I have a confession to make. I love reality tv self betterment shows. These are the "Hoarders" or "Intervention" type shows. I love them since I love rooting for the people and seeing them achieve their goal. I love seeing their life improve, I love that the shows actually have professionals helping, I love that they offer therapy, and I love that they are real stories. Part of the draw for me to watch "Hoarders" is I can't believe how people can live like that. I am one of those people who clean and organize things. When I feel anxious or stressed cleaning calms me, so I can't imagine living that way. Until now...

Moving into a house that is still undergoing total renovation means we have boxes piled up everywhere. We have rooms that are not actually being worked on at the moment that are packed so full of boxes you can barely open the door. Other rooms have a small path cleared out so we can maneuver around in them to get to the sofa for a place to sit. Another room is completely empty since we keep the dogs and cat in there when we are working on things. We constantly are moving things around so we can have room to work. At the end of the day it is overwhelming to sit on the couch and be surrounded by stuff. When I sit there I feel stressed, anxious, and defeated. I have no idea where to move things to be out of the way. I have no real place where I can put stuff. I can't even try to store it in the attic because I can't get to the attic since so much stuff is in the way. We can't store it outside since the weather is bad and our garage is full. So I am living like one of those hoarders on the TV show I love to watch.

I get it now. I understand how overwhelming it is. I understand now how I even will retreat to my phone or go to a friends house to block out and avoid the mess. I feel myself even slipping into depression over this which makes me so unmotivated. I really do feel like I am drowning in stuff and mine isn't even bad. I even know that I have an end in sight. I know this is temporary, but my anxiety still spikes when I look around me. I always knew hoarding was a problem tied to our emotions and a mental issue, but I didn't realize how that problem manifests into such bigger issues. I already know from packing up our old house how after a bit I got defeated by stuff and thought about just leaving it for the new owners or just tossing it in the dumpster. I didn't let myself do that though and I packed it away in one of the boxes that now loom in a corner. I am already dreading going through these boxes and making the decision on what to keep and what to donate. I know it is going to be an exhausting process. So I took tips from the show.

We just finished one of our bathrooms. It isn't the master bathroom but it will eventually be a guest/kids bathroom. However unloading the totes for our bathroom and getting things organized and put away was very helpful to my "hoard". I was able to empty two bins and now I am using those bins as a donation bin. As I move around the boxes or see an item that I know I don't use or no longer want I put it into that donation bin. My plan is by the end of the month to take those bins to Goodwill. I put an appointment on my calendar to do this and even already planned to stop by Starbucks for a small coffee treat. That way I make sure to follow through with this plan. It is a super small step but it does help me feel better. Our next project will be the kitchen pantry so I am hopeful that getting that organized will allow me to have even more boxes unpacked.

I know I am not a true hoarder. I know that I am willing to let items go. I know that I have a plan for organization and won't be overwhelmed by stuff for long. However now I truly understand how this can happen. I understand more on how mental issues can make things worse. This experience has allowed me to have more compassion and understanding. I now understand that when those people are making decisions so quickly on their hoard how exhausting and hard it is. While I still love that the tv show brings in professionals to help individuals with their hoard, I realize that just like "Rome wasn't built in a day" you can't expect problems like that to go away in a day.

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