What'z up with these hoarders?

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I have been watching these hoarder shows on TLC... what is up with them? One of them, and I've only watched half a dozen maybe, seemed like she might be on the spectrum... Jahn. They feel like they are "collecting"... some of them say. None of them have friends, and lead actual normal lives. Mostly they are "prickly," and have pushed people out of their lives years ago. The people that get "saved" are hoarders who have family, who they havent seen for years, that come and see them, and who are shocked to see what has happened to them. The family hire people to come and clean up.

I hear it's some form of OCD and I never understood the hoarding. I would hate to live like that so why would I even let it happen? It's even worse when they have kids who are still kids.

I watched *one* documentary on animal hoarding. I still have mental scars burnt into my brain.

Last edited by Gomenasai on 12 Aug 2012, 8:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

It seems like a lot of the people started hoarding after some traumatic event in their lives. Like one guy whose wife died suddenly, and he was the one who found her dead in the house, and he started hoarding after that. And a woman who had the hoarding tendencies for most of her life, and she and her sister both hoarded a bit while they were living together in their house. Then, her sister died suddenly, and she totally lost control of the hoarding.

There is another show that shows a different side of hoarding, it was called Pack Rats. There was a guy with probably over 100,000 records.

I believe that people who hoard are acting out of response to trauma, often related to a real of perceived loss. I've seen elderly people who remember (or whose parents spoke endlessly about) the Depression of the 1930's hoard food that they refused to throw away, instead buying extra refrigerators to store even more food. I've seen people who suffered the death of a parent hoard cars until their place looks like a junkyard, believing the longer they hang on to these vehicles, the more they'll increase in value. While this may be true of an original car kept in mint condition and garaged, it is not true of cars subjected to high heat, blowing dust, cold and years of sitting in the same place without adequate protection..

When my mother contacted me after 35 years (after illegally accessing my financial records and making ambitious plans for what money I had in the bank which wasn't nearly as much as she seemed to imagine), I began to buy and collect rare, beautiful and often expensive Geological specimens that I ran out of room to display. I also went beach combing in Southern Oregon quite regularly and amassed thousands of specimens. After I moved to Arizona, I began collecting specimens of metal, turquoise, rose quartz, petrified wood and possible meteorites... the message was only slightly cryptic: "Mommy Dearest, should you manage to outlive me, I hope you enjoy many happy hours sorting through this collection and attempting to determine what is and isn't valuable. Best of luck!" This woman abandoned me without remorse and I spent about 10k on therapy and medication to ease the panic attacks that began after I hung up the phone, having spent more than $100 to call her back and talk for the better (worse) part of four hours after she'd left a 4-minute message on the answering machine. People who knew me and saw just a portion of the minerals I'd collected thought I'd gone completely off the deep end. During the first and most expensive phase, I didn't quite understand my sudden obsessive "need" to acquire minerals. Yes, many are beautiful, but I'd gone over the edge! So there's a personal example of collecting beyond the point of anything sane. In my case, OCD had nothing to do with it. Heartbreak was the root of the problem.

I've met some strange people here in Arizona that I keep my distance from due in great part to the fact they are consumers of something euphemistically termed "bathtub speed". These people will go out into the desert and collect old rusted metal cans and attempt to turn them into "art" (unsuccessfully). Same people will enter the properties of others and steal outdoor water fixtures, door knobs, license plates, tools... they then meticulously mount these objects on to a painted piece of plywood or the sides of buildings and PAINT the objects, as well. I've even seen cactus that's been painted rainbow colors (which, unfortunately, kills whatever parts have been painted). And there's never enough room for them to store all these wonderful treasures, so they pile up. Ergo... substance abuse can be an answer to "what makes someone hoard."

I don't believe there's one blanket explanation. After awhile, people don't see the chaos piling up around them. When the reality of their situation kicks in, the chaos is often overwhelming and they give up before they begin. At least I've organized my massive "collection" into boxes that are stored in a large shed and labelled ONLY with the place of origin. Maybe I'll put up certain specimens and regional collections for sale..still undecided. I need the money a helluva lot more than Mom does! She gets a Social Security check... can't help but wonder which dead ex-husband's money she's collecting.

In some ways, something like that is kind of cool.

On these hoarding shows, however, a lot of what they hoard is pure shiit. You can argue that maybe to them it has value, but they actually hoard garbage like used napkins, hamburger wrappers, styrofoam coffee cups, etc amid all their other objects.

I don't get that aspect of it. It's like it's not so much about attachment to the objects but rather a sever phobia of throwing ANYTHING out.

i am a hoarder. not so much of trash but of things that i like and things that i need.

I hoard books

You never know when you might need something, especially if you are poor. Throwing things out that you could need is a waste.

If anyone, whether a relative or some show tried to come into my home and mess with my stuff I'd tell them to gtfo.

Take it you mean this sort of thing?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOKLahJN4E0[/youtube]

A British Channel 4 documentary on the subject from last year.

(Let me know if people outside the British Isles can see this or not. If not, I'll try to upload it somewhere else if I can.)

I think it's to do with special interests. I used to be (still am), obsessed with cuddly toys, and bought 100s, but had to stop when I ran out of room(some obviously don't stop). The same goes for lots of other interests, that I've had in the past.

I have a tendency to keep things that most people won't, but I recognize that, and I force myself to give away or sell or otherwise dispose of items that I don't use enough to justify keeping them. I do have over 20 vehicles, but they are all well-kept, properly stored, and licensed and insured, and I do drive them enough to keep them in shape. If I couldn't afford to keep them under these well-kept circumstances, or if the cost became a burden, I'd immediately sell as many as necessary to keep my life balanced. So I guess I'm not a true hoarder; my understanding of a true hoarder is that they keep everything regardless of whether it might cause trouble or burden, or worse yet a danger. I will also never keep anything that I feel I am neglecting; such as any hobby project that I haven't touched in years, and which might be better of with someone else taking it on.

Charles

Ahem, I think I may be a borderline hoarder. Yes, it's true. I ''feel sorry'' for objects that could get thrown away, or I worry that I might need them so I keep them stored somewhere. It's all very well and good, but there comes a point where too much is stored, and I need a very bossy person to help me have a sort-out. My mum is nothwere near hoarder, so she's a good person to help me sort out some of my stuff.

To prove that I'm a hoarder, I have kept an old toothbrush because I ''feel sorry'' for throwing it away!

I hear that a lot of these hoarders have had traumatic experiences in life that guided them towards the way they are. It makes sense.

My 6yr old daughter has hoarding tendencies. She doesn't have a diagnosis yet - we're getting that next week. She refuses to part with anything (I mean paper, stones, shells, sticks and she still has some baby books and toys). The only way we've been able to remove items from the home is by hiding them for several months. Once we're almost certain she has forgotten about them, we then take them to the charity shop. She was distraught when we replaced the living room rug and wanted to keep a square from the old carpet too.

I am seriously concerned about the future, because I've seen a hoarder's house. It was bad, although nothing in comarison with some of those TV documentaries. The collector/hoarder in question was my father-in-law. I say he was hoarder, because he had no clue what he actually had. When he died, most of his stuff was not even suitable to be handed into charity and went striaght to the dump. It was absolute rubbish that he had no use for. He wasn't diagnosed, but I'd say that without any doubt that he had Aspergers, as well as these tendencies.