"Hoarding: Buried Alive" on TLC

I just watched an hour or more of short clips from "Hoarding: Buried Alive" on TLC. I am thankful that my problem with hoarding is not as severe as the problems illustrated in the clips, but I know that I must fight the problem now, while I have a chance for success. Life will only become more complicated as I age. I must use my remaining strength and intelligence to fight against this illness.

Setbacks...

Yesterday I was happy to have limited my weekly grocery purchases to less than $32. (I am trying to use up my remaining excess food before it goes stale.) I bought fresh herbs and vegetables, balsamic vinegar, cheese, buttermilk and a small quantity of beef.

Over the past few weeks, I had thrown out gallons of out-of-date salad dressings and condiments, so I had resolved to create small quantities of fresh dressings and marinades in the future, rather than buying prepared dressings and marinades. As one person, I just don't go through that much of the prepared stuff.

As soon as I arrived home, I started preparing a fresh salad and a pasta, meat and cheese dish. My dinner was looking good. But then it all went wrong. 

As usual, I had absentmindedly left open one of my cupboards -- the high one over my oven. I grabbed a step stool to retrieve a salad spinner from the top shelf. As I straightened up on the stool -- crack! -- my skull whacked the bottom of the open cupboard door. Oowww! Soon I was using towel after towel to soak up the blood flowing from the fresh inch-long gash on my head.

Of course, I couldn't see the gash to tell how superficial or deep it was, but I was sufficiently concerned about the injury to decide to sit down for a while.  I quickly finished heating a less-intricate version of the pasta dish and sat down to eat it. I stored the would-be salad in the fridge. 

A couple of hours later, my friends at flute choir told me that the wound was crusting over. They advised me to leave it alone. I was relieved -- it would have been a real irritation to have to go to the emergency room to get stitches. The gash hurt a little, but not a lot.

Tonight, however, I was feeling okay, so I finished making the dinner I started last night and washed my dishes from both meals. The meal tonight was good, and I enjoyed it -- although I am still picking away at the salad as I write this. The buttermilk dressing needs to marinate longer.

The taxman cometh...

I am two years behind in my tax filings. I probably don't owe much, since I haven't worked in the last two years, but I have been too distracted/immobilized by issues to get all my documents together.  My accountant is aware of my mental health issues and has been in contact with the government tax officials to notify them what is happening.

My priority assignment for several weeks -- and months -- has been to finish collecting my financial documents for my accountant. I have been working on this task for the last three years, but most of the time, I have been unable to deal with the task. Piles of mixed up papers cause me GREAT DISTRESS.  In the past, I have hired people to help me face my papers, but I didn't feel that I could do this with my current unemployment. 

Trying to sort my computer parts a couple of months ago started out as a way of avoiding going through my stacks of papers, which harbour my tax documents. Making decisions about computer parts is much easier than making decisions about paper. I have no emotional blocks in dealing with the computer parts.

I hoard information and paper

As a compulsive researcher and hoarder of information, I have way too much paper in my house at any time. Add in my problems with distraction, and both important and worthless papers are quickly scrambled together in an unfathomable mess. To sort them, I must make decisions about what to do with each piece of paper -- and I quickly get lost in the forest of detail.

Unlike some hoarders, I can recycle worthless bits of paper. I often fill my recycling bin with discarded paper. But I also often feel completely overwhelmed when sorting through and dealing with the important papers. Being a detail person, I get lost in the detail. Informational papers, personal papers, music, and financial papers all get scrambled together.

To reduce my paper use, I have tried to make electronic PDFs of many documents that I previously would have printed out. However, I have the same problem with PDFs as I do with physical items that are out of my sight: Out of sight, out of mind.

The worsening of my issues

I have felt my anxiety and depression worsening over the past two years. Two years ago,  I left a job that had become a bad fit to return to school to study digital media. I finished the course, dealt with some minor but irritating physical issues and then tried to re-enter the job market. 

I am intelligent, well-educated and have good skills, but, at 61, I don't seem to appeal to potential employers as I once did. I never expected to be unemployed at this point in my life. I am currently very worried about my financial future. That anxiety has fuelled my compulsive acquisition of books, software, courses, cameras and hardware that I hope might help me find a job. 

When will I be gotWhen will I be good enough to get a job? When will I have the right combination of assets it takes to find employment? Some would say that I should quit battering myself on these points. I feel guilt and shame that I have been unable to translate my up-to-date skills into paid employment. And to top that off, I have been busying myself with volunteer work to the point of craziness. And the volunteer work often isn't even appreciated, leading to more stress.

Crippling indecision...

In dealing with this stress, I am now having a great deal of difficulty making decisions about ANYTHING. Tom, one of the mental health professionals helping me, says that it is to be expected that my current decluttering efforts would bring up feelings of unresolved grief. After all, hoarding is often a response to grief, as I have mentioned previously.

Tom and I discussed the feelings my cleanup effort had brought to the surface. I talked about the anxiety I feel about my various commitments to myself and others. Tom listed these -- eight in total -- and asked me to prioritize them. Then he had me weight them by allocating a total of 25 points between the eight commitments. To my surprise, I assigned the bulk of the points to three of the commitments and none to the bottom three.

My top concern was collecting my tax documents for my accountant.

A plan for dealing with the financial documents

Tom suggested that we use this weighting of priorities in creating a plan of attack for getting past my current roadblock with the financial documents. Together we brainstormed about the problem and came up with this action plan:

1. Go through the remaining few unexamined piles of papers to remove all bank statements, pharmacy receipts, and hardware and software receipts. (Ignore all other papers for now.)
2. Mark deductible receipts on my bank statements and invoices.
3. Make a spreadsheet listing all of these expenses by type and year.
4. Sort the physical invoices into folders by year.
5. Deliver the information to my accountant.

I'll let you know how this plan goes.

Why I write...

Several people have asked me why I am writing this blog.

As a writer, I often write to try to figure things out for myself: Why do I do this? Can I stop doing it? Can I learn new habits? Writing forces one to reflect on one's thoughts and actions.

I also hope to explain to others, including my beloved daughter, professional organizers and mental health professionals, why there isn't a simple cure to this problem, solved by medications, lectures, threats, blackmail or, as in the television show Hoarding, massive clean outs and culls.

The problem is rooted in anxiety, depression, loss, learned behaviour, personality, genetics, compulsions and habit. The solution, like the problem, must be multi-faceted and long-term, and even then, may fail to achieve a cure. I would be happy with harm reduction -- controlling the problem to the point that I can live safely. It would be a super bonus if I could control the problem to the point of again sharing my space with others.

Stasis...

Stasis is a state of equilibrium or inactivity, created by opposing, equal forces -- or,  in pathology, a stagnation of fluids due to an obstruction.

Yesterday was difficult for me. I stayed up very late Monday night, playing Solitaire on my computer. This is a response to anxiety. I am not sure why I was so anxious, but I was supposed to be collecting my financial documents for the accountant -- a task I find stressful. However, I had just had a joyful evening with friends.

After the lack of sleep, I found myself restless and unable to concentrate yesterday. My stomach was upset, my head was hurting, etc. (I have irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), a problem caused by stress. IBS results in diarrhea or constipation. In me, it is always the former. I will never die from IBS, but it will periodically rob me of productive time and complicate my life.)

However, that was yesterday. Today is a new day. My stomach is still upset, but I have taken medication and will soldier on. I look forward to two meetings with others today -- two chances to share my humanity with friends. Most of my stress comes from isolation. I am an extrovert.

This is a starting point

A starting point is a place from which explorations and forays into the unknown are attempted, documented and mapped.

Homework for this week...

As I continue to work alone on my kitchen, I have several other homework assignments: Collect the rest of my tax documents and get them to the accountant. Ask a friend who doesn't drive if he will share grocery shopping duties with me. I will ask him to police my purchases in exchange for a ride to the grocery store.

Maintaining my focus...

I was glad to see Kathy, the visiting occupational therapist, on Friday. I wanted to show her my again-chaotic kitchen, despite my continuing efforts at cleaning. "Is something wrong with my brain?" I asked her.  She said that she felt I was just overwhelmed by the continuing overabundance of stuff. She recommended a more drastic cull. Elaine, having read my last post, said much the same thing.

Kathy could see good progress, but she could understand my concern that Elaine would feel that I was backsliding. The counters were again covered as I worked to fit everything into the cabinets.

Since Elaine's last visit, I had been trying to work my way through the bins of food and nonfood items that we had collected from the counters, sinks and floor when we first started the kitchen cleanup. To put the counter stuff away in cabinets, however, has meant having to cull through excess items INSIDE the cabinets, so that there would be room for everything. In integrating the counter stuff into the cabinets, I realized that I had recreated the chaos of before.

I had, however, taken several carloads of things away and filled several city bins for recycling, landfill and composting.

I was feeling depressed about it, fully realizing the scale of my problem again. Neither Kathy nor Elaine were surprised, however. Both told me they felt that it was the sheer quantity of excess stuff that was proving a barrier to my success. Both women urged me to pare down even more dramatically.

I'm not sure that I am ready to be a minimalist. I still have visions of having large gatherings of family or friends for dinners -- as I did in the past, before my resident family downsized from three to one.  My mother, a product of the Depression followed by a comfortable middle-class lifestyle, had a well-stocked kitchen, and I have followed her lead in stocking mine well, too.

I have warned Kathy and Elaine that I may need to downsize in stages. I don't think I can do it in one fell swoop. Meanwhile, I have been working hard to take away what excess stuff I can part with -- while not bringing in new items.

More work on the kitchen with Elaine...

Elaine came over to help in the kitchen again for about three hours. She helped me empty out another pile of expired soup and juice cartons and otherwise clear the sink. Together, we freed up some other areas.

Her instinct was to put more bins of stuff on the balcony again, to free up more space for sorting in the kitchen. I resisted, however. I had to wash everything that sat on the balcony for several days a week ago. Most had collected dust and dirt. Some items were ruined by moisture. I am still struggling to finish some of the items -- hardware that will eventually go to the basement.

The table, however, is now partially clear to use as a sorting area. I am sorting hardware and office items there, bringing them in from the dining room and living room as I find them.

The struggle and the fine balance...

Of course, I realize that Elaine's instincts to push me to do more NOW are probably completely right and necessary, but sometimes I need to slow down the pace of change to deal with the anxiety that change causes in me.

This doesn't mean that I don't appreciate Elaine's suggestions or her generous offer of help. And I may later decide to do EXACTLY as she and Kathy have suggested. However, sometimes I just need time to adjust to the change. Luckily, Elaine will be away all this week, so I will be continuing to work on this on my own for a while. I  can try to solve the challenges I face in my own way -- and have time to think about her suggestions. Can I truly do with much less stuff?

Why do I have so much hardware, tools and manuals?

Just as my mother influenced my kitchen-stocking habits, my do-it-yourself dad influenced my hardware and tool habits and thinking patterns. He was an electrical supervisor with a degree in Industrial Education. He had grown up on a farm and had learned, by necessity, to fix just about anything. But fixing things became a passion for my dad. To support his passion, he purchased SEVERAL of every possible kind of tool and manual required to do anything he wanted to do.

I have never approached his expertise with tools, but I did inherit his mindset. I have always enjoyed reading manuals and how-to books, even if I ended up hiring a professional to do the job. At least I would know about the possible challenges or problems the professional might encounter. (As a technical writer, I have written a number of "how-to" books, mostly about software manuals.)

One of my dad's most endearing traits was his determination to be absolutely fair in his gifts to my brother and me. That meant that we both got identical tool sets, lamps, vacuum cleaners, knives, tv sets, and so on as Christmas gifts. He gifted us equally. (As a younger brother, my dad felt that his father had shown preference to his older brother in purchasing clothes and shoes. He was determined not to make that mistake with the two of us.)

Daddy also encouraged both of us to take all the science and math courses we could in school -- and made sure that we had science kits and books. He had wanted to become an engineer, but he had stumbled over Differential Equations. Because he felt that I could master the higher math, he encouraged me to study engineering. When I studied English and Journalism instead, he was disappointed.

However, Daddy would have liked it that I later became a technical writer. Like my dad, I have always been passionate about technology, so the shift to technical writing was not unusual. In my late 50s, I picked up a diploma in Information Technology. If my dad had been born a few decades later, he, too, would have become a computer geek. Unfortunately, by the time that personal computers had begun to take over modern life, my dad had developed Alzheimer's.

Daddy himself wasn't a very patient teacher -- in fact, he could become quite irritated with the two of us when he coerced into helping him with one project or another. It wasn't that we weren't smart -- he was just a perfectionist. My brother and I both regret that we didn't absorb more of our dad's mechanical and electrical skills over the years. We could have found great use for those skills.

Like my father, I often purchase multiples of certain tools, partly to be prepared, and partly because I forget where a particular tool is when I need it. I am also a compulsive buyer of how-to manuals. Whether because of distraction or attention deficit, I am very absent minded and constantly lose things -- just like my dad. This isn't just an age thing. I constantly lost or misplaced things throughout my teen years.

After Elaine left this afternoon, I managed to spend several hours sorting through some of the hardware bits and pieces. I am thankful that there is now room on the kitchen table for sorting items.

Semi-scrambled computer parts

Earlier this afternoon, I managed to empty out some space in the kitchen hallway that had been used for storing kitchen items. Now I am temporarily using the space to store about a dozen containers of computer parts, on their way from my living room to eventual storage in the basement. (I had been using the open space in the middle of the living room in recent months to sort the computer parts. Again, I have way too many. I need to inventory what is there, though, before I can decide what stays and what is sent for recycling.)

I have already sorted most of these by type, but some of them have become scrambled by interruptions in my routine. Music books, office supplies, and papers have been scrambled in. Also -- alas! -- I discovered several more bins of computer parts in the basement last week. Luckily, those parts are mostly older cables and hardware that I probably should recycle. Earlier today, I dropped a dead scanner and ink cartridge off at a recycling depot.

Exploding cans of food, expanding messes...

The chaos phenomenon -- I am feeling challenged and discouraged tonight. My kitchen looks almost as bad as it did when Elaine and I first started our work a week ago. How do I swirl and churn sorted items into chaos so quickly? At least we've carted bushels of stuff out of here, but there is still so much left -- and I've scrambled it again.

As I have tried to put away the assorted stuff we had collected from the counters, table and floor, I've been pulled into other messes. As I open each of my cabinet doors, I am trying to remove excess items for recycling or move to another location. These, too, have ended up recluttering my counters and floors, if I can't immediately find a place for them.

I'm also still struggling to sort the nonkitchen items and prepare them for transport to where they belong. For example, I've started several containers of items intended for the basement -- bicycle parts, pest control items, hardware bits and pieces, tools, etc.

I took photos of my new chaos, but I am too ashamed to post them. I did show them to one of the mental health professionals who is trying to help me. I told him: My father died from Alzheimer's Disease at age 75 -- and he began showing signs of his illness when he was about my age. Could I be experiencing early signs of dementia?

The health professional promised to see about testing me for signs of early dementia. I have already passed some of the simple dementia and memory tests. Later, I tried some additional tests I found online. I seemed disgustingly normal. Does my problem with putting things away result of anxiety, chronic disorganization or some other cognitive impairment?

Exploding cans of food -- Tonight I started trying to put away some canned food we had collected from the counters -- those we had decided to keep. However, when I looked into the appropriate storage cabinet, I found a black mess: A can of tomatoes and a can of pineapple, from two different manufacturers, had both exploded. The explosion had blackened the cans' labels and sprayed black droplets onto the cabinet and shelf liner. 

Immediately, I went to my computer to search the Internet for "exploding cans of food." 

What did I learn? While an exploding can of a fruit or vegetables can be a fairly benign sign of improperly processed, transported or stored food, showing chemical activity and gas production, it can also be a sign of a more serious problem like botulism contamination. 

Fearing the latter, I went into decontamination mode and cleaned out the shelf, its contents and environs with a bleach and water mixture, protecting myself from exposure with an apron and rubber gloves. Even after bleaching, the shelf liner and the contaminated area in the cabinet remained stained with a blackish red stain. The shelf liner is still soaking in bleach water, but I have decided to dispose of the it, and I have repeatedly coated the stain on the cabinet with bleach water.

I read online that botulism can spread to humans through spore exchange in the air, but I had nothing to use in protecting myself from breathing in such spores. I don't know how long botulism spores live.  The cans' contents  had dried out inside, the fruit reduced to some dry, solid chunks. I decided to throw out all of the surrounding cans of the same items from the same manufacturer and any others that looked suspiciously swollen. I rinsed off all the other cans in the bleach water.

I sealed all of the exploded and suspicious cans inside two sets of plastic bags for landfilling. That was what the food safety sources I found on the Internet recommended.

I now smell strongly of bleach. 

Today I smell like curry mayo and rotting food...

Finishing cleanout of the fridge

I spent several hours finishing my cull of food from the fridge today, then I refilled the fridge and took my "after" photos. After adding the last of my recycling, landfill and compost items to the city bins in my garage, I rolled two of the bins out to the street for city pickup early tomorrow.

Finally, I took a bath and changed to remove the smell of curry mayo and rotting food from my skin and clothes.

How can I do better with the fridge in the future? -- I often forget what I have in the fridge and ALWAYS buy too much. The fridge becomes clogged with items. I want to try posting all the current food in the fridge on the door, so that I can check items off as I use them. That should help me keep a better idea of what food items I need to restock.

Note: The "before" photo doesn't show the detail of food spilled on the floor of the cabinet. It was a mess. Also, I purchased the milk and yogurt shown in the "after" photo after taking the "before" photo. However, there was no room for them in the fridge until after the cull.

"Before" fridge cabinet and door

"After" fridge cabinet

"After" fridge door

Sorting nonfood items on the balcony

Before the smelly, messy work with the decaying and out-of-date food, I had spent several hours sorting through nonfood items that Elaine had stored temporarily on my balcony. Before leaving my house on Sunday, she had charged me with trying to find more items for the church garage sale by Friday, the deadline for the sale. So far I haven't had a lot of lucky with this assignment.

Culling this collection was TOUGH. I have quite a collection of plasticware, some of it brand new. What do I cull? My initial thought is to cull some brands of the plasticware but keep the others. I agree that I have too many -- I had recently purchased a number of tempered glass containers to replace some of the plasticware. I have several more bins of plasticware (currently stored in my living room) that I need to look through before making up my mind.

I also had hardware and bicycle items in this collection on my balcony. These belong in the basement, not in the kitchen, but I have temporarily stored these items in my dining room, where I have been collecting some other items for the basement.

I found an old scanner in the stuff on the balcony, which I will take it to one of the local electronic recycling depots. (Sellers of electronic devices in Canada now have to offer electronic recycling services.) I also found several packages of batteries, which I have transferred into a plastic box for storage.

A lot of the things I sorted today are still not in their intended home, either in the kitchen or elsewhere. I hope that I can get them to their homes before they get churned back into the kitchen.

This stuff is now sorted, washed and back in the kitchen,  but I still need
to make decisions about what will happen to these items.

Some people churn milk, but I churn stuff

One of my worst habits is to temporarily move stuff around and then, becoming distracted and losing my focus, leave it in a new, completely inappropriate place. Quickly, everything in my home can become churned into different rooms on different floors. This is typical of many hoarders, particularly those with attention disorders. As I mentioned earlier, my doctor doesn't think I have ADD, but I am definitely absent minded. One would find a strange assortment of treasures, abandoned food and dishes, and completely worthless junk in any small  area you might pick in my house. I am not aware of doing this. (My adult daughter often scolds me for this behaviour, but it has been with me all my life.)

I often have very good focus on whatever I am currently thinking about -- but I often don't pay much attention to other things going on around me. This isn't an age thing -- my mother took me to a hearing specialist when I was a teenager, thinking that I had a hearing problem. The doctor asked me, "What is your problem?" and I replied, "My mother thinks I have a hearing problem." He tested my hearing and confirmed that it was normal. I am just really good at tuning out other activities besides those I am focusing on. People often startle me when I am working away at my computer, because I am completely focused on my current project.

Time: 8 hours, 1 person

Attacking the fridge

With the help of my friend Elaine, I finally tackled the fridge today. What a disaster! I initially told Elaine that I thought I had cleaned out the fridge as recently as last summer. Not so. The "Best Before" dates of items in the fridge told us that it was probably the summer of 2011. No, I think I did at least a mini-cleanup last summer or fall.

"Before" photo of inside of fridge

We filled several gallon-sized bags with compost material and poured several dozen bottles of salad dressings, syrups and sauces down the drain. I had purchased multiples of most common condiments. The experience was illuminating. Most bottles contain about 500 ml -- about two cups -- of liquid. As a single person living alone, this is WAY TOO MUCH for me to reasonably use before the usual best before date. Does anyone sell seasonings, sauces and dressings in smaller quantities? Do I need to just make small amounts myself instead of purchasing large bottles that I will never finish?

This is all I can write tonight. I'll pick up on this tomorrow. I smell like salad dressing after basting in it for several hours while cleaning out the fridge. I think I'll take a bath. I post the "after" photo tomorrow. I still have some stuff to go through before I can consider myself finished.

Time -- 2 people, 3 hours + 4 hours more for me

Trying not to buy...

I took another car load of excess acquisitions to a local charity today. I also needed groceries, but I came armed with a shopping list. With the list, I was able to keep my grocery purchases to $38 -- much less than I normally spend for a week's groceries. I have been eating a lot of the excess  food that Elaine and I have collected from my kitchen over the past week -- and trying to cook items in my overloaded freezer and refrigerator.

Decluttering my house is not only an exercise in recycling or otherwise disposing of excess possessions. It also means curbing my compulsion to buy items. Since I live alone with my two cats, shopping has become a pleasurable activity for being around other people. I need to find another activity that isn't so counterproductive.

'I am many things, but I am not a hoarder'

A social worker friend corrected me when I told her this week that I was a hoarder. "You are a woman of many talents. You are many things, but you are not a hoarder. You just have a hoarding problem."

I feel shame for the compulsive acquisitions and the extraordinary clutter, but she is right in that I am many things. It is hard to keep the positive in mind when the negative is choking my living space. Elaine likens it to a heart with severely clogged arteries.

Elaine offered to come over to help me today, but I had other jobs to do and was feeling tired. Decluttering and not acquiring is hard work for someone dealing with anxiety issues. I wonder at times how I will ever accomplish what I need to accomplish. At the least, I want to make my home safer, to reduce the potential harm to myself and others.

Enjoying the fruits of our labour

Home-cooked meal from newly clean stovetop

We still have a lot of work to do on my kitchen, but I am already enjoying the fruits of our labour: a clean place to cook, eat and clean, and a fairly clear path across the kitchen floor. I have been cooking, eating and cleaning in my kitchen since about Day 3 of our cleanup effort.

I still haven't tackled the decaying food in the refrigerator or the filthy floor, but I'll get to those in time. I also still have bins full of sorted excess food that needs to be eaten, disposed of or stored. I am choosing foods out of those for my meals.

The bins of sorted excess nonfood items are still on my balcony. The tarp covering them is now covered with a sheet of ice. We had an ice storm overnight.

I have other chores to complete before I can continue this journey. Elaine thinks I should post updated photos of the stove, sink, and table -- and I will. I just need to take care of some other responsibilities first.

Clean, clutter-free stovetop allows me to cook again

Note -- Friends, thank you for your comments via Facebook or email. Your input is helping me shape this blog -- and learn from it. If you see typos or other errors, let me know. Even a good writer needs a good editor, and I don't have one for this blog. I often my mistakes later and try to clean them up, but I can't wait for perfection before publishing. Perfection never comes. As a professional writer, I learned that years ago.

The poverty of life after loss

A friend reading my blog immediately saw through my masses of things to the underlying essence. She wrote: "By hoarding, you are making a physical statement about the poverty of life after loss. I am glad you have someone to help you clear it. Isn't that the point really? Having someone to share loss and joy?"

My problems with collecting and acquiring remained somewhat under control as long as I had someone here at home to share my losses and joys.

Then my parents died, my ex-husband left for another woman and my daughter left for university. My brother, my other close relative, remains too far away. (Dear, complex person that he is, my brother and I are so much alike that we often drive each other crazy.) Where is my incentive to clean up my home or control my purchases, when one is here to share my losses and joys? Any potential romantic partners are frightened away by the clutter blocking the door. I seem to be stuck here, alone, in my cluttered cave. However, to be fair, my daughter describes me as a virtual social butterfly. I delight in my friends and activities OUTSIDE my home. It is only here, at home, that I feel isolated and alone.

Trauma often tips people into hoarding behaviour

Many hoarders point to major life traumas as the beginning of their complete loss of acquisition control. The death of my mother in March 2000 was one of the first of several major traumas in my life. My brother and I had to make several extremely difficult decisions regarding her end-of-life care. She had been the moral and emotional anchor for my family. Her death left a huge void for both of us.

I brought back a van load of memories from my parents' house. My ex-husband, who is a minimalist, was floored -- and protested vehemently. I was in deep mourning, and he interpreted my vacant stares (from dealing with my grief) as lack of interest or respect for him. Within a few years, he had begun an intimate relationship with a co-worker.

His affair and eventual abdication was my second major whammy. I went into a major depression.

Unfortunately, the affair and marital breakup came at the same time as my daughter's graduation from high school and leaving for university. Suddenly the three-legged stool that I often used as a metaphor for my family was horribly off balance and broken. Kirstin was not home to share my grief over the loss of the marriage. In fact, my sudden weakness frightened her. I had been the strong one in the family, but now I was weak, almost helpless, with grief and depression.

It was a difficult time for both my daughter and me -- and probably for my ex-husband as well. (He has since married the other woman and moved out of the country.)

Acceptance of loss and move to a new home

Seven years ago, I accepted the reality of my loss of partner/lover and removed myself from the scene of the disaster. I have rebuilt my life, but I still mourn the loss of that three-legged stool of a family that meant so much to me. I felt that my heart had been torn, still beating, out of my chest. The area is healing, but at times, it is still aches.

I have worked hard to re-establish myself in this new place, which has been wonderful from the very beginning. I have many new friends, a wonderful new church and a new "normal" that is mostly pleasant. I have added many new skills to my repertoire and tried to create the "me" that I want and hope to be. But I still grieve the loss of the three-legged stool that was my treasure.

Comfort Food

Often I have purchased food, music, books, gadgets and other possessions for comfort. I have tried to purchase perceived solutions to my problems. None of these purchases, however, gave me someone to share my joys and sorrows with. They were just hollow substitutes. I know that, intellectually, but that doesn't stop my drive to acquire.

The acquisitions became compulsive -- or maybe they were always compulsive.

(I realize this post sounds very sad and negative, but I will fashion a new, more upbeat reality that represents my healing self. I am just sharing the depth of despair that prompted the worst of the problem. Luckily, I also have a good sense of humour.)

More, more, more...

Work on decluttering the kitchen and removing excess items 

Two people, 3 hours -- Elaine helped me march more boxes of stuff and bags of recycling, landfill and compost out the door this morning. Actually, Elaine did most of the marching and climbing (of stairs) while I tried to fill up boxes and bags for her. Our church rummage sale is at the end of this month, so part of today's disposals were to the church for the sale. We have strayed a bit from the kitchen, trying to clear excess books from the living room and excess linens and clothing from elsewhere.

Elaine would have liked for me to send "maybe giveaway" stuff to the church for temporary storage, but I balked. My brain seems scattered enough as it is, and I find it very stressful to have the items I haven't made up my mind about out of my sight.

Common Hoarder Traits

Out of sight, out of mind -- One typical hoarder trait is the strong need to SEE one's possessions, for fear of losing or forgetting them. I find it very difficult to store items behind closed doors. I fear that I will forget that they exist -- and I often do. I will buy the same item over and over again because I have forgotten that I already have it.

Distractibility -- Attention Deficit Disorder sometimes results in topsy-turvy piles of unrelated items. My doctor doesn't believe that I have ADD -- I would have shown signs of it as a child -- but I am easily distracted from many tasks (cleaning, picking up, chatting with others) while able to concentrate very carefully on others (writing, photography, painting, designing, working on the computer) for long periods of time.

Different ways of seeing possessions -- Specialists who work with hoarders say that their clients tend to view possessions somewhat differently than the average person. I know that I feel responsible for an item that I have purchased or acquired and feel very badly if I let it go to waste -- which I sometimes do because of absentmindedness or forgetfulness. I find it much easier to donate excess items to charity or another good home than to recycle them, and much easier to compost something than to landfill it. I feel very guilty about landfilling items.

Emotional attachments to stuff -- Specialists say that some hoarders have excess emotional attachments to stuff, but I'm not sure that I do. As with most people, it bothers me to throw away family photos or mementos, but I don't feel that I am unduly sentimental. I think my larger concern is wasting an item or otherwise not using it as intended.

Creativity -- Hoarders often think of unusual or creative uses for an item. In Myers-Briggs terminology, I have an ENFP personality -- extroverted, intuitive, feeling and perceiving. I see the world in terms of multiple possibilities and choices. Creativity helps me as a writer, photographer, designer and musician, but I am sometimes overwhelmed by the many options I perceive. In deciding what to do about my many things, I worry: Is this choice really the best, or should I consider another? Because of uncertainty, I often delay making a decision.

Anxiety and Perfectionism -- Hoarding is considered a side effect of an anxiety disorder. Depression may also be involved. Some hoarders have obsessive-compulsive traits and elements of perfectionism.

I do not have Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), a full-blown anxiety disorder, but I do have some obsessive-compulsive traits. For example, I decided several years ago, while taking a course in Microsoft Access, that I needed to create a full-blown database of my music, so that I could instantly find any book or item of sheet music I wanted from my thousands of items of music. I worked for weeks on the database, but I eventually gave up on it -- and my music is now scattered throughout the three floors of my house. Perhaps if I had attempted something simpler, instead of something elaborate, I would have completed my project. As it is, I failed in a big way.

I have also changed my mind several times about how best to store the music -- in magazine holders? in bins? in binders? in filing cabinets? The many options tripped me up. The music is now stored, in bits and pieces, in each of these storage media -- completely inconsistently. That bothers me, too, because, as an editor, I like consistency.

Not all obsessive-compulsive traits are bad, however. Technical writers and editors need to have some obsessive-compulsive traits -- and most do. I think it is those traits that make me a good writer and editor. However, these traits can be a pain in the ass in other endeavours. It is sometimes hard for me to avoid going into overdrive when a "good enough" attitude is preferable. A former boss used to tell me, "Kay, just give me 90 percent today -- I don' have time for perfection."

Sometimes I overlook the simple way to do something, seeing only the "best" way to do it.

Medication -- Medication won't cure hoarding. However, medication for anxiety and depression may help someone with an anxiety disorder to manage her anxiety responses more effectively. I have been on the minimum therapeutic dose of a common antidepressant/anti-anxiety drug for a number of years. However, with unemployment and the worsening of my clutter/hoarding problems, I recently concluded, in consultation with my doctor, that I needed to increase my dosage of the medication. With the help of both Elaine and the increased medication, I am now making progress. A week ago, I felt overwhelmed and unable to accomplish anything. Now I am moving forward!

Finding the Right Coach

The personalities of the hoarder and the person coaching her for clean up are bound to differ: What makes me good at hoarding is naturally at odds with what mades another person good at helping me cleanup and declutter. Therefore, I must recognize that there will be some necessary and normal tension with anyone who helps me clean up. However, I think there are ways to minimize conflict. And thankfully, my friend Elaine has been brilliant so far in her approach to helping me. I will try to define these traits over time. However, I will mention a few important traits.

Trust -- As I mentioned previously, a hoarder often feels a sense of responsibility for her stuff, however jumbled and excessive it may seem. The hoarder needs to feel that the coach is respectful of her possessions and will help her accomplish decluttering without doing further harm to the person's anxiety levels. If someone starts pitching my possessions indiscriminately, I feel violated and angry.

I don't feel that I am overly emotional about my things, but I am extremely anxious about some things:

• I like to get all an item's parts together before making a decision about disposition of it.
• I like to collect, sort and use small items like paper clips, nails, screws, change, buttons, and so on -- instead of just pitching them.
• I do have a sentimental attachment to family photos and letters.
• I sometimes jot down important information on paper or keep printouts of information I will need in the future and fear that I will forget. The coach needs to let me decide whether notes or printouts are ready for recycling. I am not someone who collects meaningless bits of paper.

Assertive, but not a Bulldozer -- In seeking help, I am looking for someone who can suggest a solution when I feel stuck and don't know what to do. I do not, however, want that person to make decisions for me about disposing of items. I have welcomed Elaine's thoughtful, positive and creative suggestions and plans for my kitchen -- as well as her willingness to accept my reservations about some ideas.

On my own

Progress -- At 2 a.m., I managed to get my recycling and compost bins out for city pickup. Then I went to bed and slept till about 10 a.m. I struggle to fight my natural tendency to be a night owl.

For breakfast, I ate part of an extremely stale bowl of cereal before deciding to compost it. Elaine and I have collected a huge plastic bin full of cereals over the past few days. Obviously some will need to be thrown out.

Today, working alone, I have cleaned all of the counters and the stove top and burners with soap, water and elbow grease. I have also washed tons of stuff in the sink -- now that I can access the sink! I also wiped off my small appliances and rearranged them. I hung six hooks over the sink to hold various cleaning utensils. I cleaned and sorted pots and pans storage area.

Finally, I cooked a tofu stir fry on a burner on my now clean stove. It was good and healthy -- and there is enough left over for a second meal.

I poured out a number of out-of-date protein and green supplements. I have ten jillion tea bags in every imaginable flavour, but I don't know what to do about them. Eventually, I donated the unopened packages to the local food bank.

Work in other rooms -- I have been washing clothes and linens and placing those suitable for recycling in bags for charity. I have started more boxes of books for recycling.

Mood -- This is becoming more difficult. It is easy to part with some things, but I am having trouble with others. Some are brand new items that I haven't yet used. Others were my mother's and I feel an attachment to them. I have many versions of some items -- colanders, strainers, cutting boards -- but I am having trouble getting rid of some of the extras. I think I may need to do this in stages.

Elaine sent me her dream description of my kitchen -- and a tea party with my daughter. It sounds wonderful, but I fear it is beyond my reach. I think Elaine mentioned having all of my counters clear of items. I don't think I can do that.

I wanted to clean out the refrigerator tonight, but my energy has disappeared. That job will have to wait. It is useless to mop the floor until after I have cleaned out the refrigerator.

Lost Treasure Found -- On Day 1, I found my iPhone at the bottom of a basket of dirty (or clean?) clothes. On Day 2, we found an unwashed gas royalty cheque for $400. On Day 3, we found a camera battery and memory card. I still need to find my driver's license and health card, but I think they are underneath a pile of computer parts and papers in the living room.

"Your kitchen is still appalling, but it is not quite so appalling"

Two people, 1.5 hours -- Elaine admitted today that the cleanup of my kitchen is not going as quickly as she anticipated. She had underestimated the astounding quantity of stuff cluttering my kitchen. We succeeded in clearing the stove and about half of the kitchen counters today.

Some of these things we uncovered are already packed and ready to go to charity, but others are stored in plastic bins on my balcony and on the kitchen table for further work. Essentially, we've mainly just SORTED the bits and pieces. We still need to find storage place for them -- or else dispose of them. The items in my cupboards are fairly well organized, but the cupboards are full. I must find find new homes for some of the items.

My hoarding behaviour in the kitchen concerns food, utensils, kitchen gadgets, and dishes. I have multiples of everything. Am I afraid of going without -- or just anxious to "be prepared"?

Food -- I buy entirely too much food, forget that I've purchased it, and then let it hang around too long. As a single person, I tend to avoid cooking. And when I do cook, I often refuse to eat the meal. I stock lots of canned, powdered, liquid and frozen meals. And many hang around until after their expiry dates.

Example of my excess purchases -- Elaine and I collected more than a dozen bags of cough drops in the kitchen alone. I probably have more upstairs. We collected a bushel-sized bin of cereals and almost a bushel of tea bags.

Bin of ready-to-eat foods collected from kitchen counters 

Purchases -- I purchased two packages of large bin liners for my green compost bin. I have liners, but I haven't been able to find them. Elaine wanted to know why I had bought two packages instead of just one. Years of habit and an underlying concern about getting caught without something, I suppose.

I know that I buy too much, but this is a difficult habit to break. Elaine suggested that I pair with a friend for weekly grocery shopping -- one who will see that I don't buy too much of anything. I am planning to with a friend without a car would be willing to take on that duty in exchange for a weekly ride to the grocery store.

Homework -- Elaine gave me a to-do list. She won't be back till Wednesday a.m. Thursday I will be on my own. I can't believe how lucky and blessed I am that she has been willing to help me so far.

My to-do list from Elaine

Reward for good work -- Elaine also brought me a treat this morning for brunch -- a lovely bowl of yogurt and fresh fruit. I now have space at my kitchen table to sit down and enjoy it!

Elaine's treat for me

We make slow progress on the kitchen...

Progress Report

I want to recap Elaine's and my work so far -- at least as well as I remember it:

Friday, April 5 (2 hours, 2 people) -- Elaine toured my house with me, to get an overview of the magnitude of my problem. We agreed to start work on Saturday on the kitchen, which had become a real problem during the last several weeks. (I have had a minor, but exhausting, respiratory infection that has left me coughing for weeks.) I had decaying fruit and vegetables and fruit flies.

Elaine cheerfully announced that fruit flies only live three days and predicted their quick demise once we removed the decaying fruit.

She let me know from the start that her interest in helping me clean would evaporate if I didn't commit to keeping the improvements going after she left. I appreciate her honesty. She has set a good boundary.

Truthfully, I feel amazed, thankful and ashamed by Elaine's offer of help. I feel ashamed of my inability to deal with my hoarding/clutter problem on my own. Also, knowing my past problems with consistency, I fear the possibility of failure. None the less, I appreciate her willingness to give me a chance.

I like having Elaine as a helper. She is kind, upbeat, innovative, and straight forward. She makes her difficult points about areas for improvement in a matter of fact, nonjudgmental way. She has creative ideas about how we can make the cleanup fun and effective.

We are hoping to exchange labour. Elaine says that she may call on me to give her daughter flute lessons in exchange for her assistance with my cleanup.

Saturday, April 6 (2 people, 2.5 hours) -- My friend Elaine and I took "before" photos of the kitchen and began trying to sort items and clear working space. We filled a number of recycling, compost and landfill bags, which we emptied into city bins in my garage.

We ran a load of dishes in the dishwasher and washed some dishes by hand. By the time Elaine left, the sink area of my kitchen was clear.

Afterward -- I soon refilled the sink with dishes. Guelph has hard water, and my dishwasher, in conjunction with my water softener, doesn't remove soap scum well, so I had to rinse a number of clean dishes that that came out of the dishwasher and leave them out to dry in the dish rack.

I also washed and hung two loads of clothes. This included some comforters I plan to donate to charity.

Later in the afternoon, I attended an open house at the Muslim Society of Guelph, which last year opened a mosque near my house. There I met a young non-Muslim ESL teacher who was THRILLED to take several hundred dollars worth of new, unused ESL books from me. She is planning to share the ESL booty with other teachers at St. George's ESL School.

Afterward, I delivered another four boxes of books and four bags of clothes to a local charity.

Sunday, April 7 (2 people, 3.5 hours) -- We sorted food and other items into a number of plastic bins and temporarily stored the nonfood items on my balcony. After finally clearing my kitchen table, I was able to wash it with soap and water before we moved the bins of food items back in for the night. We emptied several more bags of compost, landfill and recycling material into the city bins in my garage, and I was able to fill another couple of boxes with kitchen items for charity.

Bins of nonfood items stored on balcony

Observations -- Food hoarding is probably one of my worst issues -- I'm not really sure why. Living alone, I don't often cook -- not only because of the lack of space but also because of my reluctance to make the effort for just me. I am semi-vegetarian, so I keep lots of nuts, dried fruit and grains around. I also keep lots of fruit and milk boxes around. Crackers and dried breads seem more practical to me than fresh bread, since fresh bread often goes stale before I can finish a loaf. I would freeze it, but my two freezers are stuffed full right now.

My fridge is stuffed full of decaying food. I continually buy too much, and it decays before I get around to eating it. Sometimes I make the effort to cook but then have no enthusiasm for my home-cooked "masterpiece." (When my friends ask me for computer help, I often suggest that they "pay" me with a home-cooked meal. I savour home-cooked meals, but I have no enthusiasm for cooking one.)

That is all for tonight. Elaine will be back at 8:30 a.m. I don't know where she finds all her energy. After she left this afternoon, I was exhausted. Lying down for a quick nap, I fell into a deep snooze that lasted about four hours.

Before Photos of My Cluttered Kitchen

"Before" photo of counter under pantry area

"Before" photo of my kitchen table

"Before" photo of my kitchen sink and counter

"Before" photo of my stove

"Before" photo of counter to left of sink