin, according to my dad, is a moderate hoarder - his house(in Sweden) is still liveable, though without much space to walk around in. My dad found it fascinating - apparently his cousin also keeps a lot of stuff at his late parent's house and at his mother-in-law's place.

My friend Paula I cry when I hear the song my husband wrote called "Waiting for Love" (she sang on the demo recording of that song and I always think of her when I hear the lyrics). She was emotionally abused as a child and in her words, "discarded". Her apartment is so full of boxes and plastic bags full of stuff, that she can't get into her bedroom any more and she sleeps on the couch with a throw rug. She says she cannot bear to throw anything away.

My school friend's aunt. She says her mother goes to her sister's place when she knows she won't be there so she can throw away stuff. She does it very carefully so it isn't noticed. This one seems the worst of the lot "A Current Affair" worthy. She will throw her orange peels on the floor and just leave them there.

I am the opposite. I am planning to throw away/give away half the stuff we have lying around at our place, instead of finding this stuff comforting, clutter around me drives me nuts

Muse2NOPharaoh said:

As is often the case, you are right. I think he felt like he was successful in the parts of his life that were not that important to him (like work -- he's very respected and makes mucho $$$) and not so much in the parts of his life that he really cared about (healthy relationships, a strong sense of self-worth). Like his life, even though it is on the surface going pretty well, is completely out of his hands.

Oh, and when I broke up with him, he had no control over that, but he immediately started looking for everything he could possibly exert control over. He asked for a bunch of stuff back that he had given me or that we shared. . . anything he could possibly ask for that wouldn't seem totally out of line. Stupid shit. Just because he COULD.
[Edited 10/8/06 21:21pm]

I don't like to waste paper....i like to use both the back and front...or i'll tear the edge...bottom....corner and use it to write.

ZombieKitten said:

I get so much satisfaction out of overcoming my packrat genes (and I do think there is a difference, as noted, between being a packrat -- keeping things one might want -- and not being ABLE to get rid of stuff). I love getting rid of stuff. I've been working on it.

I'm actually thinking of starting a blog, where I get rid of something every day for a year. It would get harder as the year goes on, of course. Could be dreadfully boring, could be interesting.

HereToRockYourWorld said:

I was just on the phone to the master and he is taking 6 months off on half pay next year, and the first thing I thought of was to take a week and throw everything away! he was like what? I am really looking forwards to it, it will be like a purge.

unlucky7 said:

I understand that..

I resent the huge amount of junk mail in my box daily... so many trees destroyed for the purpose of that I won't read. People focus on the large and obvious like SUV's but ignore the simple obvious.... like junk mail and even junk phone calls.. resources made to trash.....

HereToRockYourWorld said:

Very understood!

ZombieKitten said:

Yeah, that sounds GREAT.

IrresistibleB1tch said:[quote][b] i read a piece in the paper today about hoarders - people who "collect" animals or things. fascinating stuff.





This is how my back room thats used as storage looked until today. I cleaned it out a whole lot! took 3 hours!

HereToRockYourWorld said:

starting with this room

which makes me so mad!!!