Are You A Hoarder?

[Jingthing]

There is a sad but hilarious American tv show called Hoarders about mentally ill people with extremely serious hoarding problems. Typically there isn't even a clear path in their homes to walk from one point to another, and there is old rotting food on the floors of different rooms. Its fun to watch the same way car accidents are fun to watch, you know its wrong, but you can't bring yourself to look away. Many of these people are about the suffer serious consequences, eviction, arrest, a spouse walking out, etc. due to their severe hoarding behavior.

http://www.aetv.com/hoarders/index.jsp

Anyway, after seeing a few of these shows, it occurred to me that I have some symptoms of hoarding. For example,

-- papers come in which I mean to sort through "someday" but I just throw them in the same drawer and they never get sorted. Sometimes I need something from the pile, so I have to go through a bunch of junk to find it.

-- "Depression" as in economic depression food mentality. For my staple food items, I am not comfortable unless I have a backup item of that item. For example, I eat oatmeal, so there is always at least one but maybe two extra cans of oatmeal waiting, so I never run out of it. Similar behavior on many staple items.

-- Saving stuff that has perceived but useless (to you) value. I have been saving the metal cans from the tea I buy. I use about three of these for useful purposes, such as pen box or to store folding money, but the rest just sit there. I feel they are nice cans and I may find a need for them someday, but I also realize that day will never happen.

-- Sales stock up. This I think is more normal. If there is an item that I know I use all the time and I find a great sale, and it is non-perishable, I will buy a years supply of it. There are only a few items like this for me. I can see this would be a problem for people who don't have any storage space for such purchases or if you are doing this for scads of items.

So in my case I voted

Yes, moderately, but it's not a serious problem for me

Edited July 14, 2010 by Jingthing

[Travel2003]

Used to be.

Im glad I managed to stop it.

I still keep postponing the trip back to my home country to start filtering all the stuff I left behind.

Still have an apartment there, with a lot of stuff collected in my past.

[tigerfish]

im not so much a hoarder although i do hold some things close to my heart and will never ever let them go. have an extensive record, tape and c.d collection that i am slowly running out of storage room for. theres always the odd t-shirt or favorite pair of jeans that i will always keep no matter what state they are in.

one place that i have always found facinating is a little place i stay in when on the rare occasion i take a trip up north to chiang mai. its called the tapae inn, situated on the road by of the same name. i dont know how long its been there, but the guy collects all kinds of things from vintage styled motorcycles to coke cans and bottles that back date nearly fifty years. he also has numerous amounts of advertising posters and pictures, rare collectable clocks, watches and cameras. must be worth a small fortune!

that reminds me now, i must tell the good lady wife to sort through all the water, beer and whiskey bottles. must be at least 500 bahts worth of stuff we can flog on to the guy that comes around every day.

Edited July 14, 2010 by tigerfish

[IanForbes]

Depends on what you call a serious problem, but yes, I am a horder. But, the stuff I hoard is all good junk that I spent a lot of money on. I'd give it away, but that's too much like work. I'd rather give it away to someone that needs or wants it than sell it to someone who wants to make a profit at my loss.

[smokie36]

With the nomadic lifestyle I lead there's no room for hoarding anything really.....only a few items of sentimental value I treasure photos and the like.

Maybe I'm just saving up for the moment I settle down and start making up for lost time....

[joe552]

The only things I hoard are books - although I rarely read a book a second time, I can't bear to throw them away (or give to a charity shop or whatever).

[seanocasey]

The only things I hoard are books - although I rarely read a book a second time, I can't bear to throw them away (or give to a charity shop or whatever).

Don't throw your books away!!

Keep them close, close as your local library, that is.

I love my books. I try to read at least two or three a month. Sometimes that many in a week if I'm travelling allot. Paperbacks from airports, old hardbacks from used book store and new ones from Amazon. They start out as a new adventure and end up as friends.

I have, as you, faced the question of what to do with the dwindling space during a Spring cleaning a few years ago. Your local library is just the place for these treasures to find a new home. Not to far from home, in the off chance the urge comes over you to pick it up and read it again.

This approach will give others the opportunity to discover the joys of your old friends and public libraries are aways in need of good books. Uncle Sam will thank you too with an IRS tax credit on your donation.

So throw them away! Give them a new home close to home, Your local library.

[xen]

I also tend to being a horder and again , like some of the other posters, it is books, cd's ,DVDs etc.

But i also tend to keep other stuff out of sentimentality and a weird sense of perserving history. Stuff like old toys, really old magazines, old photos etc. I have a respect for history and heritage but it does tend to weigh me down. I have a huge collection of old hi fi equipment from the seventies and eighties - not enough for a museum but a good start for one.

However ,one of the advantages of going thru a divorse is that i am forced to lighten my processions and have had to throw so much out. It is just a matter of continual prunning the amount of rubbish that i have until i have enough to just pack into a few boxes. When i move to LOS, i can't afford to bring too much anyway and it will soon accumulate again .

[Jingthing]

Yeah, I hoard books also. I trade in the ones I read, but I have a collection that will be way more than I will ever read in my lifetime. Preserving history is an excuse the severe hoarders use, watch out. I think I got this neurotic hoarding mentality from my Dad who grew up in dire poverty in the depression. He was lucky to have a big house so the hoarding evidence was all in the basement while the main living area was semi-normal.

[xen]

Books can be hard to get rid of, especially my design or technical books. Also some books i could never replace like my Charles Bukowski collection., But i rationalize by telling myself that i am a collector of some taste, not a horder.