How Will We Get Through This Traumatizing Hoard?

Today was traumatizing. If you, or someone you know is struggling with a hoarding disorder, please get help. Although, hoarders don’t seem to know they have a problem. I am now feeling guilty seeing what I put my family through for so many years even though it wasn’t anywhere near this bad.

Believe it or not, when I got home from working on this for 7 hours today, the only thing I wanted to do was clean my dining room. It’s full of wrappers and tools from working on the bathroom. I’ve been telling myself all week that I’m just too busy to deal with it. Well, I don’t care what else is going on, it’s getting done. Tonight.

Well, back to today’s traumatizing hoard. My mom sat outside with her friend all day while they went through the bags of stuff that were on the stairs. The whole backyard was full from the stuff on the stairs. There can’t be more than maybe 10 or 12 stairs but the amount of stuff was enormous. The amount leaving the property was not. These before and after pics are bittersweet to me. I like seeing progress but I know these areas will be refilled within hours.

She really has no comprehension of how much she has in that house. Every now and then, there would be a little comment and I would think that maybe we were getting through to her, but then that was it. She wouldn’t let anything go. We did fill up one whole garbage bin with cardboard boxes and another with garbage. But that’s it. There’s one of those printer paper boxes full that’s for Goodwill. Zero dent.

We left a large pile of the stuff that she wanted to keep. She asked where are we going with all this now? Well, I’m sorry but there isn’t an inch of space anywhere in your house for it to go. So it’s outside right now. It’s not supposed to rain but we’re still worried about dew. But really, where is it supposed to go??

There’s one more thing that’s making this so traumatizing. It’s the fact that when I clear a spot, I know that all she’s thinking is “Great! I have room now to put more stuff!”. I can see it in her face.

Then we have the furnace area which is where I was working all day. I almost have 5 feet on one side of the furnace. There’s still 2 more sides to go. Thankfully, the fourth side is a wall. The second side will be fairly easy to get cleared out but the third side is going to be a struggle just from the sheer amount of things.

The area that I’m working in was full of empty boxes, Christmas things, and wood. Yes, firewood that she knew was down there but she said she has never seen!! I only got about half of it out and will be going back with one of my other kids to get the rest out tomorrow. We also found a wood burning stove that she said disappeared. We said no it didn’t disappear, it’s down there. She was shocked.

We need to talk about the Christmas trees too. At last count, we were at about 12. She was telling me how she would put one in the living room, and one in the dining room, one in her bedroom, one in the kitchen and one at work, etc. I told her that they’re all very beautiful trees but she can’t use them right now and they’re very awkward to store. I was struggling to get around them. She agreed with all that but she still wasn’t willing to let any of them go.

I’m going to end here for today so I can get back to cleaning my dining room. If you have any ideas or advice for me, please share it in the comments below.