Not quite a horder - decluttering

There is a pile on my guest room bed also and it is a big bed. I cleaned out the cedar closet today and used the vacuum all around it. I have about 15 pillows. Where they came from I have no idea. I was stockpiling them. I also have a big plastic bin in the basement all full with tags.

Do not mention clothes!!! I have size 16, 14, 12 jeans and I now wear a 10. The 16 and all but 2 pair of 14s could go.  There is something wrong with me.

Glad to see you are all working to de clutter.

I thought I would share a site that might be useful.



It is www.freecycle.org.



I regime rented for two counties in NY (l live in one and am 1 mile from the next). I look for people who want something and offer it, OR I can post things I want to get rid of and people respond to it. I created a separate email, just to deal with this website (I have way too many other emails in my regular emails)



I don't fall for "first come first serve" anymore as I feel a lot of people are just reselling and have smartphones to get alerts as to new postings so they can be first to respond. Instead I try to see if there is a story (hopefully a true one! ) and give to who I think is neediest.

I gave away an old TV, and child's bedroom furniture to a woman who had take her son back in, along with her young granddaughter, after a divorce. I felt good helping her out.



When you decide who to donate to you don't have to have them come to your door, I have left things at my lamppost or mailbox....with specific instructions to NOT knock on my door.



When I was starting to babysit for a friend I was able to acquire a crib, high chair, and other items via freecycle.



There is also an advanced search feature on there....you can search the author to see how often they ask for things....you can type in the name of something you are looking for and see if it is posted already as an offer from someone.



Just thought I would share, great site to unload (or pick up!). I need to go there to look and see if I can get a clarinet for my son.



Pat

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I really will.  I spent a lot of time with them.  But I know this is for the best for many reasons.

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Congratulations, BUNKIE10!! That is hard work, and takes alot out of you! Pat yourself on the back, and take it easy!!! 
Feeling inspired....
Mod Melissa

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Hi all!

I'm coming here for support and motivation. Am so embarrassed about my situation it's almost depressing me. Maybe if I admit it and "purge" my feelings, I'll purge my messes too. We moved to a fairly big house many years ago with the provision everyone (meaning DH, DD and DS) help out with cleaning and chores which never happened. My DH's idea of cleaning is putting things in piles, moving that pile out of sight, repeat....

When DS moved out, DD got his room, I finally got a sewing room. Yay! But it hasn't ever been used for that. It got filled with stuff. Hated all the complaining but no one doing anything. My sewing room got overrun with stuff so I just ignore it now. Then we had water damage back in fall 2011, had to get everything off the floors as entire house was re-floored and 90% had pop corn ceilings removed and walls painted (we started ceilings and floors in a couple rooms already). DH was unemployed (with drinking issues), I was working, he stuffed things in boxes, unorganized (meaning not labeled and unrelated stuff together), he never unpacked many boxes (yes, he wasn't working). I tried to get some things put away, but so tired after working, laundry, cooking, shopping, cleaning I didn't get much done. Then bc DX last fall and just don't have much energy or strength. Also, several sizes of clothes (lost lots of weight couple years ago, got back to normal, not putting on weight thanks to Anastrozole). So storing clothes because I've lost my job with mx and can't afford to replace new sizes.

I so need to get motivated to tackle the office (my hubby keeps adding instead of filing) and my sewing room. I was forced to straighten our bedroom a couple weeks ago when cable company needed to make a service call. Don't go there much, have moved to the guest room due to his snoring and complaining when I can't get settled because of TE's and implant exchange surgery pain.

My parents are also down-sizing moving from Las Vegas (250 miles away) to 35 miles from me. Guess who's been asked to helped? Not my brothers who live really far away.

I have surgery July 5th and would love to accomplish something by then.

Thanks for your help and inspiration!!

Goodness gracious 2nd Time, you have a lot on your plate!  If this were me, it would take a long time.  I'd have to have a five-year plan, and really, I'd have to put on blinders and just focus on Year 1.  Since you have seem to have a particular force of chaos working against your progress (I'm speaking of your DH, and I do apologize if I've misread that), your progress may be more modest still.  I have recently cleaned a couple of awful humiliating monster piles that were especially bothering me, and it feels fantastic.  I only did it under very specific and immediate pressure, though, in the form of a party I'd planned mainly to thank my BC helpers, but also a little bit to push myself to get cleaning done.  It worked.  I did cut corners and put some things off until later, but I got those piles tidied up.  That just meant that my years and years of photos got put in six large matching tubs instead of being in some uncountable pile of schlumpy cardboard boxes that were all different sizes, and my kids' schoolwork and artwork went up in the attic in two loosely organized mountains that I won't curate this year at all.  I call that a win.  I've been slowly circling my pile of boxes, carried around for my whole adult life, over the last many years.  Each year, always in a flurry, I make a little progress.  I say things like, "For my birthday, I just want you to make yourself available to me for a couple of hours every other Saturday," but it doesn't work.  However, "please put up those shades for me today" does work.  (I know, I should really learn how to use the cordless drill.  Baby steps!)  You may get no help at all, so maybe, as Teka said, you can just pick a couple of modestly sized things that are especially in your face and do those.  Then in a month or two, pick something else.  It's useful to look at the big picture, but sometimes it's paralyzing and you just need to look at the little picture.  There's a famous organizing book that says to tackle a big project by making it into Swiss cheese--just nibble little holes in it.  That image works pretty well for me.

It also sounds like there are other big issues--and there usually are!--including understandable resentment.  I hope you can mostly take care of your own needs for a while until this next surgery is over and healed, and then maybe look at some of the other things you're dealing with.

Have you noticed that it's always the wife that's blamed for the mess? No one ever says 'he's so messy no one could keep up'. I would love to call the New Yorker and cancel his subscription until he's read and disposed of every single one in the house. I never go into his office/study or the garage.

Wren, exactly!!!!

Bunkie, it looks as if you have a good plan and a good knowledge of what the issues are!  A storage unit sounds like a great way to get ahead of it. It would feel so great to move those bins out to the storage unit as you get done going through them!  Then you'd see the amount of stuff in the house just shrinking, shrinking, and you'd feel as if the future is closer to your grasp.  That would be a really nice thing you could do for yourself!

I've been thinking about your situation too, 2nd Time.  I don't think "lazy" is the right word with hoarding and clutter--not in your case or mine or probably most.  For instance, as a college professor, I work very, very hard during the semester, and I still have plenty to do in the summer.  I'm not a lazy person, even if there are times when I get really down on myself as if I am.  It's more about how I distribute my energies and where I have resistance to facing something, and a fear of not having things I might want or need, and hanging onto the past, and other emotional or work-process issues like that.

Bunkie, You might want to get or borrow one of those gadgets that tells you how much electricity an appliance is using. You plug it into the wall and the appliance into it and it gives you a number. My friend in Montana lost his freezer to old age and his electric bill went down so much he decided not to get a new one. Maybe you would discover one is enough.