Would you do anything?

[Jaylee53]

I have been watching this show for a while now.   Very strange and very tragic behavior.
I'm just wondering if you knew some one like this what would you do.   Would you intervene and call the authorities or try to help them yourself?  Would you just keep silent.
I'm not sure what I would do.   I think we are all hoarders to some degree but most of us can toss that piece of wrapping paper or odd box that we think we might use someday.

[Jaylee53]

[LadyBug]

You know what? I don't want to watch this stuff on TV. The promos alone are more than enough!! What will the ads be for -- psychotrophic drugs, probably....

[Bob Stepp]

This a tough one. I think probably to the extent some of these folks go to one might say there is an imbalance somewhere in their minds. That being said, I am a huge believer in personal freedoms and property rights. I've always felt what I did on my own property was no one's business but mine, and I have always given the same consideration to other folks. Probably, as long as no laws are being broken or there is no danger to society, I would leave 'em alone. Everyone has an individual right to happiness in some measure no matter what others may think.

[LadyBug]

I agree, Bob. To each his own. Maybe what is insanity to us, is what keeps hoarders sane.

[Stir Young]

Heck, I am one of those people.

I love my stuff.....I hope "they" don't ever take it away from me!

[D. D. Olson]

Someday we'll be on that show. We have a whole farm full of.... stuff.

[Chez moi]

Wow. I come from a long line of string savers, but that stuff is truly extreme. Scary, even.

I am feeling more and more the need to prune down my possessions. I know that within maybe ten years I will be looking at selling this big place and moving into a smaller, more efficient, centrally located home. I can't do that with a ten-room house full of furniture, so I shall be shedding possessions as the next few years pass. The hardest things for me to shed would be some of the books, photos and art and a few special pieces of furniture. The rest has little sentimental attachment for me.

[Quinn]

Marie lived across the street from my Aunt for fifty years. She never married, had a great job working for the city and was gorgeous…beautiful face, trim body, she was so stylish and chic and classy. She had every article of clothing she had ever purchased…talk about a trip through time.
At age 84 she asked my cousin to be her Power of Attorney as she had no family. Shortly after that she was diagnosed with end stage cancer and was put into nursing care. Meg was left to take care of Marie’s property—a property that was beautiful on the outside—very well maintained. The inside? This video pales in comparison to the inside of Marie’s house. No one in the neighborhood had any idea. While she was neighborly, she never invited anyone into her home, but we always just assumed she was a somewhat private person.
Most of Marie’s money was spent on cleaning the house out and making it habitable and up to building code so that it could be sold [for a fraction of it’s worth].

The moral of the story? [ yea, yea, yea...I talk too much :-)] Marie appeared to be a happy person for all of the years that I was acquainted with her. She was not a recluse, she went out regularly to shop or meet friends or see a movie. She was in good health and her living conditions did not have an adverse effect on her, or anyone else.

[Snagg]

There is a dumpster at the front door of a house across the street from us right now, slowly being filled with detritus, "keepsakes" and god-knows-what by the family of the old lady who recently vacated the house and moved into an assisted living center. I've snuck a peek, and it ain't "heirlooms", not by any imaginable stretch of the definition - Empty "Nine Lives" cat food tins from the 70's are not, nor shall they ever be, valuable.

My dad was like that - He spent a lot of money and a lot of time with his metal detector, and it was very hard for him to admit that everything he found wasn't treasure. That half-crushed, pitted pot-metal toy car the size of a brussel sprout with the wheels torn off that he dug up at an abandoned playground - ? "Somebody might want that some day. Could be valuable."

No. No, it won't. How do you tell somebody, "You're kidding yourself"? There's such a thing as a harmless, messy hobby, and then there's neurotic, reality-denying, ravening self-delusion. When my mom is ready to let me, my brother or somebody step in and clean up the last mess he left behind, ready to let it all go, to reclaim her house from the swamp of trash in her basement and in her garage, then there's one of those dumpsters waiting to be backed up to her house, too.

[Baia]

This show and others like it motivate me to keep the stuff moving out to the garbage, recycling and clean green pickup every week and to the Goodwill drop-off as often as possible. We have lived in this house since 1973 and both my parents passed away leaving me with good furniture and boxes of stuff that siblings didn't want to claim at the time. My two adult children have stuff here, too. It would be easiest to sell the house to one of the kids and just rent my bedroom back. That is my first choice plan.
Coming from a childhood where money was tight and we were expected to take good care of our possessions until they were used beyond mending, it felt wasteful to actually throw things away. But there are so many alternatives to the land fill these days. Right now I am working on my own bedroom and closet trying to talk myself out of the notion that I will ever want to wear those clothes again. I am very close to the brink of boxing up everything, taking it to the Goodwill and then going out and buying just what I need to replace it. I am not the child cutting up cereal boxes to duct tape into my shoes because I won't get another pair until school starts in September. I can get a new pair any time I want. I just did. I just got a new pair of red Crocs for my upcoming cruise to replace the pair that has all the tread worn off.