Hoarders: Buried Alive

kittyinaz
kittyinaz Posts: 300 Member
edited September 26 in Chit-Chat
So I'm watching Hoarders.... these people BLOW my freaking mind. I just don't get how people want to keep everything. But I think I'm like an obsessive thrower-away-er (lol not sure what to call it).

Watching this show makes me want to run and clean my house even if it's already clean. And it makes me want to go through my garage (even though I go through it every few months) and find everything I can to donate and get rid of.

And I have a pack-rat boyfriend. It sucks. His crap is all stowed away in one closet and I told him he has to sort through it haha.

If I deem it un-needed or I'm just sick of it, I throw it out. Sometimes I find him going through our trash before it goes out because he knows I probably threw something away that was still "usable" (tupperware for instance lol).

Are you a pack-rat or are you like me and want to have as little stuff as possible??

Replies

  • DarthBubbles
    DarthBubbles Posts: 138
    I've noticed that most people on that show have gone through some sort of a traumatizing loss in their life...it's sad, but sooooo extreme.
    Anyway, I'm a lot like you, I get rid of anything and everything periodically-nothing is safe! My husband is a saver, ("Oh, I'm gonna use that"), even though I tease and call him a hoarder. I let him have the garage even though I have fantasies about cleaning it out lol
  • Dippydog
    Dippydog Posts: 154
    Too funny.....I call myself a chronic throw-a-wayer!!!!!
  • kittyinaz
    kittyinaz Posts: 300 Member
    Sweet! I'm glad I'm not alone hahaha! <3

    Yeah my boyfriend is a "saver", too. He always asks me - "What if we need this a few months down the road??!"

    I tell him -- "We'll just buy a new one" LOL
  • DarthBubbles
    DarthBubbles Posts: 138
    Sweet! I'm glad I'm not alone hahaha! <3

    Yeah my boyfriend is a "saver", too. He always asks me - "What if we need this a few months down the road??!"

    I tell him -- "We'll just buy a new one" LOL

    Maybe they are just frugal hahaha I just always have to be like "what if we don't need it? We just keep it forever in hopes that someday we'll use it??" Lol
  • missy5978
    missy5978 Posts: 19
    I personally hate holding onto a lot of things! My elderly mother lives with us and she has held onto so many things that I know she will never wear, use, etc. but a lot of it belonged to her mother, my grandmother. She passed away in 2006 and it hit us all very hard. I have pushed my mom to throw a lot of things out, but I feel very guilty because I know how hard things have been for her since my grandma died. She doesn't get much pleasure out of life, so I don't want to take away all of her things. We have a storage unit for most of it as well. :)
  • kittyinaz
    kittyinaz Posts: 300 Member
    Maybe they are just frugal hahaha I just always have to be like "what if we don't need it? We just keep it forever in hopes that someday we'll use it??" Lol

    Haha yes. Exactly.

    I have very few things that are precious to me that I'd DIE if they got thrown out. However, one thing did get lost --- my thumb drive with 6 years worth of pictures on it. I took it to school one day and I guess it fell out of my pocket :(

    And the 74 book series I read when I was a kid called the Thoroughbred series. And a few odds and ends that I'm like overly posessive about haha.
  • Elzecat
    Elzecat Posts: 2,916 Member
    I'm an "in between" kinda person but lived with a boyfriend for 4 years who was a total hoarder, although I did not know what it was called at the time. It drove me NUTS.

    Everytime I watch that show or Hoarders, I clean something :)
  • CelticDragon
    CelticDragon Posts: 66 Member
    There's a huge difference between being a pack rat and being a hoarder. My Grandmother was a horder and deeply ashamed of it. She COULDN'T part with anything, it was pschological. Even though much of what she kept was, in fact, trash. It is a disease. My roomate of 22 years is a pack rat, she will part with things, she'd just rather not if it is still usefull, we're not talking trash here, just things I feel have outlived their usefullness in our lives. I, on the other hand, am like you. I obsess over getting rid of things we don't need or use. And I too feel the need to clean after I watch such shows.

    I do, however, suffer from OCD and they say it's a short trip from what others see as "normal" OCD to that which is hoarding. They do classify hoarding as a type of OCD. I can vouch for both my Grandmother and one Aunt who began as meticulous housekeepers, with OCD in a variety of other areas and, due to some trauma in life, became hoarders.

    Sorry, I guess this is a touchy subject.
  • kittyinaz
    kittyinaz Posts: 300 Member
    I personally hate holding onto a lot of things! My elderly mother lives with us and she has held onto so many things that I know she will never wear, use, etc. but a lot of it belonged to her mother, my grandmother. She passed away in 2006 and it hit us all very hard. I have pushed my mom to throw a lot of things out, but I feel very guilty because I know how hard things have been for her since my grandma died. She doesn't get much pleasure out of life, so I don't want to take away all of her things. We have a storage unit for most of it as well. :)
    At least you have a storage unit for it :) -- keeps it out of the house for the most part! I know lots of family members that don't want to give away passed family member's old posessions.
    Everytime I watch that show or Hoarders, I clean something :)
    LOL Me too. I have been watching it all evening and if I wasn't so drained today I would totally have swept the floor LOL.
  • missy5978
    missy5978 Posts: 19
    Has anyone seen the one where they find cat skeletons in the lady's house? How do you lose your cat in your house?! That is RIDICULOUS!

    OR.. Have you seen the one with the guy who has all of the rats as pets? They invaded his home and he just let them take over. You couldn't see the carpet because there were so many!! Sick!
  • lisa35120
    lisa35120 Posts: 230 Member
    I used to keep everything! If there was just a chance I might need it later on I kept it. Now I'm almost the exact opposite. I can't keep much because I live in a tiny apartment with my husband, and we don't want to pay for storage. He hates keeping things even more than I do.
  • sarahsmom1
    sarahsmom1 Posts: 1,501 Member
    I am a saver. My son and I were cleaning out the garage and for some reason my son threw away a bicycle seat one of those big ones that dont get lost in your hinry when you ride the bike. I took it out and put it some place else he found it and threw it away, we went threw this like 5 times and he stopped and looked at me and said MOM, how many bicycle seats do you have? I said 1 and he kicked me out. It can be very hard to get rid of things, to some people they think of the items as things, and others think of them as memories. Like now I'm going threw my husbands things he passed in 2006 I can finally start with his stuff then I moved my mom in , in 2007 and she passed in 2008. My dad in 2003, my brother in 2007 so it can be hard. So don't be to hard on the savers. But most of mine is in a storage facility until I can go through stuff.
  • lisa35120
    lisa35120 Posts: 230 Member
    Has anyone seen the one where they find cat skeletons in the lady's house? How do you lose your cat in your house?! That is RIDICULOUS!

    OR.. Have you seen the one with the guy who has all of the rats as pets? They invaded his home and he just let them take over. You couldn't see the carpet because there were so many!! Sick!

    I saw the one with the cat skeletons! That was horrible. I can't imagine living like that!
  • kittyinaz
    kittyinaz Posts: 300 Member
    There's a huge difference between being a pack rat and being a hoarder. My Grandmother was a horder and deeply ashamed of it. She COULDN'T part with anything, it was pschological. Even though much of what she kept was, in fact, trash. It is a disease. My roomate of 22 years is a pack rat, she will part with things, she'd just rather not if it is still usefull, we're not talking trash here, just things I feel have outlived their usefullness in our lives. I, on the other hand, am like you. I obsess over getting rid of things we don't need or use. And I too feel the need to clean after I watch such shows.

    I do, however, suffer from OCD and they say it's a short trip from what others see as "normal" OCD to that which is hoarding. They do classify hoarding as a type of OCD. I can vouch for both my Grandmother and one Aunt who began as meticulous housekeepers, with OCD in a variety of other areas and, due to some trauma in life, became hoarders.

    Sorry, I guess this is a touchy subject.

    I'm sorry! I didn't mean to offend anyone! I lived with my aunt for 6 months and she WAS (key word) most definitely a hoarder. She's an animal hoarder as well, but unfortunatley for all the wrong reasons (she doesn't save animals, she breeds).

    But she slowly overcame her addiction to stuff (at least for the most part). Her room is still completely un-livable IMO, but her living room and kitchen have gotten much better.
  • arfdemob5
    arfdemob5 Posts: 109 Member
    I'm a throw awayer! Everytime my mother visits she dumpster dives through my trash and takes things home with her. About 5 years ago I bought a box set of movies at walmart for like $3 and it was the movies famous African American actors did before they were stars. It featured Denzel Washington, James Earl Jones and Louis Gossett Jr. There are no words to describe how crappy these movies were. My mother "rescued" this box set from the trash. To this day it is sitting on a shelf in the dining room and every Thanksgiving I spend the whole meal eating her turkey dust looking at that box set and wanting to scream! LOL LOL

    I have a friend who says that Nirvana is knowing that everything you own could fit in your car if you wanted it to...I have three kids so this is out of the question..but I long for the day!!!!
  • kittyinaz
    kittyinaz Posts: 300 Member

    I have a friend who says that Nirvana is knowing that everything you own could fit in your car if you wanted it to.
    YESSS Oh how I wish this. So much! When I was single I used to debate living out of my car if I bought a nice big van. I could shower at the gym, live off of raw produce, etc, etc. Maybe if I'm ever single again one day and don't have a child I'll do that haha!
  • elliecolorado
    elliecolorado Posts: 1,040
    I throw away everything, sometimes I wish I didn't. Especially since my ex used to keep EVERYTHING, he definitely had hoarder tendencies. His step mother (who is the closest thing to a parent he has) is definitely a hoarder, her house could compete with anyone on that show! We just broke up about 5 months ago and when he moved out I got rid of so much random stuff he kept because 'maybe we'll need it someday'!
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