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Anyone grow up with a hoarder?
My mom isn't bad enough to be on Hoarders, I don't think. She has several formal rooms that are always clean. She cleans her bathroom weekly, but she has trouble throwing things away. When I come home to visit (not often. I haven't been home for 1 1/2 years now) I always end up going through something and getting rid of stuff, and she usually gets mad at me. (Unused fabric from the 70s, catalogs from the 90s, a stash of unread newspapers, etc.)
Anyway, if you did grow up in a messy/disorderly house, how did you learn to be a clean person? I'm so used to living in piles of papers, etc, that I don't know how to keep on top of it. I have 2 kids under 4 and a husband and a dog who sheds a LOT and we're only home 4 waking hours a day. I wouldn't think we'd have time to make much of a mess, but geez! Papers on the desk, stuff that gets put into the office so we can file it, just piles up. dog hair everywhere, toys everywhere. I had DD clean off her floor and dresser the other day and it's slowly regressing already. TIPS!
Samantha Skye - Aug 30, 2006 AND Maxwell Griffin - April 14, 2009
Re: Anyone grow up with a hoarder?
My mom isn't a hoarder, but she is a serious pack rat. There is just so. much. stuff. in my parents' house. The main rooms that people see are picked up, but the rest of the house is a mess. I make a serious effort to keep my house picked up and to not accumulate too much stuff. Don't let the stuff pile up, take care of it as soon as you're through with it. When you go through the mail, toss the junk/file important papers right away. I also go through the boxes I have stored in our basement once a year or so and have a yard sale or donate things.
If you have a problem w/ kid toys being everywhere, try getting rid of some of the stuff they no longer play with. You an even store toys in totes and rotate them out so that they think they're getting new stuff.
It also helps to have a cleaning schedule of some kind. Mine forces me to deal with each room at least once a week.
Oh, and having your family on-board helps. My husband isn't always great at picking up after himself, but likes when the house is clean. If it's not messy/cluttered, he's more likely to help keep it that way.
My parents are definitely pack rats and they just have clutter everywhere. I actually notice that I feel almost more homey when there are a few things out of place - like the house is "lived in" but I also enjoy a beautiful clean environment too. My DH grew up in a small place with clutter everywhere too - just due to lack of space.
I think because of this, we are both messy. Even though it's just us - it does not take long for there to be stuff everywhere!
I agree about throwing things out (like junk mail) as soon as you open it. We bought a shoe rack for the entry way, which helps us take off our shoes and keep them in one place (instead of all over the house where ever they come off).
A tip is to never go to bed with a dirty kitchen. We don't follow this, but I wish we did. It feels so much better to wake up in the morning to have breakfast and the kitchen is clean, not having yesterday's dinner dishes in the sink to clean up.
Also, if you spend about a half hour before bed just picking up around the house, I think you will see much of an improvement. Usually we do a quick pick up before anyone comes over and I give the apartment a scrub down every two weeks or so - usually when DH is out of town for work (keeps me busy).
We struggle with the clutter definitely, but if you clean the house once, and really make an effort to keep it that way - then it's not too bad. It's more about the little things...trying to be more conscious of putting things away when you get them out - EVEN IF you THINK you will use it again. I have started to do this, for example if I take out the ironing board and iron, but only get through half the shirts (and think oh, I can finish tomorrow) but then I still put the ironing board away. 9 times out of 10 I won't get to the ironing again until waaay past tomorrow
IN's October Siggy Challenge: Halloween Costumes
Everyday I have do decide it's going to be a good day. And while I'm thinking about how good a day it's going to be, I try and get something- anything, cleaned.
We have a large shelf or cabinet thing that has become a 'catch-all' for mail and stuff.
I finally managed to tackle it and threw away over half the junk that had accumulated there. But that was as far as I got. The good stuff is still in the "keep" piles.
I just don't know what to do with some of it.
I'm trying to find a filing cabinet I like... I'm picky, so it's taking a while
My father has always been a borderline hoarder. His house burnt down when I was young and he got in a serious accident with a head injury that exacerbated a pre-existing condition (manic-depressive) and that combination of events lead him to hold on tight to everything. He's gotten significantly better over the years, but I've known better than to try to get him to change until he's ready. Last year I graduated from college, and he wanted to have a big family party to celebrate. He hadn't had anyone in the house in years, but his excitement over me graduating inspired him to do a huge clean-up. He hired a cleaner and in the year since then, he's had someone come about once a month to do touch-ups.
I'm very sentimental with my belongings, and it doesn't help that my dad's got loads of space for storage, and lets me keep everything at his house. I guess the fact that I can keep the things I don't use at his place keeps me from storing them in my own home. I also see the conditions that he lived in, and I never want to live like that.
I would suggest hiring someone to help you set up a system that works for you. Professional organizers have the skills to help you sort through what you have and figure out how to put systems in place so you can keep your home more orderly and functioning in the future. Look up NAPO (national association of professional organizers) to find organizers in your area.
Good luck and don't let your parents' problems become your own! You are in charge of your life and you can make it anything you want it to be!
Hoarding and being a pack rat are not the same thing, IMO.
My mom was a hoarder. I don't know if she still is, because I don't get invited over anymore. However, as a kid, our house got condemned twice, so I'm pretty sure our home was just as nasty as the show. I can't stand watching the show, because I don't find this to be "entertaining" in any way. However, I am glad it's on, because I feel slightly less closeted and ashamed about the situation.
Anyway, I am not a clean person by any means, but I'm not a health hazard either. I always keep common areas clean, like the living room and kitchen. My craft room is an utter mess, but I can clean it up within a matter of hours, so it's not like anything my mom would have ever dealt with.
I think they key for me is to not own any more stuff than I can actually take care of. If my clothes don't fit, I'm going to donate them rather than saying "oh, if I lose a few pounds..." I promise that if I lose a few pounds, there will always be another shirt that will fit, so I don't need that particular one.
As far as my craft room goes, it's hard to say what will become of it. I have a degree in art, and I always toy with the idea of becoming a full time artist some day. I feel like if I get rid of some of those things, I'm getting rid of the dream. However, my career with my "day job" has evolved, and I feel less and less tied to the artwork. I still enjoy it, but it is not as much of my sense of identity like it used to be.
The emotional attachment to objects is where the problem lies.
As far as the dog hair and dust thing goes, just shove whatever "clutter" you have off to the side and just clean that stuff up.
I try not to strive for perfection, but at least strive for "presentable."
My grandmother lived with us growing up. I say she raised me because my mom was always working, so grandma was basically my SAHM. She wasn't a hoarder back then, just.... very messy. She was also a child of the great depression. So I grew up with a lot of her frugal ideas... some are good, like scraping the jar of peanut butter with a scaper. And others are not so good, like hanging onto everything for a rainy day. I did not know that not everyone didn't wash plastic baggies and tin foil to reuse until I was grown. Her room was borderline hoarder. Later when she lived alone, her whole house went hoarder. There was a path through the house and all her garage sale finds just piled up higher and higher. Then the stack of fabric in the sewing room collapsed and we couldn't get in the room.
I think the problem is that I can get everything clean, but then I think it will magically stay that way. But it won't. Because clean is a process, not a one-time event. So of course everything is regressing after a few days, because you live there. You have to keep cleaning. Every day. I do think that a minimum of 15min a day is essential.
I also have a problem when I don't have a place for everything. And I feel like that is a HUGE problem for me and definitely something I never saw from grandma when I was growing up. And even when I do think something has a home, DH will be like, "oh, you wanted to keep it there? I didn't realize that's where it belonged". I have made a little bit of progess. One thing that helps me is labelling things with their location. So I have a tape measure that is labelled "kitchen drawer" so everyone knows it doesn't belong in the garage and it makes it back to its home.
My mom was messy, stemming from a lack of organizational skills. She is amazing how how clean I keep our home. But we have a cleaning service that comes every other week. So does she, but she keeps crap everywhere whereas I strive to keep my home relatively clutter free.
No one has yet mentioned flylady.com but using her website helped me put together a system that works for me. She gives a lot tools which I adapted to suit our household.
My favorite is setting the alarm for 15 minutes and cleaning as much as fast as I can. It is amazing what gets done in 15 minutes. And I know that, if nothing else I cleaned *something* today.
My parents' house was always a disaster and I could never have friends over growing up unless there was a major house cleaning going on for a few days before that. I think living in that is what has made me very neat. I always want my house to be "guest ready" I don't know where I learned to be clean, since it wasn't at home growing up. And I don't like to clean, but I like a clean house so it gets done.
I agree w/the PP who suggested setting an alarm for cleaning. I will sometimes clean until a specific time or for a set amount of time. You begin to realize how little time some tasks take when you force yourself to do them in short intervals. For example, I hate unloading the dishwasher, but I've realized it only takes me 3 or 4 minutes to do. Knowing that doesn't make it so bad.
My mother was a hoarder as I grew up. She was a compulsive shopper and we lived among her shopping bags in an enormous house with very little living space. She has only gotten better due to her decreased resources.
I am a pack rat to an extent and DH is definitely a pack rat. However, I keep our living space clean and clutter free. I am constantly putting things away in storage. Then, about once a year, I go through the basement and pitch at least 1/3 of it. I don't care what it's worth or that it's still useful, I need to rid our home of it asap and out it goes.