I'll be the first to admit that I personally have some pack rat tendencies... but these photo's show that in some cases it gets out of control.
Thankfully, this isn't a picture of my house... but it's a house that belongs to a lady that I've been appointed the legal guardian of.
This is called Hoarding.
As a Social Worker, I see a lot of Hoarding. Hoarding results in people keeping large amounts of items that to the outside world seem excessive or worthless/useless. Hoarding is surrounded by much secrecy and shame. People become isolated and unsocialized.
The general public thinks these people are just slobs or lazy, but actually most of the time they hoard because they don't want to waste things... or they want to make the right decision about an item (to keep it or throw it away) but they can't figure out the answer. The person fills up with anxiety to the point that it becomes overwhelming to make a decision and thus they "just keep it."
And after 40 years of "just keeping it" you see homes like the one pictured above. Unfortunately, these pictures don't even come close to showing the worst of it. Many of the pictures I took are not for the faint of heart. The lady who I'm legally in charge of didn't even have a pathway to get to her bathroom. She'd been using a 5 gallon bucket in her living room as a toilet for last 2 years! She also hadn't left her home or had guests over for 15 years because of embarrassment about her living conditions.
I'm going to use these photo's as a reminder to CLEAR CRAP OUT of the house this weekend. I urge you to do the same.
3 comments:
Oh, that's so sad, is that who I think it is?? The one I did the case study on?? She's obviously not doing well.
p.s. don't forget about lunch sometime in the near future.
Mandy
This makes me feel so much better about my bedroom! How are you?? Miss you! Pam
I swear my mom is in the early stages!!
I TRIED to clean out her rooms and she would go back through the traash and pull it all out and said she need it for some reason or another...
Maybe while she's in Indiana I'll go clean..she can't take trash out while she's hundreds of miles away. But then she may have a panic attack if I do..
It's sad that things like that happen to people.
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